"Loaf Pan Lasagna" with Cottage Cheese & Spinach

The one thing that I don't like about making lasagna for our small family of 3 is that half of it goes to waste. I do love leftovers but somehow they always get pushed to the back of the fridge, forgotten about until cleaning day. And that doesn't end well.
I tried a new thing yesterday - making mini lasagnas in the meat loaf pan. I am not the first person to do this but for some reason it had never occurred to me before - it's magical! Half the cooking time and one pan equals one dinner for a small family. This recipe makes two loaf pan sized lasagnas so eat one tonight and freeze the other for a rainy day.

Now I know some people have a thing against cottage cheese so you can easily substitute ricotta in this recipe if you must...

Ingredients & Prep - Makes 2 loaf pans. Each serves approx. 2 adults & 2 kids with small appetites.  Recipe adapted from the meatier version on the blog Hogwash.

• 2 cups 2% cottage cheese
• 2 large eggs
• dried basil
• dried oregano
• salt & pepper to taste
• fresh minced garlic to taste
• 3-4 cups marinara sauce
• 2 cups frozen shredded spinach, thawed (I like to use frozen spinach because once you microwave it to thaw, you can easily squeeze the excess water out and it removes that pesky task of washing, chopping, stemming, cooking the fresh stuff).
• 2 1/2 cups of mozzarella, shredded
• 1 box no bake lasagna noodles.  Try to get the flat edge lasagna noodles that are smaller than traditional noodles. I like to use the Garofalo brand. They look like the noodles in the picture below. Perfect for a loaf sized pan.

1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. Whisk the eggs to blend in a mixing bowl, and season with basil, oregano, garlic, salt and freshly ground pepper. Stir in cottage cheese, and set aside.
3. Thaw the spinach and squeeze out excess water.
4. Spread 1/4 cup of the marinara sauce on the bottom of each of two loaf pans. Add a sheet of pasta to each, followed by another 1/4 cup sauce, 2/3 cup of the spinach, and 1/4 cup shredded mozzarella. Next, add another sheet of pasta, followed by 1/2 cup of the cottage cheese mixture. (It will be slightly runny, that’s okay.) Top each with another noodle, then 1/4 cup sauce, and divide the remaining spinach between the two pans. Top each spinach layer with another 1/4 cup mozzarella, then a sheet of pasta, and divide the remaining cottage cheese mixture between the two pans. Finally, top the cottage cheese with the last of the pasta. Divide the remaining sauce over the noodles, spreading it to cover them all the way to the edges. Sprinkle each with about 1/2 cup mozzarella.
5. Cover each pan tightly with foil, and bake for 30 minutes. Remove foil, and bake another 15 minutes uncovered, until cheese is melted and beginning to brown. Remove from oven and let rest for 10 minutes before cutting and serving.
6. To freeze cooked lasagna, let cool to room temperature, then cover the top with foil, wrap in plastic, and freeze up to 2 months. Transfer to refrigerator 24 hours before baking, with foil on top, for 20 to 30 minutes at 350F, or until hot all the way through.

Stacked Caprese Salad

Hands down these are my favourite individual salads to make especially for a group of people if you are trying to be a little fancy but don't have much time! They look so nice on a dining table if plated on a white plate with a drizzle of good quality, rich olive oil.

I picked up some gorgeous vine tomatoes the other day and knew I had to make these for dinner. One thing I find harder to find is fresh mozzarella. Where I live there aren't too many specialty cheese boutiques so I make do with the fresh mozzarella at the grocery store. Still yummy but not quite the same. Keep in mind, this cheese is the soft, round cheese packed in water not the ball of firm mozzarella.


Ingredients & Prep: Serves 4

• 1 ball fresh mozzarella
• 4 vine ripened tomatoes
• bunch of fresh basil
• olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste

Wash and slice the tomatoes into equal sized pieces.  Arrange on salad plates alternating mozzarella and basil. Finish with a drizzle of olive oil. Allow guests to add salt if they prefer and offer fresh ground pepper at the table.

13 Bean Soup

I love Bob's Red Mill products and like to try as many different things in their line as I can.  I bought this soup mix thinking it was an all-in-one mix with stock/flavouring etc. but turns out it was just the beans - 13 types of beans, but still just beans (and a few lentils).

As instructed on the package, I soaked the beans overnight and for most of the next day to get them a little softer. I drained and rinsed the beans and then boiled them for 3 hours on low with 2 1/2 quarts of water and 2 chicken bouillon cubes.  Once they were quite soft I added more water to thin out the soup, tomato paste, garlic, onion, salt & pepper and the juice of 1/2 a large lemon.

Overall, the bean mix made a great starting point for this soup.  If you are looking for a way to get more fibre into your diet and/or a vegetarian source of protein, this is the way to go (but use vegetable bouillon instead!).

Ingredients: Serves 6-8

• 2 cups mixed beans
• 2 1/2 quarts water
• 2 bouillon cubes
• 1 onion, diced
• 15 oz can tomato paste
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• juice of 1/2 large lemon

Jamie Oliver's Real Mushroom Soup

I have a fascination with making soup and even though it is about 28 degrees I had to try this the other night. Fresh mushrooms from Ontario are all over the markets right now and I was able to get a couple of lbs for a great price.  What better time to make a "real" mushroom soup? My parents have just returned from the UK and made a point to stop in at one of JO's restaurants in London. I am now the proud owner of a Jamie Oliver's Italian jute (hemp?) tote bag, 4 white & blue cloth serviettes, 2 JO tea towels and a stolen appetizer menu (thanks to my Mum). In honour of Jamie and to make up for the stolen menu, I decided to try out his soup recipe!


Ingredients and Preparation: Serves 6
Recipe taken directly from Jamie Oliver's book "Jamie's Dinners".

• a small handful of dried porcini
• olive oil
• 600g (1.5 lbs) mixed fresh wild mushrooms (chanterelles, girolles, trompettes de mort, shitake, oyster), cleaned and sliced
• 2 cloves of garlic, peeled and finely sliced
• 1 red onion, peeled and finely chopped
• a knob of butter
• a handful of fresh thyme, leaves picked
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 litre chicken or vegetable stock, preferably organic
• a handful of fresh flat-leaf parsley, leaves picked and roughly chopped
• 2 tablespoons mascarpone cheese
• 1 lemon
• optional: truffle oil

Place the porcini in a small dish, add boiling water just to cover, and leave to soak. Get a large casserole-type pan nice and hot, then add a good couple of lugs of olive oil and your fresh mushrooms. Stir around very quickly for a minute, then add your garlic, onion, butter and thyme and a small amount of seasoning. After about a minute you'll probably notice moisture cooking out of the mushrooms and at this point add half of your porcini, chopped up, and the rest left whole. Strain the soaking liquid to remove any grit, and add it to the pan. Carry on cooking for about 20 minutes until most of the moisture disappears.

Season to taste, and add your stock. Bring to the boil and simmer for around 20 minutes. I usually remove half the soup from the pan and whiz it up to a purée at this point, then pour it back in, adding the parsley and mascarpone, and seasoning carefully to taste.

You can serve this soup as you like, but there are a few things to remember when finishing it off. Mix together a pinch of salt and pepper with the zest of one lemon and the juice of half of it, then spoon a little of this into the middle of the soup. When you go to eat it, stir it in and it gives a wonderful flavour. Other things you can consider are little slices of grilled crostini put into the bottom of the bowls before the soup is poured over. Or you could even quickly fry some nice-looking mushrooms – like girolles, chanterelles or oysters – and sprinkle these on top of the soup. If I was going to use truffle oil, then I would use it on its own – a few drips on the top just before serving.

What to do? I am no longer living in Suburbia.

Do I need to change the name of the blog to match my new location? I am technically no longer in the suburbs but more of a small town with one set of traffic lights.  Deep thoughts this Saturday evening.

Now that we are finally settled into the new house and almost organized in the kitchen I hope to get back to blogging some fantastic recipes this summer...made a delicious pasta tonight with asparagus, tomatoes, vidalia onion and artichokes but ate it before I had a chance to photograph it. Long day at the beach equals a hungry family.

Menu planning starts back up again tomorrow.

Fruit Smoothie with Soy Milk

It's been a couple weeks since my last post - but there have been a string of illnesses in the family and food has been the last thing on my mind! We have been living on tea and saltines trying to get over various stomach bugs.  Fingers crossed sick season is over now.

I try to drink one of these every day...I am not the best at eating a piece of fruit but if I blend it up with some vanilla soy milk it goes down so much easier.  My daughter loves these too and it is a good way to get her to eat fruit other than bananas. Frozen berries are a dream come true for me.  If I do buy fresh fruit it can generally be found weeks later looking very poorly at the back of the produce drawer.

This 3 ingredient smoothie is awesome for breakfast, as a healthy snack or dessert and takes only a couple of minutes to make with a hand mixer.


Method and Preparation: Serves 2 adults + a toddler

• 1 cup frozen mixed berries (raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, blackberries)
• 1 1/4 cups Vanilla Soy Milk (I use Natura brand)
• 1 banana

Put the fruit, soy milk and banana into a tall plastic container, take out your hand blender and whizz up until smooth!  It's that easy.


*Another smoothie option I like is Litchi juice (Ceres brand), frozen blueberries and banana.

I use a Cuisinart hand blender and it is the most used tool in the kitchen. I highly suggest buying something like this if you don't have one already.

Corn & Black Bean Chili with Cornbread

I thought it was supposed to be Spring?  The snow just keeps coming here in cold Ontario and I am so over it - dreaming of days relaxing on the patio sipping a cold bevvie.  Instead of making yet another soup for dinner (to stay warm) I decided to go with a corn and black bean chili. It is so easy to make and takes very little energy to whip this up after a day at work.  The cornbread is super easy to and takes only 20 minutes in the oven.

Ingredients & Preparation: Serves 6

• 1 large can of black beans, rinsed
• 1 large can of whole tomatoes
• 1 large onion, diced
• 2-3 tbsp olive oil
• 10-12 large white mushrooms, quartered
• 2 cups fresh or frozen corn
• Old cheddar cheese for garnish, shredded
• Cilantro for garnish, chopped
• 4-5 tbsp of chili powder or to taste
• 1 cup of tomato juice

In a large pot, add olive oil and onion. Cook until translucent and then add the mushrooms. Cook another 5 minutes and add the corn.  Cook for about 7 minutes and then add in the black beans, tomatoes, chili powder and tomato juice.  Cook on medium low heat for about 15 minutes until all the flavours are incorporated. While the chili is simmering, preheat the oven to 400F for the cornbread.

Cornbread Ingredients & Preparation: Serves 6

• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 1 cup yellow cornmeal
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1 cup whole milk 
• 1/4 cup melted butter
• 1/2 cup sugar

Preheat oven to 400F.  Combine the first 4 ingredients in a medium bowl.  Then combine the remaining ingredients in another bowl. Grease a 9"x9" baking dish (I prefer glass). Mix ingredients from both bowls together for about 15 seconds until dry ingredients are moistened but don't over mix.  Pour batter into the pan and bake immediately.  Should take about 20-22 minutes in the oven until the top is golden brown. Insert a toothpick in the centre to make sure it is done (if it is, the toothpick will come out clean). Serve with the chili, cheddar cheese and cilantro.

Weekly Meal Planning

What will you be eating this week? I'd love to get some new ideas and inspiration...

Here is what we are eating this week (or close to it):

Monday -  Corn & Black Bean Chili with Cornbread

Tuesday - Pea & Mint Soup with Lemon Cream and Gouda & Prosciutto Paninis

Wednesday - Shrimp, Olive & Artichoke Salad with Chickpeas

Thursday - Toad in the Hole 

Friday - Grilled Calamari (Greek Style) with Vegetable Kebabs

Saturday -Out for dinner

Sunday - Spinach & Ricotta Cannelloni