Homemade Lasagna + More!

It’s Secret Recipe Club reveal day, and this month I feel honored to have been given one of the co-hosts blogs. Exciting!

My blog assignment this month was Tina’s from Mom’s Crazy Cooking

And let me just tell you, she did not disappoint! Mom’s Crazy Cooking is full of fantastic recipes, beautiful photography and sweet stories, many that accompany the food and recipes.

I had the hardest time picking just one thing to make. There were so many delicious, mouth watering recipes and so mini chef and & sat down and browsed the blog. It took us over two hours to decide. But when we were done, we had a whole meal!
Yep, that’s right – I made a WHOLE meal off Tina’s blog. All recipes and photos below:

Let’s get started with the delicious main course: Homemade Lasagna. We chose this for several reasons. One, her recipe called for lots of cheese, and well – we looooove cheese. And we had spinach that we wanted to use up. We aren’t huge fans of meat in our lasagna so we substituted with the spinach instead and we also added cottage cheese. Other than that, the recipe is pretty much the same.

Homemade Lasagna

2 Boxes of Lasagna Noodles
Homemade Spaghetti Sauce (but a jar would work just fine!)
Lots & Lots of Cheese (yellow & white)
1 small pkg. frozen spinach
2 cups cottage cheese
Parmesan Cheese

The noodles need to be boiled first. I agree with Tina, putting them in the casserole without cooking them, simply doesn’t work out that well.
Boil them.

Then just begin to layer them.

Next, in a bowl, mix together the spinach, trying to remove as much moisture as possible, mix in the cottage cheese and sprinkle some Italian seasonings in. Mix this whole thing together and put it on top of the noodles.

Next top with a layer of sauce. Sprinkle the shredded cheese on top of that.

Do all four things again – Noodles, Cottage Cheese Mix,  Sauce, and Cheese.

Continue this over and over until you have it as big as you want it. I didn’t use a super thick casserole pan, so I had enough ingredients to make two casseroles and I threw one in the freezer for later.

Preheat oven to 350 and cover with foil. Cook at 350 for about 45 minutes to 1 hour, depending on oven. (Last 15 minutes take the foil off)

Tina, this was honestly the BEST Lasagna I have ever eaten. My kids all raved, my husband raved – I don’t know what made it so different, but it was SO good. I am looking forward to thawing the other Lasagna next week on a school night for dinner.

But wait – there’s more.

While the Lasagna was cooking, two children made these:

Poor Man’s Garlic Bread - Any leftover bread you have (we used hamburger buns for this one, but we also use hot dogs and whatever we have. You spread with butter, sprinkle some garlic salt or garlic powder on each one, add some Italian seasoning. We topped with mozzarella cheese to make it cheesier. Broil for 2-3 minutes. So good!

And we ended the evening with Chocolate Camping Cake, which Tina said her hubby loves for his birthday and we can see why! Very delicious. I normally make all my cakes from scratch, but this one was super quick with the boxed mix, and I had some so I used it.

Chocolate Camping Cake

1 box Deviled Food Chocolate Cake Mix
1 box of Jello COOK & SERVE Pudding (can NOT be instant; either size box is fine, I use big box)
Chocolate Chips
Walnuts (or favorite nuts)

Make the pudding according to the directions on the box.

Then add the dry cake mix to the cooked pudding and mix well. Don’t add anything else. Nope not another thing. Nothing else.

Pour it into a greased 9×13 pan, sprinkle with chocolate chips and nuts (about 1/2 a bag, more if you’d like).

Bake. (approx. 30-35 minutes; I usually follow the cooking directions on the back of the cake box) 

Cut & Serve! The cake was delicious and they ate the whole thing in one night! Thank you so much Tina, for so many great new recipes!!