Chicken Lasagna

This was probably one of the most delicious lasagnas I've ever made. Lucky for you, I had you all in mind while I was making it, so I made a conscious effort to remember the ingredients and the process!

Ingredients

• 1 box of lasagna noodles
• Seasonings, spices: Italian seasoning, crushed red pepper, Parmesan cheese, oregano, basil, parsley
• Mozzarella cheese
• Parmesan cheese

For the sauce:

• 1 onion, chopped
• 4 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1 can (32 oz) of crushed tomatoes
• 1 can (8 oz) of diced tomatoes (I picked Rotel, with green chilies)
• 1 can of whole, peeled tomatoes
• 1 bag of baby spinach
• 1 green, red, orange, yellow pepper
• 1 zucchini, chopped

For the chicken:

• 1 tray thing of Trader Joe's Sun-Dried Tomato & Basil Chicken Sausage
• 1 cup chicken broth

For the cheese mixture:

• 1 container of ricotta cheese
• Bread crumbs

Procedure

1. Put the ricotta cheese into a bowl and mix it with ½ cup of bread crumbs, salt and pepper (to taste), Italian seasoning, crushed red pepper, Parmesan cheese, and parsley.

   

2. Next, start cooking the chicken.
   1. This is the slightly troublesome part. You have to take the casing off of the sausage because we just want ground chicken.
   2. First, heat up some olive oil in a skillet.
   3. Then while that heats up, let's uncase the chicken. The best way I found to do this was to take a sharp knife and halfway-slice the sausage down the middle. (Don't cut it in half, the knife should only visibly cut through the casing.) Then you have to get your hands a bit dirty and essentially take the casing off of the ground chicken and let the chicken just fall into the pan. Do this for all five sausages, stirring the pan occasionally and breaking the chicken into smaller pieces.
   4. I added some crushed red pepper and chili powder just to add a little kick.
   5. Add the 1 cup of chicken broth.
   6. Add about half of the can of whole tomatoes you had to the skillet. When the tomatoes are in the skillet, break them into smaller pieces and stir in with the chicken.

      

   7. Now put it on medium-low heat and let it cook uncovered for about 15 minutes, or until the liquid has all evaporated.
3. Now let's get saucy:
   1. Heat up some olive oil in a pot.
   2. Add the chopped onion and minced garlic and stir around until the onion gets semi-transparent.
   3. Chop up the baby spinach and add that in first.
   4. Once that's wilted, add in the diced zucchini and peppers. I had a lotttt of peppers, so I just used half of each and froze the other half sliced up and ready for another day.
   5. After about 5 minutes of stirring around and cooking, add your can of crushed tomatoes, the rest of the whole tomatoes (smash them in the pot again), the diced tomatoes.
   6. Add a tbsp. of brown sugar to the sauce and mix it in.
   7. Season with a whole lot of Italian seasoning, oregano, basil, parsley, parmesan cheese, salt, pepper, crushed red pepper.
   8. Sometimes if I have a leftover jar of marinara sauce, I go ahead and put some of that in.
   9. I usually top it off with a handful and a half of the mozzarella cheese, and stir it in to make it deliciously cheesy.
4. Preheat your oven to 425 F.
5. I bought the no bake lasagna noodles…that supposedly cooks in the oven by getting boiled by the water in the sauce. However, I was super hesitant and since it was for a dinner party, I figured I'd be on the safe side and just cooked them al dente before layering.
6. And now for the part that makes lasagna lasagna: the layering.
   1. Start with a really thin layer of sauce at the bottom.
   2. Add a layer of noodles
   3. Spread a thin-ish layer of the ricotta cheese mixture on top of the noodles.
   4. Add a good layer of the sauce.
   5. Put a layer of cheese (I mixed my bag of mozzarella and parmesan together and sprinkled that everywhere.)
   6. Add a layer of chicken
   7. Repeat.

      

7. The top-most layer should be noodles, then bread crumbs, then mozzarella cheese.
8. Once you're done layering, cover in foil and bake for 30 minutes.
9. Then take out and serve with garlic bread or eat it just by itself!