Lasagna

You gotta love Italian food. My grandmother-in-law bought us a beautiful dish and our chard was growing nicely in the garden so I decided to make a hearty lasagna.

1-2 pounds of no-bake lasgna noodles(varies depending on size of dish and amount of marinara used)
Extra virgin olive oil
1 1/2 lbs. spicy Italian sausage
1/2 lb. ground beef (optional)
1 large red onion finely chopped
8 stalks of rainbow or Swiss chard
2 cloves of garlic chopped
1/4 cup fresh basil leaves finely chopped
1 tablespoon fresh oregano finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 tiny pinch of nutmeg
1 cup of red wine
1 1/2 quarts (approx 32-48 oz.) marinara(varies depending on size of dish and amount of noodles used)
1 1/2 quarts of ricotta cheese
2 eggs
1/2 cup of parmesean
1 lb. mozzarella shredded
1 lb. buffalo mozzarella sliced

I started with chopping the 8 stalks of rainbow chard first removing the stems from the leaves. Be sure to thoroughly wash the chard if you are taking it from your garden or you may end up killing earwigs on your kitchen counter-top (hint: you can't see the eariwgs in the photo below).

Cook chard stems, chopped red onion, salt and pepper in a large skillet, bringing all ingredients to a nice caramelized state.

Once caramelized place the sausage and beef in the skillet and cook meat thoroughly mixing together all ingredients well. Do not clean the skillet because it will be used later.

Transfer these ingredients into a 3 qt or larger pot. Pour the marinara sauce into the same pot and bring all ingredients to a simmer. I usually pour a little bit of wine that is going to be served with dinner right about this time and let it blend into the meat sauce. Simmer meat sauce for 25 minutes or more letting flavors blend together. During the last 5 minutes of simmering, place the fresh basil and oregano and blend together.

Place the chard leaves in the skillet used to cook chard stems and onions and saute in a little olive oil for about 10 minutes or just until tender. Transfer to a plate and allow to cool.


Place the ricotta cheese, eggs, parmasean, nutmeg, and chard leaves in a large bowl folding together nicely. Let the mixture set for a couple of minutes.

Coat the bottom of a large baking dish 13x9 or a dish that similar in size that is at least 2 1/2- 3 inches in depth with a layer of meat sauce. I have a dish that is perfect for baking lasagna that my grandmother gave to me last Christmas.

Place one noodle against each of the short ends of the pan and two one each side of the longer ends forming a collar to keep the lasagna from sliding around.

Cover entire bottom of pan with noodles and then spread ricotta mixture over noodles. Place more noodles on top of ricotta mixture and pour meat sauce over noodles. Add a light coat of shredded mozzarella over meat sauce. Continue this alternating pattern of layers ending with meat sauce at the very top dish. Place sliced buffalo mozzarella on the very last layer of meat sauce and bake in the oven at 350 degrees F. Cover lasagna with aluminum foil making sure that foil doesn't touch cheese.