Description
What are Baked Lasagna Rolls? Lasagna sheets rolled in ricotta, mozzarella, parmesan and spinach. The lasagna rolls sit on a meat sauce made from jarred sauce. It’s topped with more meat sauce and baked with mozzarella on top. The perfect meal.
Ingredients
8 oz package of dried lasagna noodles (or approx half of a standard 16 oz package), cooked (make sure to separate right after draining the water as they will stick and it will be hard to pull apart)
1 c. mozzarella cheese for topping
Additional fresh parmesan cheese for topping
Sauce:
1 – 28 oz jar of your favorite red sauce (I used Paesana Sicilian)
1 small onion, chopped
1 very large garlic, minced
1/2 lb. ground beef
1-2 Tbsp dried basil
1-2 Tbsp dried parsley
1 tsp dried oregano
1 Tbsp sugar
Salt & Pepper
Ricotta:
24 oz. ricotta cheese (3/4 of a 2 lb container)
1 c. mozzarella cheese
1/2 c. parmesan cheese
1 garlic clove, minced
1 extra largo or jumbo egg
3/4 c. frozen spinach, thawed and water squeezed out of it
1/2 tsp. pepper
1/2 tsp. salt
2 Tbsp dried parsley or 1/8 c. fresh chopped parsley if available
Instructions
Preheated oven to 350 degrees F.
Lasagna Noodles:
Boil a very large pan of water and cook lasagna noodles according to package directions. Drain and as soon as you are able to handle, separate the noodle to cool. Noodles are pretty hot at this point so wait until you can handle safely.
Sauce:
While the noodles are cooking, make the red sauce. On medium heat, in a frying pan, saute the chopped onion in the olive oil until translucent but not completely browned.
Add the mionced garlic and cook for 30 seconds (make sure you don’t cook on too high of a light as you will burn the garlic and ruin the sauce. If this happens, throw out and recook an onion and garlic).
Add ground beef and cook until no longer pink.
Add jarred sauce or fresh sauce ingredients.
Add herbs.
Cook on low heat until you are ready to assemble lasagna rolls.
Ricotta:
Put all ingredients in a bowl and mix together with a spoon.
Assembly:
Using a cutting board or something that fits the lasagna noodles but moves easily, lay lasagna noodles out flat. Spread filling on one side. Turn 90 degrees to roll each one and place in a casserole with a little red meat sauce on the bottom. Continue filling and rolling lasagna until bottom of casserole is covered.
Top with red meat sauce, leaving some noodles showing.
Cover with aluminum foil and bake at 350 degrees F for 30 minutes.
Take off foil, cover with 1 cup of the mozzarella and bake another 15 minutes uncovered.
Serve.
Notes
In this recipe, I used bagged shredded mozzarella in the filling and fresh sliced mozzarella on the top. Only because that is what I had. I would have used all bagged shredded mozzarella because hubby doesn’t care for melted fresh mozzarella. I grated fresh parmesan, but jarred would be fine also.
I never measure when adding herbs to my red sauce, but have tried to approx amounts.
As important fresh parsley is in meatballs, it is equally important in the ricotta. Use fresh if it is available, if not, dry is a good substitution.
- Prep Time: 15 min
- Cook Time: 45 min
- Category: Main Dishes
- Cuisine: Italian