I have shed blood in the performance of my Food for Thought duties. After foolishly attempting to use a mandoline cutter without its safety pusher, I whacked a quarter-inch divot from my finger. And this right after I'd mopped the Food for Thought test kitchen floor. As I told food commentator Nancy Leson, "It looked like there'd been a sword fight in there."
Ironically, this carnage happened in pursuit of vegetarian lasagna.
Both Nance and I tried different recipes for vegetarian lasagna this past weekend. They were both weekend recipes, requiring hours of slicing, dicing and other prep.
I used a recipe from Deb Perelman's Smitten Kitchen blog. Even she puts quotes around "lasagna" as it's really just a potato, cabbage and mushroom casserole. It was good, though a bit soggy. My only tweak was adding some ground dried shiitake to the vegetable mix for boosted 'shroomocity.
Nancy made the Cook's Illustrated vegetable lasagna. That method taught her to use a microwave to prep eggplant. Nance has found the no-boil lasagna unsatisfasctory in the past. This time around she got better results. She later learned that you can use regular dried lasagna noodles as no-boil if you just let them soak in hot water for five or 10 minutes before using, making sure they're in plenty of sauce. Here's more on the no-boils.
Both of these lasagne are hearty stuff, though mine was more on the heavy than hearty side. But it's still good for cold, wet winter days.
"I am not a vegetarian because I love animals. I'm a vegetarian because I hate plants." – A. Whitney Brown
