I studied the recipe and took the comments into account. These are by people who obviously cook more than I do, so I listened to their advice. I did not precook the lasagna noodles and chose to use basil instead of rosemary. My own personal change to the recipe. Other than these changes, I followed the recipe accordingly. I put the lasagna together at my house, but took it over to Todd's to continue baking it. He contributed to the meal with a salad that had tomatoes, cucumbers and lettuce from his garden with mushrooms and carrots from the grocery.
Most of the ingredients came from the First Alternative Natural Foods Co-op. There was confusion with the mozzarella, so I went to Fred Meyer to get some Tillamook cheese. I was proud to be using really fresh and local ingredients. Even the cheese is from Oregon. Go me.
The first thing I had to do was make the filling of onions, garlic, artichokes, spinach and tomato sauce. I don't like chopping onions. They made me cry. Why do people cook if things make them cry?
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| Onions make me cry. Jerks. |
To the onions, I added vegetable broth, spinach and the marinated artichokes. I used fresh spinach instead of the frozen. Another change to the recipe.
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| It smelled really good. |
To this I added one jar of Tomato Sauce and stopped taking pictures because I was trying to get things all prepared to make it to Todd's by 7pm. Cooking takes too much time and effort. I was all hot and sweaty. Why do people put themselves through this daily?
When I got to his house, Todd had the oven preheating to 350. I didn't add the feta until I was ready to put the lasagna in the oven. That's what I said at least. Really I just forgot until I was rushing out the door.
While to lasagna was baking, and smelling really yummy, Todd and I played Gin and Rummy. I had never played Gin before and it had been a very long time since I had played rummy. I won the first hand of Gin and accidentally cheated at rummy. Meh. It happens.
Before I could cause more problems it was time to take the lasagna out of the oven, uncover it, and stick it back in the oven for another 15 minutes. The grueling card games commenced. We also sipped on some Pinot Noir, Estancia. It was a bit sweet for my taste and I assumed it was because it was a California wine. I already broke my rule of Oregon wines only, but it was Todd's choice, so I obliged.
We took it out to cool for 10 minutes and while it was doing that, we had some delicious, fresh salad.
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| Mmmmmm Garden Fresh Salad. |
It looked decent and smelled really good once we took it out of the oven. I was still skeptical because I tend to burn toast and much of my other culinary experiments turned out kind of funny. I was excited to try it though!
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| This smelled really good too. It wasn't burnt, those dark spots are just bits of spinach. |
I don't mean to toot my own horn, but TOOT TOOT! It was pretty darn good. I might make this again someday. Right now I have some leftovers to last me for a few days and I left some with Todd. I did text him this morning to make sure he wasn't having any intestinal problems. He said he was fine.
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| I need to work on my presentation, but it tasted so very yummy. |
Now I am going to research something new to try. Cheese Enchiladas came up in a discussion.
The best part was having good company. If there is anyone (in Oregon) who wants to entertain me while I cook and taste what I have made, let me know. I'll try to not poison you. So far so good.
