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vegetables | cheat's lasagne

Serves 4 with side salad/mixed vegetables and/or bread

We had a devil of a job trying to make a really good alternative lasagne. We tried all sorts: silken tofu, coconut mixtures, blended spinach, faux cheese, yeast flake sauces...! I think this one must be version 40 something! And it's absolutely gorgeous. This is now the one I make all the time. The Secret Sauce makes it taste creamy and compensates for the lack of cheese. I often cheat and use the cans of ratatouille and it's still gorgeous.

Wheat free, dairy free, nut free, meat free version...

Method...

1. Heat the oven to 170°C.
2. Make the ratatouille or mix the cans of ratatouille with the sun dried tomato paste. Wilt the spinach in a colander. (simply rinse it, then pour boiling water over it until it wilts. Wait until it has cooled, then squeeze the excess water out with the back of a spoon or your hands. If you're using your hands, make sure it's cool enough. Hot water gets trapped in between the leaves and can give you a bit of a shock!)
3. Layer the tomato mixture with the pasta then the secret sauce, then spinach. The lasagna pasta needs to be sandwiched between 2 layers of sauce to ensure it cooks properly.
4. Repeat until ingredients used up - I usually do two layers.
5. The last layer should be a layer of secret sauce, which you can garnish with the sliced tomato and sprinkle with oregano.
6. Bake for 45-50 minutes.

Maybe serve with...

Great with salads, wheat or wheat free baguettes, or lovely green vegetables such as broccoli, asparagus, peas, courgettes etc. If you wanted to stretch it out further, you could cook potato wedges and serve with a hearty helping of vegetables.

For those able to eat dairy ...

The easiest way to accommodate everyone is to simply split the mixture and put into separate dishes, then you can sprinkle cheese on the tops of the lasagnas for those who can eat it. If everyone can eat dairy, instead of the Secret Sauce, you could put 1 pint (600ml) of milk in a pan, add 4 tsp of cornflour which has been mixed with 2 tbsp of cold water, then start to heat slowly. Add half tsp English mustard and stir through until evenly distributed. When coming to the boil and thickened, turn off the heat and stir in 1-2 cup fulls of mature cheddar cheese. Grate some more on the top before arranging the tomato slices and sprinkling the oregano.

For those able to eat wheat...

Simply add wheat lasagne pasta, either plain or verdi instead of the wheat free pasta and make exactly as above.

For those who can eat meat...

If you want to add meat, the recipe needs completely reworking, although you may wish to use the recipe for the meat part of the flat roof cottage pie.

If you have leftover spinach and/or Scarlett's secret sauce, see the multipurpose salmon. If you have leftover secret sauce, add to mushroom provençal, pepper paprikash, pork paprikash or Italian beef stew. If you have leftover lasagne pasta, see the flat roof cottage pie and cannelloni.

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