by Lani Muelrath, M.A.

 

It's a recipe jammed with real food, loads of veggies, no added fats or animal products....and so delicious you won't believe it's on my get-your-skinny-on food list.

 

"Love your body" lasagna?

To qualify as a true "love your body lasagna", it would need to:

•  be delicious

•  be chock full of phyto - nutrition (that means color, plants, fiber, and all their friends)

•  be low on fat

In essence, it would have to have it all.

Look no further, here's the recipe that meets all of these requirements.   As it so happens, it was my Valentine's Dinner recipe and had my honey swooning.

Talk about a recipe that fires on all cylinders!

This lasagna recipe is tightly based on the Raise-the-Roof Sweet Potato - Vegetable Lasagna from one of my new favorite cookbooks, Rip Esselstyn's Engine 2 Diet.  I say tightly-based as I only needed to make a few minor adjustments to the recipe due to what I had on hand;  those adjustments are noted below with an asterisk*.

As a person  who usually passes on recipes with more than 5 ingredients, this was surprisingly easy to put together and made enough for multiple meals. This recipe is free of all animal products and has no added fats or oils.  And it has enough vegetables to easily top off your recommended daily veggie minimum.

Raise-the-Roof Sweet Potato - Vegetable Lasagna

    * 1 onion, chopped
    * 1 head of garlic, peeled and pressed (*I just crushed 6 cloves out of a jar)
    * 8 oz. mushrooms, sliced
    * 1 head broccoli, chopped
    * 2 carrots, chopped
    * 2 red bell peppers, seeded and chopped (*3 roasted red peppers from a jar, chopped)
    * 1 can corn, rinsed and drained  (*2 cups frozen corn)
    * 1 package firm tofu (*I only had 1 cup;  could leave this out and you  wouldn't notice)

    * 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper (*eliminated)
    * 1 tsp. oregano
    * 1 tsp. basil
    * 1 tsp rosemary
    * 2 jars pasta sauce (* 1   1/2 jars of fat-free Trader Joe's marinara sauce)
    * 2 boxes whole grain lasagna noodles (*1 box was plenty)
    * 16 oz. frozen spinach, coked and mashed (*1/2 bag fresh baby spinach)
    * 2 sweet potatoes, cooked and mashed (*yams)
    * 6 roma tomatoes, sliced thin (*didn't  have on hand, and eliminated - there was plenty of tomato with the sauce though in summer I'd put 'em on)
    * 1 cup raw cashews, ground

Steam saute (that means in a little bit of water) the onion and garlic on high heat for 3 minutes in a pan.  Add the mushrooms and the rest of the veggies, pop the lid on the pot and let them finish cooking to tender-crisp.   (* I added 3 Tablespoons of Bragg's aminos and a pinch of sea salt for flavor).  Drain the tofu and crumble it into the vegetable mixture.  Mix it all together with the spices.

Assembly

Cover the bottom of a 9 x 13 inch baking dish with a layer of sauce.  Add a layer of noodles, and cover the noodles with more sauce.  Spread the veggie mixture next.  Cover with another layer of noodles and another dressing of sauce.  Add the spinach, and cover with the mashed sweet potatoes.


You can add another layer of noodles and sauce, but I stopped here because my pan was overflowing!

I also assembled this several hours before cooking, which made it unnecessary to cook the noodles first.  By the time I got around to cooking, they had hydrated from the sauce and veggies and were perfectly done upon cooking.


Cover the lasagna with a layer of thinly sliced roma tomatoes.

Bake at 400 degrees for 45 minutes. Then sprinkle it with the ground cashews, and return to the oven for 15 minutes.  Let it sit 10 - 15 minutes before serving - if you can stand to wait!

Find the entire recipe online HERE as well....

Fit Quickies^(TM) Launched January 24!   Special Package Prices

 

 

February 18, 2010

Vol. 2, Issue 51

 

 

FitQuickies^(TM)
Targeted Body Shapers
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Lani Muelrath, M.A., specializes in helping women succeed in their w*eight and body shaping dreams by transforming their relationship with their body, eating, and exercise. Rewriting behaviors and patterns into those that are consistent with the fitness, health, mental outlook and positive energy we desire is her forte!

With over 30 years of experience as a teacher, coach, and trainer, Lani is a Guest Lecturer in Kinesiology at San Francisco State University, and is recipient of the Golden Apple Award for Excellence in Instruction. She created and starred in her own CBS TV show, and is the Healthy Living Examiner at examiner. com.She is also the Fitness Expert at the McDougall Health and Medical Center.

 

If you want to move forward your  fitness - and life - Lani's compassionate and knowledgeable approach and tools for mastery make it possible.

Lani overcame her own lifetime struggle with w*eight over 10 years ago when she lost 50 lbs, which she has maintained easily with the tools that she now teaches in her signature program, Woman's Fitness BluePrint: An Action Plan for Success.