- Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
- Yield: 6-8 1x
Ingredients
- 1 pound lasagna
- 3 cups Béchamel sauce
- 16 ounces mozzarella, thinly sliced or cubed
- 3–5 zucchini (about 2 pounds)
- Olive oil, for frying
- Salt, to taste
- Ground white pepper, to taste
- Parmigiano-Reggiano, grated
For the Béchamel Sauce:
- 1/2 cup flour
- 8 ounces butter
- 3 cups of milk
- 1 teaspoon nutmeg
- Salt, to taste
- Ground white pepper, to taste
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Find OutInstructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook the lasagna until very al dente (about half of the package’s suggested time). Drain and drizzle with olive oil to keep moist.
Prepare the Zucchini:
- Wash the zucchini thoroughly in cold water. Cut lengthwise into 1/4 inch slices. In a large skillet, heat the olive oil and add the zucchini. Cook over medium heat until lightly golden. Remove from heat and rest on paper towels. Add salt and pepper to taste. (As an alternative, you can brush thee zucchini with olive oil and grill or bake them at 400 F until golden.)
Prepare the Béchamel Sauce:
- In a sauce pan over low heat, melt the butter, add the flour, and then stir in the milk gradually, with a whisk. Add the salt, pepper and nutmeg. Do not allow to get too thick.
Assemble the Lasagna:
- Spread a spoonful of Béchamel over the bottom of pan. Add the first sheet of pasta. Cover with a spoonful of Béchamel, then some zucchini, then some mozzarella. Add another layer of pasta, and repeat the layers, using a proportionate amount of Béchamel, zucchini, and mozzarella between the pasta layers. Sprinkle the top layer with grated Parmigiano, and cover with foil, then bake for 30 minutes. Remove the foil and broil until the top is golden brown. Let sit for ten minutes and serve.
Ed's Review
I've just had two more friends tell me that they've sworn off pasta for good. Bah humbug! So here's a little diet advice for all the ladies out there from Sophia Loren, via Ed Garrubbo. She's now 80 and looks great, so I'm certain that her advice (via me) is exactly what every woman wants to hear.
Sophia is famous for saying "everything you see, I owe to spaghetti." When I saw her interviewed a while back, she got to talking about pasta and said that she eats it daily. Then she put her fingers together, index to index and thumb to thumb, to form a circle the size of a reasonable Italian-sized portion. And she said, "Yes, I eat it everyday, but only this much."
So take it from Sophia (and me), enjoy the pasta, but first put your fingers together in the shape of the circle. (Just don't do it around my neck; the messenger means well. ) I promise you, at 80, you'll look just like Sophia.
Buon Appetito!
Ed Garrubbo
Dearest Eduardo,
I assure you that the only way some of us will ever come close to looking like Sophia Loren is if we take that very handy amount of pasta she indicates as a proper portion and use it as padding inside a certain undergarment. Besides, when pasta ends up tasting as good as yours does (I’m not convinced La Loren has her with Bechamel and mozzarella, btw), it is impossible to have the aforesaid portion.
Index to index, thumb to thumb. It’s more like “How wide can one’s arms extend?”
Listen, i never said that i could ever eat only a small portion of any pasta, which is why i will never vow not to eat it! consequences be damned…