<\/a><\/p>\n

A hearty but healthier lasagna with lean ground beef, mushrooms, spinach, low-fat cheese, flavorful tomato sauce and whole wheat noodles – doesn’t this sound like the perfect comfort food for all this cold weather we’ve been having recently?<\/p>\n

I hope everyone’s been keeping safe and warm, especially those of you in the Northeast affected by the recent winter storm!\u00a0It hasn’t been TOO horribly cold here in the Atlanta area lately. There was a bitter cold streak a few weeks ago that was not fun, but so far no snow! Even then, I’m definitely craving comfort foods. And I’m always a fan of cooking food so that we have leftovers for the next few days, it sure makes planning dinner easy!<\/p>\n

So remember when I worked with Red Gold Tomatoes<\/a> over the summer? (Quick reminder, it was this Quick and Easy Black Bean, Tomato, and Corn Salad<\/a>!) \u00a0Well, they asked me to work with them again and try out their \u00a0“Skinny” lasagna recipe as part of their 2nd annual “Red Gold Simple Gourmet Lasagna Party,” in conjunction with Laura’s Lean Beef<\/a>, which produces lean, natural beef from humanely-raised cattle who are fed a natural grass and grain diet and are not given any hormones. You can check out their party on Facebook<\/a> and enter for a chance to win some fun goodies.<\/p>\n

You know me and how I like to tweak recipes all the time. \u00a0So, I looked at their recipe<\/a>\u00a0and made a few changes like increasing the amount of spices (shocker!), substituting some finely chopped fresh mushrooms for part of the lean ground beef, and adding spinach to the sauce. \u00a0Oh and I used part-skim ricotta instead of cottage cheese. \u00a0Sorry, not a cottage cheese fan!<\/p>\n

Red Gold Tomatoes and Laura’s Lean Beef were kind enough to supply me with my own lasagna making kit! \u00a0I got a cute Laura’s Lean Beef apron, a coupon to buy some Laura’s Lean Beef, lasagna noodles, Red Gold diced and crushed tomatoes, six Simple Gourmet Lasagna recipes (including their Skinny Lasagna recipe), and a super cute tote bag to hold everything! \u00a0And they’re letting me give away a kit to one of you!<\/p>\n

** Giveaway!! **<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Here’s what you need to do to win, each is worth one entry:<\/p>\n

1. Visit the Red Gold website<\/a>, then come back here and leave me a comment telling me which of their recipes you’d like to try.<\/p>\n

2. Visit the Laura’s Lean Beef website<\/a>, then come back here and leave me a comment telling me which of their recipes you’d like to try.<\/p>\n

3. Leave a comment here telling me your way you like to make lasagna<\/p>\n

4. Tweet about the giveaway – make sure you mention @spicesbites<\/a>, @RedGoldTomatoes<\/a>, and @LaurasLeanBeef<\/a><\/p>\n

Giveaway is limited to U.S. residents age 18 and over. Giveaway runs from Monday, February 2nd, 2015 through 9pm EST Friday, February 6th, 2015. Once I\u2019ve selected a winner, I will email you to get your contact info, so make sure you enter an email address when leaving a comment (it won\u2019t show up in the comment). Winner has 48 hours to reply or else I will have to select another winner.<\/p>\n

*Disclosure: Red Gold Tomatoes and Laura’s Lean Beef provided me with the lasagna kit described above. I did not receive any compensation and am not obligated to post a positive review. Any opinions are my own. Red Gold Tomatoes is providing the prize for the winner of the giveaway.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0*UPDATE*<\/span><\/p>\n

Congratulations to Maryann! You won!<\/p>\n

<\/a>
\nMaryann D.<\/em>
\nSubmitted on 2015\/02\/03 at 7:23 am<\/em>
\nI would love to try Beef and Cheese Manicotti from Laura\u2019s Lean Beef Website.<\/em><\/p>\n

Please contact me with your shipping info so we can have this sent out to you!<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

“Skinnier” Lasagna<\/p>\n

adapted from Skinny Lasagna recipe<\/a> on www.redgoldtomatoes.com<\/p>\n

Ingredients<\/span><\/p>\n

1 tbsp. olive oil<\/p>\n

1 tsp. jarred minced garlic<\/p>\n

1 dried bay leaf<\/p>\n

1-2 tbsp. Italian seasoning (or use combination of dried oregano, basil, marjoram)<\/p>\n

1 lb. extra-lean (96% lean) ground beef or lean ground turkey (I used Laura\u2019s Lean Ground Beef)<\/p>\n

8 oz. fresh mushrooms, chopped finely<\/p>\n

16 oz. frozen cut spinach<\/p>\n

1 (28 ounce) can crushed tomatoes, or 2 (15 ounce) cans crushed tomatoes (I used Red Gold)<\/p>\n

2 (14.5 ounce) cans diced tomatoes with basil, garlic & oregano (I used Red Gold)<\/p>\n

1 (16 ounce) box traditional whole wheat lasagna noodles<\/p>\n

1 (15 ounce) carton part-skim ricotta cheese<\/p>\n

2 cups shredded low fat mozzarella cheese<\/p>\n

1\/2 cup shaved Parmesan cheese<\/p>\n

Preparation<\/span><\/p>\n

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.<\/p>\n

In a large saut\u00e9 pan, heat olive oil over medium heat, then add minced garlic, bay leaf, and Italian seasoning. Cook until garlic starts to turn golden.<\/p>\n

Add ground beef, continuously stirring and breaking up meat so that it browns and gets flavored by the garlic and herbs.<\/p>\n

Once ground beef has cooked through, add the chopped mushrooms and frozen spinach, cooking until heated through.<\/p>\n

Add the canned tomatoes, stir to combine pan contents, and bring to a boil. Once sauce has come to a boil, lower the heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer for about 20 minutes.<\/p>\n

Cover the bottom of a 9×13-inch baking pan with 1\u00bd cups of sauce.\u00a0 Arrange 1\/3 of noodles on top of sauce, slightly overlapped.\u00a0 Top with \u00bd of ricotta cheese, \u00bd of mozzarella cheese and 1 cup of sauce.\u00a0 Repeat layers and top with last 1\/3 of noodles and the remaining sauce.\u00a0 Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.<\/p>\n

Cover tightly with foil and bake for 1 to 1\u00bd hours; until noodles are cooked. Let stand for 10 minutes before serving<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A hearty but healthier lasagna with lean ground beef, mushrooms, spinach, low-fat cheese, flavorful tomato sauce and whole wheat noodles – doesn’t this sound like the perfect comfort food for all this cold weather we’ve been having recently? I hope everyone’s been keeping safe and warm, especially those of you in the Northeast affected by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,128,246,2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.spicesbites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3948"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.spicesbites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.spicesbites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.spicesbites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.spicesbites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3948"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.spicesbites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3948\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.spicesbites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.spicesbites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.spicesbites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}