Years ago, I remember a friend telling me she made lasagna soup and it was a favorite in her house. Fast forward about 7 or 8 years and I tried it…and you know what? It’s pretty good!
I have no idea what her original recipe called for, but when I started thinking about a deconstructed lasagna, there aren’t too many ingredients — noodles, meat, tomato sauce, onions, garlic, olive oil and usually mozzarella and ricotta cheeses.
Here are some descriptors of this recipe: easy, quick and healthy.
Easy. The hardest part is browning the meat. The rest of the recipe is just putting things in a pot. Even if you mess up on ingredient amounts, it’s no big deal.
Quick. I usually give myself an hour to make dinner, so 25 minutes is a total win for me. Plus, about 15 minutes of that time is hands off — the perfect amount of time to pull together a salad.
Healthy. I kept this simple. I considered adding carrots and spinach, but I don’t typically put those in my lasagna, so I left them out.
Classic Lasagna Soup
Ingredients:
- 1 pound extra lean ground beef or Italian turkey sausage
- 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- 1 medium yellow onion, diced (about ½ cup diced)
- 3 big cloves garlic, minced (about 2 tablespoons minced)
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
- 1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes
- 3 cups low sodium chicken stock or vegetable stock
- 6 classic hard lasagna noodles, broken into bite sized pieces
- ½ cup full fat fresh ricotta cheese
- Optional: Fresh chopped parsley, grated parmesan, baby spinach mixed in
Instructions:
In a medium-sized pot or Dutch oven over high heat, add the beef or sausage and break apart with a spatula or wooden spoon and cook until it is brown all over and you no longer see pink. Turn off the heat, take out of the pot and empty into a strainer to drain the grease. Set aside in a bowl.
In the same pot over medium heat, add the olive oil and onion and sauté until the onion is translucent and soft. Add the garlic and sauté for an additional minute. Add the salt and Italian seasoning and stir.
Add the tomatoes, stock and lasagna noodles and bring to a boil. Boil soup for 10 to 12 minutes or until the noodles are soft. Add the meat back into the pot and let the soup cool enough to eat.
On top of each serving of soup, add 1 to 2 tablespoons of ricotta cheese and any other additional toppings.
