New Recipe
Julie came over last night, so I volunteered her to be my guinea pig. I cooked her dinner, we caught up, and then stamped the night away! In the end, dinner turned out well, but getting there was the hard part....

I jumped onto the Food Network yesterday morning looking for lasagna recipes. The first one listed was by Iron Chef, Cat Cora. I enjoy watching Iron Chef. Have you seen it? It's where a great chef competes against an "Iron Chef" in "Kitchen Stadium" to see who can come up with the best recipes using a secret ingredient. Cat Cora is the first female.

So, the directions were relatively easy. I reluctantly poured 1/3 of a cup of oil into the pan to cook the meat. How about just a couple of tablespoons!?!? A 1/3 of a cup of oil is A LOT of oil! Here's where the problem began. I turned my back to the stove while the oil was warming up. I had lots of veggies and fresh herbs to chop. I turned around and smoke was billowing out of the pan. Yikes! I was close to having a hot-oil kitchen fire on my hands. I quickly removed the oil to let it cool. No worries - no fire. But, the house did fill with smoke! Maybe I should be concerned that I didn't hear a smoke detector go off....I don't remember when I changed the batteries last. Randy probably did it - so that gives you an idea of how long it's been. So, when I thought it was safe, I started browning the meat. It didn't take long! So, I went back to cooking veggies. Once the meat was browned and the veggies were cooked, I added them to the pan. Now, if you read the recipe, you see that I was supposed to remove the meat. I forgot. I decided that it might be better for them to all co-mingle in the pan together. After the veggies cook, I added the tomato products. It was smelling good and tasted surprisingly wonderful. I added just a pinch more salt and was very pleased with the result.

So, it was supposed to simmer for an hour. Well, it cooked up awfully quickly - the meat in there probably didn't help. After about 45 minutes I had a thick, pasty substance. Oh well. It all kinda blends together in the lasagna anyway, right?

With my noodles cooked, and Julie observing, I started layering. I shredded fresh mozzarella (more than they called for). By the time I got to the top layer of noodles, I was out of meat and sauce. But, after re-reading the recipe, I think that's the way it was supposed to end up. However, I was still VERY confused. The recipe never told me to add the meat back in, but they kept referring to it as a meat sauce. Apparently I should have had some meat sauce left to spoon over the lasagne once plated. That stuff was a big "glob" of meaty paste...it wasn't getting spooned anywhere!

In the end, it tasted good. Our plates were coated with that oily pizza-grease looking puddle. I'll probably make it again, but not quite sure what I'll do with the meat this time. I do recommend this recipe - maybe you can figure out how it's actually supposed to be cooked!!!

My favorite "blurb" in the recipe reads - "This recipe was provided by professional chefs and has been scaled down from a bulk recipe provided by a restaurant. The Food Network Kitchens chefs have not tested this recipe, in the proportions indicated, and therefore, we cannot make any representation as to the results." Why didn't I see that one before?!?!!?