Ham and Vegetable Alfredo Lasagna

I had so much leftover ham from Easter and had been keeping my eye out for new recipes to try using said ham.  I saw a few posts for a ham and cheese lasagna that looked good but I really wanted to add some vegetables in there and lighten up the recipe just so it was a tad bit more Weight Watchers friendly.



Now, don't get me wrong; I am not calling this a Weight Watchers recipe.  It still had LOTS of cheese, the points from the noodles, and plenty of other not so great ingredients but I did lighten it up so it should be fewer points than normal and added more vegetables so hopefully a smaller serving will be filling.

It was soooo good! My youngest son is a notoriously picky eater and not only did he have no idea that I had added vegetables to it but he told me it's one of his new favorites.

Ingredients:

2 cups pureed cauliflower (cooked)
8 Laughing Cow cheese wedges (I used Asiago)
3 cups skim milk
1 clove minced garlic
1 16 ounce container fat free ricotta cheese
2 cups diced ham
1 cup shredded zucchini
9-12 lasagna noodles (depending on how many layers you make it and what size noodles you use)
1 cup shredded Monterey Jack cheese

The very first thing I did was boil the cauliflower and puree it in the blender.  I use a 1/2 head and had just under 2 cups.



In a medium sized sauce pan, I combined the laughing cow cheese wedges, milk, and garlic and brought to a low boil.


Once the cheese wedges had melted and the milk mixture had thickened just a bit I turned the heat down to low and added in the mashed cauliflower as well as the ricotta cheese.  Once that as nice and creamy, I added in the ham and the zucchini too.

I took a 13x9 pan and sprayed it with non-stick spray then used 1 cup of the cheese mixture to line the bottom.  Then layered 3-4 lasagna noodles to cover the bottom of the pan and kept alternating layers between noodles and 1/3 of the cheese sauce.  Ending with cheese sauce.  I then topped it with 1 cup of shredded cheese on the very top.



As you can see it is quite watery looking and I was worried at this point that we might not have a dinner to eat.  But I had made a very similar recipe years ago and found that the cheese sauce thickened considerably in the oven so that's what I hoped for.

I baked the lasagna in a preheated 375 degree oven for 45 minutes.

It started to smell amazing and I gave a took a look at it... it was looking all bubbly and delicious.


By the time it finished we had an amazing looking lasagna!  Now i had baked my lasagna in the morning and just heated it (covered with foil) at dinner time.  If I had wanted to serve it immediately after baking I would have let it stand for 10- 15 minutes to let the cheese sauce firm up just a bit.



My boys had no idea there was cauliflower or zucchini in it!  As you can see the noodles buckled here and there was they absorbed the milk but that's just fine.  To me, it's worth not having to bake them at all.





Linking Up With: Craft Schooling Sunday,








Comments

  1. Great idea! I cooked a turkey recently and did the something similar with the leftovers. It was a big hit.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I have leftover turkey too; I hadn't thought of using it in something like this!

      Delete
  2. How clever to use pureed cauliflower and Laughing Cow cheese!! Sounds wonderful!!
    Jenna

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you! It made it a much lighter dish.

      Delete
  3. This sounds great. In the last year, I have started putting more veggies in my spahetti sauce including grated carrots (sliced cook too slowly!), black olives, summer and/or zucchini squash, and celery as well as peppers, onions, and mushrooms. Wish I'd done this when kids were little! My SO is diabetic and I figure the more veggies we eat, the less carbs we're eating! Any leftovers are also a good soup base!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I love summer and zucchini squash mixed into my sauce. My boys won't eat it though; they pick out any "chunks" from the sauce and just eat the sauce.

      Delete

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