Vegan Lasagna
Ingredients:
6 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1 large onion, diced
4 cloves of garlic, minced
21 oz button mushrooms, chopped (use the stems too)
2 carrots, diced
1 zucchini, diced
14 oz frozen spinach, thawed according to the package directions and squeezed
2 teaspoons salt, divided
Pepper, to taste
2 cups unsweetened plant milk
1 cup vegetable stock
½ cup flour
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
3 cups / about a jar and a half marinara sauce
Lasagna noodles
Instructions:
Heat a large pan over medium-high heat and add 2 tablespoons of the oil, the onion and garlic and fry until soft. Add the mushrooms and fry until browned (work in batches if they don’t all fit in your pan at once). Add the carrot and zucchini and fry a couple more minutes until soft. Finally add the thawed spinach, 1 ½ teaspoons of salt and pepper to taste.
Preheat the oven to 400° F.
Combine the plant milk and stock in a bowl. Add the remaining 4 tablespoons of oil to a pan over medium heat and sift in the flour. Stir well. Cook for 5 - 10 minutes, stirring from time to time, until the flour begins to brown and gives off a nutty smell. Add one ladleful of the plant milk-stock mixture and whisk really well until evaporated. Continue adding the liquid one ladleful at a time and always stirring until you get a creamy sauce. If you’re unlucky and get some lumps, pass the sauce through a fine mesh strainer. Finally, stir in the nutritional yeast and remaining ½ teaspoon of salt.
In a 11 x 7 x 2 inch baking pan, place a layer of marinara sauce, followed by a layer of the béchamel, followed by a layer of lasagna noodles (I put the noodles in uncooked) . Then another layer of marinara, half of your veggie filling, the béchamel and more noodles. Continue with more layers. Finish the top with a layer of marinara and a layer of béchamel. Mix them together a bit so that the colour looks more like cheese.
Cover with tin foil and bake for 30 minutes. Then uncover and bake for a further 10 minutes, or until the top begins to brown in places and looks like cheese. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for at least 30 minutes before cutting and serving.
