HEARTY VEGAN LASAGNA!

Hello All!  Welcome to my delicious veg food blog!  Today I am going to share with you a recipe I've adapted from grouprecipes.com for making a hearty vegan lasagna that will trick all your meat/dairy eating friends.  The first time I served this to my brother he didn't even realize that it was vegan!

Within this recipe you will also find a recipe for Vegan 'Meat' Sauce with TVP and for Melty Nutritional Yeast 'Cheese,' both of which have been adapted from recipes found in The New Farm Vegetarian Cookbook, one of the pioneer vegan cookbooks published by The Book Publishing Company and The Farm in 1975.

INGREDIENTS

• 9 wheat lasagna noodles
• Vegan 'Ricotta' Filling
• 1/2 lb organic carrots
• 1/2 c. fresh parsley and basil, chopped and mixed
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 c. veggie stock
• 1 (14 oz) block tofu
• 1 (8 oz) package vegan cream cheese
• 1 lemon, juiced
• 1/8 tsp. nutmeg
• 1/4 c. nutritional yeast****
• 9 oz. fresh baby spinach
• Vegan 'Meat' Sauce with TVP *
• 1/4 c. olive oil or margarine
• 1 med onion -OR- 2 tsp. onion powder**
• 1 large or 2 small green peppers, diced
• 1 c. sliced mushrooms
• 4 c. tomato sauce
• 1 (15 oz) can fire roasted tomatoes, pureed
• 3 1/2 tsp dried oregano
• 1 1/2 tsp dried basil
• 1/2 tsp allspice
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 1/4 tsp cumin
• 1 1/2 tsp. chili powder
• 1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper -OR- hot sauce (opt.) ***
• 1/4 tsp finely ground black pepper
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 Tbsp sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
• 1 1/4 c. TVP
• Melty Nutritional Yeast 'Cheese'
• 1/2 c. nutritional yeast flakes****
• 1/4 c. cornstarch
• 2 Tbsp. flour
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
• 2 1/8 c. water
• 1 tsp. dijon mustard
• 1/2 c. extra virgin olive oil

*WARNING: there will be extra!!! do not feel the need to use all of this ingredient...save it for another day!
**I have a strange and bizarre phobia of onions so I rarely use them in cooking.  This is why you will find onion powder used as a substitute for onions in 95% of the recipes I publish.
***I frequently use Conchy Joe's Hot Pepper Sauce to spice up soups and sauces!

****Use the yeast strain Saccharomyces cerevisiae, try KAL Nutritional Yeast Flakes.

DIRECTIONS

• Preheat oven to 375 degrees
• Prepare lasagna noodles according to package directions <while boiling water begin to prepare 'meat' sauce>
• Prepare 'Meat' Sauce 
• Gather ingredients
• Slice mushrooms and dice peppers and onions (if using fresh)
• Saute mushrooms, peppers, and onions (if using fresh) in med sauce pan in olive oil until peppers are soft.
• Add tomato sauce and pureed roasted tomatoes, stir
• Add all spices except for garlic powder, stir
• Bring to a boil and then let simmer for approx. 20 mins. <while sauce is simmering start preparing 'ricotta' filling and melty 'cheese'>
• Add TVP and garlic powder, stir then turn off heat and cover for 10 mins
• Prepare 'Ricotta' Filling
• Peel and chop carrots to fit into food processor
• Process carrots to a uniform consistency, NO CHUNKS!
• Mince Garlic
• Chop parsley and basil
• Saute Garlic, parsley and basil in olive oil for approx. 1 min.
• Add carrots and vegetable stock, let simmer uncovered for 5-7 mins.
• Add tofu, vegan cream cheese, and lemon juice stir well and heat until 'melty' and uniform
• Add nutmeg and nutritional yeast, let simmer for a few more minutes
• KEEP WARM!
• Prepare Melty Nutritional Yeast 'Cheese'
• Mix dry ingredients in a sauce pan
• Whisk in water
• Cook over medium low heat, whisking constantly until it thickens and bubbles
• Whip in oil and mustard
• Whisk in 1/8 water to thin
• Put Spinach in food processor and process to a fine consistency
• Oil 13" x 9" baking dish
• Assemble Lasagna
• lay down 3 lasagna noodles
• spread half of 'ricotta' mixture over noodles
• spread half of chopped spinach over 'ricotta'
• spoon a thin layer of melty 'cheese' over spinach (does not need to be entirely uniform but try and spread as evenly as possible!)
• spread a layer of 'meat' sauce over melty 'cheese'
• repeat once
• lay top layer of noodles down and top with a layer of 'meat' sauce and a layer of melty 'cheese'
• Cover lasagna with tin foil
• Bake @ 375 degrees for 45 mins
• Remove lasagna from oven and set oven to Broil
• Remove tinfoil from lasagna and return to oven on a rack about 4 inches from broiler 
• Broil for 6 mins.
• Remove and let cool for 5-10 minutes
• ENJOY!

STEP BY STEP PICTURES