1 hour/60 minutes total: 45 minutes covered with foil and 15 minutes uncovered.
World’s Best Lasagna Recipe Substitutions
While I love this homemade Lasagna Recipe as written, you may have other preferences! Here are some simple substitutions that you may want to try.
Ground Beef vs Ground Sausage
You can absolutely substitute Sweet Italian Sausage or even Spicy Italian Sausage in place of the ground beef if that is your preference.
Cottage Cheese vs Ricotta
Classic Italian Lasagnas are typically made with a blend of creamy Ricotta cheese, Parmesan cheese and Mozzarella cheese.
If you don’t like using ricotta cheese because of the taste or texture, you can definitely substitute cottage cheese in its place 1:1. Everything else in the recipe will stay the same.
Regular Lasagna Pasta vs Oven Ready (no boil) Pasta
I don’t recommend the oven-ready noodles for this particular lasagna recipe. While they may seem like a simple sub, they are partially cooked and dehydrated for packaging. Oven ready pasta is thinner than regular lasagna pasta and I find those give you a more starchy lasagna that doesn’t taste very good (in my opinion). Also, they soak up a lot of moisture because they are essentially cooking and softening in the oven as the lasagna cooks. It’s easy to get a dry lasagna because of this.
Best Lasagna Recipe Tips
The best lasagna you’ve ever eaten is only steps away. Here are my golden rules for creating the best-finished product.
Cook your meat sauce for a long time. This not only concentrates the flavors for a more flavorful meat sauce, but it reduces the amount of liquid. If you want to cut perfect slices and not have a soupy mess on your hands, cooking your sauce for an hour or two until its very thick is a big step in the right direction. Bonus points for making the sauce 12-24 hours in advance. Red sauces of any kind always taste better the next day…in my opinion. Reheat the sauce before layering it up in the lasagna for quicker baking time.
Boil lasagna noodles for two-thirds of the time, according to package directions. Most lasagna pasta will cook for 9-11 minutes. I pulled mine out at around 7 minutes. I don’t want to cook the pasta all the way through because once they hit the oven for baking, they can get mushier than al dente. So, draining them early means they will soak up any extra liquid in the sauce and after the hour in the oven, your pasta will be perfectly cooked, not mushy and help hold those beautiful layers together.
Don’t use fresh mozzarella. While I big puffy heart eyes love fresh mozzarella, I feel the added moisture isn’t worth the taste. Instead, reach for a block of sturdier mozzarella cheese and grate it yourself. If you think this is sacrilegious and would prefer the fresh mozzarella, be sure to cut it into thin slices and press it in between paper towels to get out as much moisture as possible. And please please please don’t use the pre-grated mozzarella cheese.
Let your Lasagna rest 15-20 minutes. Again, when trying to achieve those perfect slices, you have to let everything settle and rest before digging in. It will stay plenty hot, but the rest time really gives your lasagna those last few minutes to soak up that moisture and let the cheese firm up a touch. Garnish with dried or fresh basil.
How to store Homemade Lasagna
Half the fun of eating lasagna is being able to eat it AGAIN the next day. Store any extra lasagna in the fridge covered for up to 5 days. Whether that is in the same casserole dish or cut into individual slices in plastic containers, just ensure they are sealed airtight.
Individual slices can be reheated easily in the microwave. If you have more than a few slices in your casserole dish, cover with foil and bake at 350° F until heated completely through again.
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