John has been on a super diet. He has lost 30 pounds in the last 5 weeks! One of the major things that has helped is that we are sticking to 500-calories-or-less dinners. Grilled chicken and steamed veggies gets old fast! So I have been scouring the Internet for more inspirational ideas.
I found this recipe on Hungry Girl's website for Lasagna Cupcakes. Of course, as always, I changed things up a bit. In the end, I cut the calories of by half, and they are still REALLY good. The little kids loved them and even my teenage son went back for seconds & thirds! Bear with me though, when I cook, I don't do measurements and I wasn't actually planning on posting this since it is an adaptation. So this recipe is more of a guideline that really exact amounts. There aren't many pictures, but I hope you enjoy otherwise!
Also, the sauce is made with ground turkey and Morning Star Recipe Crumbles (frozen ground soy). I know, it sounds gross. But I've been incorporating it in some of my recipes (made 100 calorie tacos the other night), and you really can't tell the difference when you combine it with ground turkey and a little beef bouillon. I wouldn't make a hamburger with it, and I wouldn't use it by itself in any recipe (yet, maybe we will get there, I mean we were the same way about ground turkey at first!) Really though, its not that noticeable. However, if you just can't stomach the soy crumbles, then don't put any meat in it at all. A veggie packed sauce would be just as good (and less calories). This sauce made enough that we can have it for spaghetti for another night (an entire pot of sauce!) So you could probably cut it in half. I just made it this amount because that is how everything came packaged.
The calories are figured by adding every calorie of every ingredient and then dividing by the total measured amount of all the ingredients. For example, the sauce comes to 37 calories for 1/4 cup etc. With all the figuring, the cupcakes come to 55 calories a piece! John could eat 9 of them if he wanted, and still stay under the 500 calorie mark. That is a TON of food!
Makes 24 cupcakes. I ate 3 of them for dinner.
What you need:
1 package wanton noodles (found by tofu and pre-cut veggies @ my grocer)
1 lb extra lean ground turkey
1 package Morning Star Recipe Crumbles (found in frozen foods, meatless section @ my grocer)
beef bouillon
1 lb sliced white mushrooms
1 onion
1 bell pepper
1 cup carrots
2 cans diced tomatoes
1 can tomato sauce
1 1/2 cup prepared spaghetti sauce (like Prego)
3 garlic cloves
garlic powder
onion powder
basil
oregano
parsley
salt & pepper
2 cups no fat cottage cheese or ricotta (John hates ricotta, so we use cottage cheese)
nutmeg
1 egg or 1 oz egg substitute
shredded no fat mozzarella cheese
shredded Parmesan cheese
Preheat oven to 375.
If you are using cottage cheese, place a paper towel in a colander and dump the cottage cheese on top. This will let the cottage cheese drain some and will keep the lasagna from being watery.
Mince the mushrooms, onion, bell pepper and carrots. I used my food processor to get them almost pureed, but you can mince them with a knife (although time consuming) for a chunkier sauce. Toss in a sauce pan over med-high heat and cook through.
In a saute pan, combine ground turkey and frozen soy crumbles. Season with 1-2 teaspoons of beef bouillon and pepper. Cook over med-high heat until cooked through. Drain and add to veggies.
Add tomatoes and tomato sauce, the 3 cloves of garlic (minced) and the seasonings (hold off on the parsley for now) to taste. I usually do a good couple of dashes of each. Taste before you add salt, because the beef bouillon is already salty. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer. Add 1 T of parsley. After simmering, if the sauce seems a little runny, mix a couple tablespoons of corn starch with a little water and add to sauce. Bring it back up to a fast simmer and watch it thicken.
Whisk the egg, a dash of nutmeg, few dashes of salt & pepper, garlic powder and parsley together. Combine with drained cottage cheese.
Using cupcake tins, spray with nonstick cooking spray. Push a wanton wrapper down into each cupcake hole. Spread 1 T of the cottage cheese mixture into bottom of cupcake. Add 1 T of meat sauce and sprinkle that with mozzarella cheese and a pinch of Parmesan. Layer another wanton, and gently push down to compress everything. Repeat layers, finishing with mozzarella and Parmesan on top. (I may have used a little less cottage cheese mix and sauce on the second layer because they were filling up pretty well already). Bake at 375 for about 10-15 minutes, until the cheese is melted and the wantons are golden brown.
For a low calorie Lasagna fix, this really hits the spot. You will not believe it is only 55 calories!
