Quick and Easy Comfort Food: Ravioli Lasagna

While in the midst of doing a million Christmas crafty-craft projects I am going to take a moment to post a quick and easy comfort food family favorite I came up with this year.  Everyone loves lasagna and everyone loves ravioli, what do you get when you meld the concept of lasagna with ravioli?  A wonderful surprise twists two very classic dishes!   This dish literally takes about 15 minutes to throw together and about 40 minutes in the oven and it tastes like you cooked all day If you would like to freeze it, skip placing it in the oven and just freeze it.  Pop in the oven for about hour covered (pull cover off the last 15 minutes).  This is a great dish to make for a meal to bring for a new baby etc…

Ingredients:

• Package of ground turkey, ground beef or Italian sausage
• 3 9-10 oz packages of per-made ravioli (you usually can find them in the refrigerator section – Costco also carries them) I mix it up and add one cheese base ravioli and then a spinach based ravioli for the other two
• 1 container of ricotta
• 1 jar of your favorite marinara
• 2.5 cups of mozzarella cheese
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Spray olive oil

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 425.
2. Brown meat and while browning meat, bring a large pot of water to a boil.
3. Add salt and pepper to taste to browning meat.
4. Once meat is browned and water has reached a boil, toss in the three packages of ravioli into the water and boil for about 3 to 4 minutes (if you toss in frozen boil for about 6 minutes) They don’t need to be fully cooked through, you want them to be very firm and they will finish cooking in the oven. 
5. While the ravioli is boiling add jar of marinara and bring to a simmer.
6. Once sauce is at a simmer (which should be within a minute or so) add the entire contents of the ricotta to the sauce and blend well.  Keep stove on low to medium and let simmer until ravioli is done
7. Strain ravioli carefully so they don’t break and begin the layering process.
8. Spray a deep baking dish with non-stick olive oil spray (Pam or veggie spray oil).
9. Start layering with the first layer being the ravioli, then sauce, cheese and then ravioli.  Do this until all the ravioli and sauce is gone.  Top with cheese and place in the oven for about 35-40 minutes.

Serves about 8-10 servings.  Serve with a fresh salad and garlic bread.