Pierogie Lasagna

Here's a secret.

I have never made traditional lasagna.

You know, the tasty pasta strata of noodles, sauce, cheese and meat... never done it.  I've made moussaka, which I'm pretty sure is the Greek equivalent of lasagna.  Oh, and white lasagna (with spicy alfredo, mind you).  And then there's this.

Pierogie Lasagna.

I've made this a total of three times in my lifetime.  The first time was after I saw a potato casserole/lasagna-type recipe on the internet.  I'm not going to say it was the best copycat of a recipe I've ever made, but it was pretty tasty nonetheless.

The second time, I was trying to figure out pierogies for the first time.  Technical errors led to a big fat failure on my part.  None of the raviolis stuck together.  So I reworked the recipe to use lasagna noodles instead.  Turns out, making pierogie filling and piling it into a lasagna is one of the best things you can do to pierogies.

You know, besides making pierogies, obviously.

I feel like this would be super good to make on a post-holiday leftovers kind of day.  You know how there's always that ridiculously large tupperware container of mashed potatoes leftover the day after Thanksgiving?  This is a crafty way of using them up without all the work of assembling and boiling pierogies.  You can just slap them in a dish and bake 'em up.

Perfect for a respectable turkey hangover.



Pierogie Lasagna
(adapted from Mr. Food)

12 lasagna noodles, cooked
6 cups mashed potatoes
3 1/2 cups finely chopped white onion
2 1/2 cups sharp cheddar cheese
2 tbsp minced garlic
Salt & Pepper to taste

Preheat oven 350F.

Saute onions in a large skillet for about 5 minutes on medium heat.  Add the garlic and cook an additional 2-3 minutes.

In a large bowl, combine mashed potatoes, 1 1/2 cups of cheese and seasoning.  Toss in onion mixture and stir until everything is evenly distributed.

Place 3 noodles on the bottom of a greased 9x13 pan.  Top with 1/3 of the potato mixture.  Repeat two more time and cover the pan with the last three noodles.  Sprinkle the additional 1 cup of cheese over the top.

Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 30 minutes.




Listening to:  Hawthorne Heights - Niki FM