Friday dinner is Lasagna Soup – Review

We tried a new recipe I got off Pinterest today – Lasagna Soup. I linked to it via the 10.21.18 menu, and wanted to review it.

It was a huge hit and a definite “add the Lasagna Soup to the keepers” list.

A couple things of note:

I try, really hard, to actually make the recipe as outlined by the author. It’s one of my pet peeves when someone leaves a review of a recipe they made for the first time telling about all the changes they made to it. It really frosts my cake when they leave a bad review after changing the recipe fundamentally.

This is what it looked like after it simmered for about 25 minutes and I added the heavy cream.

The cream all mixed in and ready to eat.

Dreamy.

A couple of things you should do when trying a new recipe –

• Read through the entire recipe from beginning to end. Twice.
• Note ingredients that you don’t/won’t eat, and think if omitting them materially changes the recipe
• Look to see if the ingredients are overwhelming – either because they aren’t in the house or if there are just so many of them
• Based on the first three items, decide if the recipe is worth a shot, or if it looks sketchy
• Note any changes you make or WANT to make the next time

It looked too good to be bothered cleaning off the bowl…

Obviously you can change a recipe – that’s the gig, really, but getting a good idea of what a recipe is supposed to look and taste like in the end is always a good thing. That way you know if your changes are good or if they take the recipe to the dark side.

I used my trusty enameled cast iron Dutch Oven (as did the author) because the acidity in the tomato base can really mess with regular cast iron and some aluminum pots and pans.

My rating scale is pretty simple – we use a best out of 5 for three different criteria:

Tastiness: this scored a 4 from me; it was a little too sweet, and I’m not super fan of sweet sauce

Ease: this scored a 5 for me; there looked to be a lot of ingredients but they were mostly seasonings and pantry items

Cost: this scored a 5 for me; I computed that we spent about $14 on this including ALL of the cheese. We didn’t use all of the cheese, but we had to buy it for the recipe, so I’m including it. It will serve at least 8 people, so it’s still pretty economical at $1.75 per person.

Overall score is a 14 out of 15 – no wonder it made it to the “Keeper” list! I would use a little less sugar next time. I ABSOLUTELY recommend including the ricotta cheese – it makes the dish. The lasagna noodles were slowly taking over the pot after it sat when we were eating, so leftovers could be real interesting.

This is a sponsored post (meaning the author is getting some payment from the brand) and I used Prego Sauce as indicated, which might have been a part of why the soup was so sweet. Next time I’d also use our regular (less sweet) marinara.

Definitely give this one a taste – it’s wonderfully filling and perfect for a cool fall night.