Easy Lasagna Without Ricotta Cheese Or Cottage Cheese

This easy lasagna without ricotta cheese or cottage cheese is a basic meatless vegetarian lasagna recipe. This homemade no ricotta no cottage cheese lasagna is so simple, cheesy, delicious and kid friendly pasta lasagna noodles dish that you can easily make even if you have not made lasagna before!

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With this basic lasagna recipe, even if you are a beginner or never made lasagna before, you can easily make lasagna for the first time with the easy to follow step by step instructions & pictures in the recipe.

This is perfect for a large family dinner like Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner when you have a crowd and you are looking for easy recipes which are not complicated at all!

Also, you can easily add more flavors as you wish, to this basic lasagna dish. You may add more veggies or if you are not a vegetarian, you may add meat as well if you want.

We use an easily available alternative or substitute for ricotta cheese and cottage cheese since this recipe since we do use no ricotta cheese or cottage cheese in its preparation.

And the best part is that this meatless lasagna is also pretty cheap to make fro scratch at home!

You can make this from relatively inexpensive ingredients and you can also add more ingredients for fillings if you would like to modify this basic lasagna recipe with no ricotta.

(I have updated this easy recipe for lasagna recently).

Cooked lasagna noodles can be baked easily using deep lasagna pans.

This simple lasagna recipe is perfect for beginners to learn how to make lasagna with minimal ingredients quickly and easily.

So add this easy lasagna recipe to your weekly meal plan if you love lasagna for dinner!

Substitute For Ricotta Cheese In Lasagna (Alternative To Ricotta & Cottage Cheese)

If you wonder what to use as an alternative or substitue for ricotta cheese in lasagna, in fact there are many options.

(Buy ricotta cheese here if you like!)

In this eay recipe for lasagana without ricotta cheese or cottage cheese, I used mozzarella cheese as the main substitue for ricotta cheese.

The recipe uses a combination of both cheddar cheese & mozarella cheese, and it works very well in this easy lasagna recipe without ricotta cheese or cottage cheese.

Bechamel sauce, cream cheese etc are other delicious options to use if you are looking for substitutes or replacements for ricotta cheese in lasagna recipes.

But in this recipe, we only use the cheddar cheese & mozarella cheese combination which works as a good alternative or substitute to ricotta cheese and cottage cheese in lasagna.

How To Make Lasagna Noodles Without Ricotta Cheese Or Cottage Cheese?

In this lasagna recipe with no ricotta cheese, lasagna sheets are cooked first in boiling water following the package instructions, just like you do for regular pasta.

And then we gather the sauce and cheese for adding in between the layers made of lasagna sheets.

I used marinara sauce (make sure to use a good one that you like for the best flavor!) and a combination of shredded cheddar cheese and shredded mozzarella cheese, which was delicious and simple.

I usually do not recommend mozzarella cheese for pasta (its ideal for pizza), since the string texture of mozzarella tend to make the pasta shells stick together and turns clumpy in most cases making it even inedible.

However, I found that adding mozzarella to lasagna sheets really work since the stringy texture of mozzarella is apparently good for the lasagna sheets to stick together and it tastes delicious too.

You may try any other sauce as you wish, and may experiment with any cheese blends as you like.

The amount of sauce and cheese in the recipe is what I used to bake the layers made of 18 sheets of lasagna.

Adjust the amounts accordingly if you have more or less number of lasagna sheets. Also if you may slightly adjust the amounts of sauce and cheese as you desire.

I tried this easy lasagna recipe without ricotta cheese or cottage cheese as I didn’t have any ricotta or cottage cheese, and the lasagna turned out delicious with the mix of cheddar and mozzarella.

So let us see the ingredients list and step by step instructions on how to make delicious and easy lasagna without ricotta or cottage cheese.

Ingredients for this recipe

1 package lasagna sheets (I used the brand Barilla which had 18 sheets)

5 cups shredded cheese (I used cheddar and mozzarella) (I used about 3 full packages and a little more from the 4th package which amounted to 5 cups of shredded cheese)

water enough to cook lasagna

5 tablespoons olive oil (or as needed to grease the lasagna sheets)

1 tablespoon extra oil to grease the baking pan

½ teaspoon salt adjust to taste

for the sauce:

3 cups marinara sauce (adjust as needed)

2 medium sized yellow onions chopped finely

6 cloves garlic minced

olive oil 2 tablespoons

butter 4 tablespoons

Spices:

onion powder 1 teaspoon

garlic powder 1 teaspoon

dried oregano powder 2 teaspoons

dried parsley 2 teaspoons

Step By Step Instructions

To prepare the sauce:

Heat the 2 tablespoons of olive oil for the sauce (see ingredients list for the sauce) in a pan and add chopped yellow onions and garlic, for 10 to 12 minutes until the onions and garlic are well sauteed.

Once the onions and garlic are sauteed and no water is left (it’s good to lightly brown the contents), add the butter and saute for few more minutes.

Add the prepared onion garlic mixture to the marinara sauce and also add all the spice powders (onion, garlic, parsley, oregano), mix well and keep this prepared sauce aside.

To prepare the lasagna:

Cook the lasagna sheets according to instructions in the package.

Once the lasagna sheets are cooked, drain the water and transfer the cooked sheets to a foil greased with oil.

Sprinkle some olive oil over the sheets and gently grease each sheet with olive oil, which will help to prevent the sheets from sticking together.

Preheat oven to 375 degree Fahrenheit.

Grease a 13*9 inch baking pan with oil (or use any large baking pan that can fit the sheets).

Add few spoons of prepared sauce to spread over the baking pan and place lasagna sheets on top of the sauce in a single layer.

Add more sauce over the sheets and spread evenly, then add shredded cheese over the sauce in a single layer and then place the next layer of lasagna sheets in a single layer.

Again, repeat the process by adding a single layer of sauce which is topped with enough cheese in a single layer.

Repeat this process until the top layer of lasagna sheets are placed.

Then add enough sauce and spread the sauce evenly.

Now cover the baking pan with foil and bake in the preheated oven for about twenty minutes.

After 20 minutes of baking, remove the covering foil and top the lasagna with more shredded cheese (sorry I forgot to take a picture of this step).

Cover the baking pan again with foil and bake for another ten more minutes.

When its done, open the pan and see if the cheese is melted enough. You may keep the pan opened, and bake for another 5 more minutes if needed so that the cheese will be bubbly and golden brown.

Once the dish is cooled enough, you can slice them in squares and enjoy!

I like to top mine with dried oregano or parsley flakes and also dried red chili flakes to spice it up.

You may add any other toppings or even suitable fillings (add accordingly as you fill the sheets for baking but make sure not to add too much) for even more flavors as you desire!

That is why I told this is a basic, simple and easy lasagna recipe which is very flexible and you can modify it as you please.

If you are using 18 lasagna sheets as called in this recipe, you may use 2 baking pans to bake the lasagna, using 9 sheets in each pan or you may use a single large pan to bake all the layers simultaneously (if you use a single pan, the layers will be little thick as there are many number of layers).

I used a single baking pan to bake all the lasagna sheets so I had 6 layers of lasagna with lasagna sheets in each layer.

If you use two baking pans, you can have smaller number of 3 layers lasagna, so do it whichever way you like it.

Make sure to use a large baking pan which can hold all layers and its fillings.

A 9*13 inch baking pan can be used easily for making lasagna, you can also use disposable baking pans of this size (just like the one you see here) which ca hold all contents.

More Pasta Recipes In This Blog:

easy baked mac and cheese without flour

no boil spaghetti bake recipe

Simple Bow Tie Pasta Recipe

Baked Mushroom Pasta Recipe

Mint Pasta With Fresh Tomatoes

Garlic Pasta Recipe With White Sauce

Indian Style Pasta Recipe With Roasted Cauliflower Florets

Easy Bell Pepper Pasta Recipe

Also see my instant pot pasta recipes collection here.

Below you can read the detailed recipe for making lasagna without ricotta or cottage cheese and no meat.