Homemade Lasagna is a family favorite and a great way to feed a crowd.
In this classic lasagna recipe, sheets of pasta are layered with a cheesy filling, a rich meaty tomato sauce, and more cheese and then baked until bubbly and browned.
While there are a few steps, this lasagna recipe is relatively easy to make and has so much flavor.
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This Is Our Go-To Lasagna Recipe Because…
- This recipe has been called the best by many and has thousands of 5-star reviews!
- It uses simple ingredients that you likely have on hand, and it packs big flavor!
- This is an easy lasagna recipe. It requires just one pan, one bowl, and a 9×13 baking dish.
- It reheats well and can be made ahead of time. You can freeze lasagna either before or after baking.
Lasagna Ingredients
- Cheese Filling: For this classic lasagna recipe, the cheese filling has ricotta and parmesan with seasonings. You can make homemade ricotta cheese or replace it with cottage cheese.
- Meat: I use both Italian sausage and ground beef for great flavor. If using all beef, add ¼ teaspoon of fennel seeds and some Italian seasoning to the meat mixture for flavor, or make my homemade Italian sausage.
- Sauce: To keep this sauce quick, I use pasta sauce or marinara sauce (it’s easy to make from scratch with crushed tomatoes and canned tomatoes if you’d prefer). If using store-bought sauce, I love Rao’s for flavor.
Spinach (variation): Spinach is optional but delicious in lasagna. For spinach lasagna, thaw 10oz of frozen spinach, squeeze out the moisture, and add it along with the cheese layer.
How to Make Lasagna
While homemade lasagna may have a few steps, each step is easy – and I assure you it’s worth the time; the perfect Italian meal!
- Boil pasta: In a large pot of salted water boil lasagna noodles per the recipe below.
- Prepare meat sauce: Cook sausage and beef with onion and garlic. Drain well, add the pasta sauce (I love this brand) & simmer it for a few minutes to thicken.
- Combine cheese mixture: Stir the cheese mixture together in a bowl.
- Layer & bake: Layer the meat sauce and cheese mixture with lasagna noodles and bake until the top of the lasagna is golden brown.
How to Layer Lasagna
- Spread about a cup of meat sauce into a 9×13 pan. Add a layer of noodles.
- Top the noodles with some of the ricotta cheese mixture. Repeat the layers, ending with a layer of noodles and sauce
- Cover with foil and bake. Remove foil, top with mozzarella and parmesan, and bake for another 15 minutes.
Once you have prepared the meat sauce and the cheese mixture, you’re ready to layer. This is the order of layers:
- sauce – noodles – cheese
- sauce – noodles – cheese
- sauce – noodles – cheese
- noodles – sauce (bake) – cheese
Serve with a big slice of homemade Garlic Bread and garnish with fresh basil or a couple of tablespoons of parsley. Finish the meal with a Caesar salad or Italian salad.
Holly’s Tips for the Best Lasagna
Here are my tips to ensure this is the best lasagna recipe you’ve ever had!
- Choose a quality pasta sauce.
- Bake this lasagna recipe for one hour.
- Cover it with aluminum foil for most of the cooking time so it doesn’t dry out.
- Add the cheese during the last 15 minutes of cooking so it becomes browned and bubbly.
- Let it rest at least 15 minutes before cutting.
Make Ahead
Lasagna can be prepared ahead of time and refrigerated for up to 2 days before baking. It can also be frozen before or after baking.
To Freeze Lasagna
Lasagna is one of the best meals to make ahead and freeze. Double or triple the recipe and store it tightly wrapped in the freezer for up to 3 months.
Thaw in the refrigerator overnight and bake as directed. If the lasagna is cold from the fridge, it may need an extra 20 minutes or so of cooking time.
How To Reheat Lasagna
If you’ve frozen leftovers, pop them in the oven at 350°F covered until reheated. This should take about 30 minutes! Of course, leftovers are perfectly heated in the microwave too!
More Baked Pasta Recipes
Did you enjoy this Homemade Lasagna? Be sure to leave a rating and a comment below!
Ingredients
- 12 lasagna noodles uncooked
- 2 ½ cups shredded mozzarella cheese
- ¼ cup shredded Parmesan cheese
Tomato Sauce
- ½ pound lean ground beef
- ½ pound Italian sausage
- 1 yellow onion diced
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 36 ounces pasta sauce *see note
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
- ½ teaspoon salt more to taste
Cheese Mixture
- 2 cups ricotta cheese or cottage cheese
- ¼ cup chopped fresh parsley
- 1 large egg beaten
- 1 ½ cups shredded mozzarella cheese
- ¼ cup shredded Parmesan cheese
- ¼ teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the lasagna noodles and cook until al dente (firm) according to package directions. Drain, rinse under cold water, and set aside.
- Meanwhile, in a large skillet or Dutch oven, brown the beef, sausage, onion, and garlic over medium-high heat until no pink remains. Drain any fat.
- Stir in the pasta sauce, tomato paste, Italian seasoning, ½ teaspoon of salt, and ¼ teaspoon of black pepper. Simmer uncovered over medium heat for 5 minutes or until slightly thickened. Taste and season with additional salt if desired.
- In a separate medium bowl, combine 1 ½ cups mozzarella cheese, ¼ cup parmesan cheese, ricotta, parsley, egg, and ¼ teaspoon salt.
- Spread 1 cup of the meat sauce in a 9×13 pan or casserole dish. Top it with 3 lasagna noodles. Layer with 1 cup of the ricotta cheese mixture and 1 cup of meat sauce. Repeat twice more. Finish with 3 noodles topped with remaining sauce.
- Cover with foil and bake for 45 minutes.
- Remove the foil and sprinkle the top of the lasagna with 2 ½ cups mozzarella cheese and ¼ cup Parmesan cheese. Bake uncovered for an additional 15 minutes or until browned and bubbly. Broil for 2-3 minutes if desired.
- Rest for at least 15 minutes before cutting.
Video
Notes
- Ricotta cheese can be replaced with cottage cheese.
- Use all beef (or even ground turkey) in place of sausage if needed. If using all beef, add ½ teaspoon Italian seasoning to the meat (and ¼ teaspoon fennel seeds if desired).
Nutrition Information
Nutrition information provided is an estimate and will vary based on cooking methods and brands of ingredients used.
Course Casserole, Main Course, Pasta
Cuisine Italian© SpendWithPennies.com. Content and photographs are copyright protected. Sharing of this recipe is both encouraged and appreciated. Copying and/or pasting full recipes to any social media is strictly prohibited. Please view my photo use policy here.
I made this for my nan’s birthday dinner! I followed the exact recipe and it turned out amazing! everyone kept saying how great it was! Thank you for sharing this recipe :)
So happy this recipe was a hit for you, Cassidy! I hope Nan had a great birthday dinner :)
I found the recipe very easy to follow. And had just the right amount of cheese mixture and meat sauce. It was a big hit with my family! My son even had seconds! Will definitely be making it again!
GOOD
1 Star for directions. The first time I made it, I used 2 C ricotta cheese, parsley and one egg. Thinking “Boy! this cheese doesn’t spread at all well.”
The second time I made it: 2 C Ricotta, parsley, egg and 1 1/2 C mozzarella cheese- as found in the recipe.
The third time I made it I added more meat.
I used oven ready lasagna, so I added 1.5 C water per the box directions.
This is a hard recipe to follow for an easy dish! Be careful.
Oh no, sorry to hear that, LeiAloha. You will want to make the meat sauce and the cheese mixture then layer as follows: 1 cup meat sauce, 3 noodles, 1/3 cheese mixture, and repeat on that order until out of the cheese mixture. To finish off the lasagna, top with 3 noodles and the remaining sauce, then sprinkle with cheese. I hope that helps!
Easy and delicious recipe.
Measurments are all wrong, with only a half a pound of each meat and 45oz of pasta sause there wasnt nearly enough for 4 layers of meat. The measurments called out dor the cheese mixture barley made enough for 2 layers and the reciped expected to make 3 layers of cheese. And finally the lasagna noodles dont take up nearly enough space to only use 3 sheets for a single layer, there was still plenty of gaps left. Judging by the video it seems that the measurments written down don’t actually match the recpie, an absolute headace following this recipe.
I’m sorry to hear that you didn’t enjoy the lasagna Red. We love it, as do most readers. We have found the recipe works as written, and the measurements are the same as is used in the video. If you have a differing pan size, you may need to adjust the layering to cover your pan.
What kind of store bought pasta sauce can I use? Where I’m from I can buy “pasta” sauce or “marinara” sauce does it matter? Thanks
Hi Gillian, I would use pasta sauce for this recipe. It tends to be a bit thicker than marinara sauce. But either should produce delicious results.
I absolutely LOVE this recipe, as does my family! Because my husband is lactose intolerant, I use Lactose Free Cottage cheese and mozzarella cheese.
Last time, I doubled the recipe and froze one. Is it possible to bake it from frozen or should I definitely thaw in the refrigerator?
Thank you. I never leave reviews but this is fantastic!
Thank you so much for leaving a review Caroline, I’m glad you loved the recipe! Lasagna can be baked from frozen and should be baked covered about 90 minutes at 375°F. Remove the foil and place a butter knife in the center to ensure it is heated throughout (depending on the shape/size of the pan you might need a few minutes more). You can broil a couple of minutes to brown the cheese if needed. You will still need to let the lasagna rest before serving. Let us know how it goes!
do i need to bake first then freeze??
Hi Samara, This dish freezes well either before or after baking!
I never do reviews, however, EVERYONE loved it. So give it a try.
Thank you so much for coming back and leaving a review Elle. so glad everyone loved it!
Hey there, we just premade this lasagna to stick in the oven later for dinner (around 3 hrs from now) and realized we forgot to precook the noodles… oops. Are we totally screwed?
If you leave the pasta overnight I know they can be uncooked but I haven’t tried it after just a few hours (while it will be firm, I do think it will work ok). If your sauce was really thick, you might like to add a little bit of water (maybe ¼ cup) on top and cover tightly it as it cooks which will help steam the pasta. Uncover and poke the lasagna with a butter knife to see if the past has softened. I haven’t actually tried but keeping my fingers crossed, I think you’ll be ok!! Let us know how it goes!
Great recipe! My family loved it.
This is the third time I make this and it is so good !
This was a super easy recipe and delicious! I did add a few extra spices to it but overall stuck to the recipe. Family loved it
What temp do I cook this at
This cooked at 350°F.
This is a pretty generic recipe. Not a huge fan.
Super easy recipe!! Tweaked it a little with some different seasonings but still on point
If you mess this recipe up, you weren’t meant to cook
So glad you enjoyed it Maddie!
This was only my husband and I’s first time having/making homemade lasagna… but i can’t imagine it gets better than this! Absolutely Delicious! We added one more pound of Italian sausage to make it extra meaty and a little more sauce to make up for it and it was perfect!!
I made an altered version using crumbled tofu , sauteed eggplant,zucchini added in with Hamburg, onion and garlic . Quick and easy to follow definetly glad I read a recipe . Had no tin foil so improvised with a second pan for covering . The way she showed you how to create layers was really easy to read real quick then go get down to cooking very clever idea !
I tried this recipe today and was quite skeptical because of some comments, and also because for me this was a new way of making lasagne (no white sauce, adding riccota etc)
However, I have got to say I love how its turned out!
I followed the recipe as it is except for the following switch ups:
Increase meat amount to 1.5 kilos
Increased pasta sauce to 40 oz
Included a sprinkling of mushrooms sauteed with onions and garlic
The taste is so fulfilling, thanks for sharing a simple enough and tasty recipe!
I look fwd to making it the next time exactly as the recipe has listed.
I gave it 4 ☆ just b/c of my own personal tastes. That said, this is one of the BEST BASE RECIPE out there. Both the method, and base ingredients are great. I was a suprised by the 4 layers over the often listed 3 layers in other recipes. But it works out perfectly. I bake as directed up to the very last step where you add the top layer of mozzrrella & parmesan. For that part, I turn the oven up to 375, when I remove the foil and add on the last layer of mozzarella and parmesan
Like other reviewers, I like the meat sauce increased to almost double, using: 2 lb beef ( or beef/Italian sausage mix) keep the 1 medium onion diced. Use 3 to 4 fat cloves . UP the marinara to the 48 oz option Maybe a little more if needed. ( I serve more marinara on the side as well.
I too, double the cheese mixture. But that is just my personal taste If you do not increase the amt (s) in the meat & cheese layer be very careful about how much you use on each layer …you may run out if being generous on 1st 2 layers
I also like a few( 3 to 4ish, depending on size) torn leaves of fresh basil added into the cheese mixture. But I grow basil, so I may be biased
One tip: If using no boil noodles you may need 1/4 to 1/2 C water or more marinara.. to prevent the dryness that some who used no boil noodles had.
You can tweak the recipe to your own liking. HOWEVER when you share ” your” tweaked version It would be only fair to give this source OR AT LEAST say ” Inspired by “spendwithpennies.com. or # this site.
Your additions sound delicious. Thank you for sharing your tips with us!