Crockpot Cooking: Lasagna

I like making this to take to the covered dish fellowship meal our church has the first Sunday of each month.
I prepare it in the slow cooker Saturday afternoon or evening, put it in the fridge overnight, and it's all ready to go first thing in the morning.

Lasagna

Noodles - almost anything but lasagna noodles
Spaghetti sauce
Cheese of your choice

I wasn't at all on top of my game Saturday night, so I forgot to get pictures until I was halfway done. First I put in a thin layer of spaghetti sauce, then I added a layer of noodles. One thing to remember here - you do not want to cook the noodles completely or they will turn to mush during the slow cooking in the crock pot later on. I cooked these rotini noodles for about 7 minutes this time, I may even cut it to 6 min. next time. We've also used farfalle (bow-tie) pasta and egg noodles. In my opinion, it's not worth the time necessary to try and fit rectangular lasgna noodles in an oval pot. Plus it's much easier for everyone (especially the children) to scoop out what they want when the pasta is already in small pieces.

Then add a layer of sauce. Ours was leftover from the spaghetti we had for supper on Friday.

Then motzerella. I prefer to use the finely shredded stuff when I do this in the crock pot. It melts easier. As you can probably see, I nearly added the cheddar before I took the picture.

And finally, the cheddar and parmesan. I was tired, so I took the easy way out and used the kind in the can though I prefer the taste of the freshly grated much better. As you can see, two complete layers of the noodles, sauce and cheese pretty much filled the pot. I put the lid on, pulled the crock out of the base, and put it in the fridge overnight. About an hour before we left for church, we took it out of the fridge and turned it on high until we were ready to leave. Then once we got to church we turned it on medium high (the 6hr setting on my pot) and it cooked for about 2 hours, until we started setting up for the meal.

You could probably put this in the crock pot at lunch time and it would be ready by supper if you turned it on low.

This is usually a big hit at covered dish meals and I almost never bring any home.