I love a good lasagna for a gathering, holiday, or family meal. Two types of sauce paired with lots of cheese and wild ground sausage.
This is a bit of a haul here, but it's truly worth the work to enjoy a comforting classic, especially on a cold winter's day. Even better, you can make it up to 3 days ahead and chill until ready to bake and serve!
I love making big batches of food. It's perfect for busy chore days, or when unexpected company shows up. It's also truly easy to make big batches of taco meat - it's always better to freeze meal-ready meats instead of raw. Twice baked potatoes will use up your potatoes from the root cellar, and fried rice is a crowd pleaser.
Why You Need This Recipe
- A from-scratch, just like mama used to make, family favourite.
- Use what ya got. From the meat to the cheese to the pasta, it's all easy to substitute.
- Gluten free! Yup, it doesn't have to be complicated to make a delicious gluten-free meal.
Key Ingredients
Meat - sausage adds a great flavour here but you can use any ground meat that's on hand. Just make sure and add seasoning if you are using plain meat instead of sausage.
Marinara - We can our own pasta sauce when tomatoes are plentiful, so that's what I use here.
White sauce - Two sauces for more fun!
Cheese - I prefer to mix up my cheese rather than just straight mozzarella. Use what's in your fridge.
Pasta - Tinkyada is our favourite pasta brand. They are made from brown rice and don't upset our tummies. I do recommend regular lasagna noodles and not the "no boil" type for this one.
How to Make Cast Iron Skillet Lasagna
***See recipe card below for precise measurements and instructions.***
Step 1: Brown the meat and season if necessary. Add to a large bowl to combine with the marinara sauce and set aside. Now your skillet is already greased!
Step 2: Make your béchamel - or just white sauce in my house! A roux gets milk and cream cheese to make a creamy sauce.
Step 3: Cook your noodles according to the package, shaving off a minute or two so they don't fall apart.
Step 4: Let's layer! In your skillet, do half meat sauce, half cheese, half the noodles.
Step 5: Next up is the white sauce, rest of the red sauce, remaining noodles, and remaining cheese.
Step 5: You can either bake now or chill it off for later! Get the details below.
Tips and Tricks
Lasagna is so forgiving that I find game meat adds no change in final product - unlike something like burgers or a roast that you need to change things up a bit. So if you’ve got moose, venison, elk bear, use away! This is a great way to introduce your family to wild game if they aren't used to it.
I find mozzarella to be a bit boring on its own. Do I love making it from my own cow's milk? Yup! It's a super easy cheese. But I like to amp things up by layering it with the other options hanging around the cheese drawer like some Asiago.
We do can our own pasta sauce, but you are free to use whatever jar you prefer (Rao's has clean ingredients, and even Aldi has a sugar-free option with basic ingredients). You can also make a cheater sauce:
- 2 cups tomato paste
- 2 cups water
- 1 tablespoon dried oregano
- 1 tablespoon dried basil
- ¼ cup dried onion flakes
- 1 tablespoon garlic powder
- 2 teaspoons salt
FAQs
Yup - use gluten-free flour in your roux and gluten-free noodles and you are good to go! Just make sure if using a jarred sauce that it doesn't contain gluten. Same goes for any prepackaged sausage you might use as gluten is sometimes in the seasoning.
Absolutely! You can bake this off right after assembling, or you can chill it in the fridge up to 3 days. Just make sure you have plenty of room in the fridge as the pan's handle takes up so much space. I don't necessarily recommend freezing, as then you'd be without your skillet for a while! It's much easier to freeze in a baking dish.
Photos by Dante from Shire by the Sea
More Hearty Family Dinners
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Cast Iron Lasagna
Ingredients
- 1 lb ground venison meat or sausage
- 2 teaspoons seasoned salt if using unseasoned meat
- 4 cups marinara sauce
- ¼ cup butter
- ¼ cup all-purpose flour or GF 1:1 blend
- 2 cups milk
- 4 oz cream cheese
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2-3 cups grated cheese such as mozzarella, cheddar, asiago...
- 8 lasagna noodles prepared according to box directions
Instructions
- In a frying pan, brown your meat. Add seasoned salt if using plain meat rather than sausage.
- While it's browning, measure your marinara into a bowl that will also fit the cooked meat. When it's done, dump the meat into the sauce. If there is more than a few tablespoons of fat I would drain some off first.
- In a small to medium heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium heat, melt butter, then whisk in flour. Add milk and cook, whisking occasionally until bubbly and thickened. Remove from heat and add cream cheese and salt.
- Preheat oven to 400°F.
- In your skillet (already greased from cooking sausage!), spread out half your meat sauce, followed by a scant half of your grated cheese.
- Layer half the noodles. Spend out the creamy sauce on top of the noodles, and then top with your remaining noodles. Spread the rest of your meat sauce out then top with your remaining cheese.
- Cover and chill until ready to use if you're not eating right away, up to 3 days.
- Bake uncovered for 30-40 minutes, until bubbly and browned. Let rest 10 minutes before serving.
Notes
- Use any meat - bear, elk, moose, cow. Seriously, this is super adaptable to any ground red meat. Especially if you are new to wild game, the flavour is covered up by sauce and cheese so it's a great way to use it.
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