Craving Lasagne

All the cold rainy weather we've been having made me crave lasagne.  We invited our friends, George and Nancy, to join us for dinner Sunday and I spent the day in the kitchen.

I baked a loaf of crusty bread.

I assembled the lasagne: lots of homemade sauce (there's nothing worse than dry lasagne); ricotta blended with an egg, parsley, salt & pepper; mushrooms; sausage; and mozzarella cheese.  I sprinkled some Parmesan on top and set it aside to go in the oven when they arrived.

Dessert took a long time.  I should have realized that a three page recipe was going to be time consuming.  The crust was lightly perfumed with lemon zest and rich with egg yolks; a layer of crushed petit buerre cookies and a boat-load of apples and calvados-soaked raisins then filled the pan; then a custard was poured over the whole thing and baked.  A dusting of powdered sugar before serving and, voila, dessert.

Brett took a double serving of lasagne to start and went back for seconds.  I guess it turned out alright.