Crock Pot Lasagna
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This crock pot lasagna recipe features the delicious lasagna flavors you already know and love, but in an easier format thanks to the beloved slow cooker.
I am a HUGE lasagna fan. It was one of the first suppers I “cooked” as a kid, although I didn’t actually do anything. Mama would assemble a lasagna the night before and put it in the fridge, uncooked. Since lasagna takes so long to cook, my job was getting it in the oven when I got home from school so it would be ready in time for supper.
Whenever I make a lasagna today, I make mine in the crockpot. There is no need to cook the noodles ahead of time and I usually have pre-cooked ground beef in my freezer. So it’s just a matter of assembling it in the morning and turning the slow cooker on. Easy weeknight dinners like this are my favorite! My husband comes home to a delicious smelling house and all I have to do is serve it up. If you’ve never made crock pot lasagna, you may find yourself making it this way from here on out!
Featuring the pasta sauce of your choice, lasagne sheets, cooked ground beef, lots of mozzarella cheese, and cottage cheese, rest assured this simple crock pot lasagne recipe has those quintessential creamy cheesy and tomato-based lasagna flavors.
Recipe Ingredients
- Spaghetti sauce of your choice
- asagna noodles
- Cooked ground beef
- ozzarella cheese
- Cottage cheese
How to Make Crock Pot Lasagna
In a medium bowl, stir together both kinds of cheese.
If you haven’t browned your beef yet, now is the time to brown and drain any grease from it.
Now let’s assemble our lasagna!
Spread a layer of sauce in the bottom of your slow cooker (I use a 6-quart slow cooker for this recipe). Sprinkle about 1/3 of your ground beef over that followed by the cheese mixture. Then add more sauce. Break up the uncooked lasagna noodles to cover this (see photo) and then repeat until all of your ingredients are used.
I usually end up with three layers. For cooking, I end with sauce on top.
Cook this on low for 6-7 hours.
I like to top with more cheese right before serving, but if your brood isn’t as into cheese as mine, you don’t have to add any more.
My husband likes cheese so much that his beloved grandmother used to always accuse him of being part rat!
Put this crock pot lasagna recipe on the menu as soon as you can! You won’t regret it.
Storage
- Store leftovers in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 5 days. Simply reheat in the microwave.
- You can also freeze lasagna leftovers for up to 3 months. Thaw in the fridge before reheating in the microwave.
Recipe Notes
- If you don’t want cottage cheese you can substitute it for ricotta cheese. Go with what makes you happy! Those are the only substitutions I’ve ever made myself to this recipe so I can’t recommend any others.
- You can also add half the shredded mozzarella cheese and half parmesan cheese, or serve your lasagna with parmesan cheese or your favorite .
- To help your lasagna come out prettier, alternate which direction each noodle layer goes. Trust me on this! You can see a demonstration of this in the photos above.
- If you’re cooking your ground beef, feel free to saute the beef with chopped onion (or green onion), , and 2 tablespoons of minced garlic to add some flavor.
- You can substitute the ground beef for ground chicken, ground pork, or ground turkey if you like. You could also use in this .
- While you can use gluten-free lasagna noodles, they can become mushier than traditional noodles.
- When I say use the pasta sauce of your choice, I mean it! Maybe you like marinara sauce, , or want to make homemade pasta sauce? The choice is yours.
- Want to add some vegetables to your ? You’re going to want to finely chop whatever you add and saute it with the beef until tender. Options include carrot, celery, zucchini, squash, eggplant, or sweet bell pepper.
Recipe FAQs
What do you serve with crockpot lasagna?
This slow cooker lasagna is the main dish as is. But if you like, serve it with some garlic bread, homemade dinner rolls, or a simple green salad or Caesar salad.
You may also enjoy these pasta recipes:
Low Carb Lasagna Stuffed Chicken
Ingredients
- 1 box regular lasagna noodles
- 16 oz cottage cheese
- 2 lbs ground beef cooked and drained
- 2 cans spaghetti sauce 26 ounces each
- 2 cups mozzarella cheese
- 1-2 cups additional mozzarella cheese to top before serving optional but wonderful
Instructions
- First, cook the ground beef if needed. Then in a medium bowl, stir together the two kinds of cheese until well combined.16 oz cottage cheese, 2 lbs ground beef, 2 cups mozzarella cheese
- Spoon a layer of sauce into the bottom of the crockpot. Add about 1/3 of the cheese mixture on top. Sprinkle a small amount of ground beef over the top of the cheese. Top with a layer of uncooked lasagna noodles, breaking to make them fit. Be sure to alternate which way the noodles go with each layer. Top noodles with another layer of sauce. Repeat this process until all ingredients are used, ending with sauce.1 box regular lasagna noodles, 16 oz cottage cheese, 2 lbs ground beef, 2 cans spaghetti sauce, 2 cups mozzarella cheese
- Cover and cook on low for 6 to 8 hours. You can also cook it on high for about 2.5 to 3 hours. It cuts better (prettier) if you turn off the slow cooker and let it sit for about 15 minutes before serving.
- If desired, top with another layer of mozzarella before serving.1-2 cups additional mozzarella cheese to top before serving
Nutrition
Thoughts on putting this together the night before and putting in the frig overnight! Bad idea?
I’ve never done it but I think it would be fine 🙂
Crockpot meals are so convenient. I’m sure gonna try this!
My family has always loved lasagna. I grew up in a military family and spent 3 years in Italy as a child. My first time cooking it for my husband he was not wanting to eat it. He grew up with a lot of German food & had never had lasagna. When he found out it had cottage cheese in it he refused to eat it. So I made him a bologna sandwich & I ate the lasagna in front of him. By the end of the day he had eaten most of a 9X13″ casserole dish of lasagna. True story. He still loves lasagna.
That is too funny!! I am glad you were able to convert him!!
My Mother made a wonderful raisin pie and had baked one for us and one for my Uncle. It was raining cats and dogs when my Dad and I jumped in the car with the pie contained in a Rubbermaid container. We turned into my Uncles driveway and someone had dug a big ditch at the entrance. My Dad slammed on the brakes,the pie went flying so we went home changed out the pies,gave my Uncle the good pie,came home where everyone grabbed a spoon and dug into the messed up pie. We got to laugh about that for years,
As a kindergartner I really tried to be helpful, and I loved our Friday meals of fish (RC) and Spinach with hard boiled eggs sliced on top. I’ve rarely seen it presented that way outside of my family home, but I learned my mother liked it due to my older sisters frequent anemia (watching their figure they skipped meals and their iron intake suffered). I just loved the eggs, I could do without the spinach at that age.
One Friday afternoon I took a dozen eggs in that pressed cardboard 3×4 container and set them in the oven – no cookie tin, no pan beneath them. I reached up over the stove and turned the oven to broil – all I knew to do. Then I went outside to play. My mother came home about 20 minutes later with the ingredients for our Friday dinner and opened the door to smoke in the kitchen. I was learning how to ride a bicycle so I was oblivious to all of this.
My mother cleaned up the mess, started dinner, and then asked me (how did she know) if I tried to help cook the eggs for dinner. That was the first I learned that I was not to touch the oven without her watching. I never thought about that event until I finished college and we reminisced about cooking ‘adventures’. I shared my “I like to clean the fridge and make soup” story admitting I had to eat some rather difficult soups only to have my mother ask me if I remembered my first foray into cooking. I thought sitting with my sisters and mother admitting to my soup errors was humbling enough, I get reminded of my love of “Oven-boiled Eggs” each time we get together in a kitchen!
LOL, I think we all have that ONE story that we will never live down 🙂
One of my early cooking experiences was learning to make biscuits and gravy – I hadn’t been allowed by my step-mother to cook at home (I might mess up her kitchen – LOL) so the only experience I had was from my home ec classes. I could read a cookbook but the gravy recipe didn’t sound like what I was used to watching my Grandma and sister-in-law make so I decided to ‘wing it’. I did follow the recipe for the biscuits (I thought) but although they came out looking beautiful they were hard as a rock (they were so bad my sweet boxer dog kindly took them from me when offered and promptly buried them – LOL). And the gravy -OMG – you could literally cut it into wedges. My goodness – what a mess. it took several (SEVERAL) tries before I finally got it edible for humans. When my dog FINALLY accepted a biscuit and sat down and ate it right then and then lapped up the gravy instead of chewing it, I served it to my husband. He said except for needing a little salt it was wonderful (my grandkids still request biscuits and gravy for breakfast whenever they are visiting and they are grown). That was about 1979 and I bet there are spots in the yard where we lived at that time that still won’t grow grass – spots about the size of a biscuit.
Oh my goodness, thank you so much for sharing that and for the chuckle it gave me!!!
This is a beauty!!! I have a good crock pot lasagna, but it doesn’t hold together as nicely as this one! Gonna have to try yours! Thanks for sharing on Meal Plan Monday!
This Crock Pot Lasagna will be on my supper list this week! Probably 25 years ago I made an Apple Crisp. I had some Squeeze Parkay that I used instead of cutting up pats of stick butter. After tasting the Apple Crisp we all knew something was a little off. I had used Garlic Squeeze Parkay! It actually didn’t taste that bad!! LOL