Lentil & Eggplant Lasagna

My lentils never softened even though I used a larger jar of sauce I had on hand. I added more water after realizing it wasn’t working, but that didn’t make a difference. I still assembled and put in oven with a generous amount of mushrooms. I’m sure I will still eat it though lol.

Huge birthday dinner hit! Instead of making the ricotta cheese I used Kite Hill’s and added basil, oregeno and garlic powder (eye-balled the amount). I made my own marinara with locally sourced tomato sauce, basil, oregano, garlic and onion powder and again guessed on the amounts.

I loved the parmesan and used it to top a ceasar salad, along with pine nuts. We use Farmer’s Ceasar dressing. It was a lovely meal with leftovers for tonight!

Wow! I’m impressed with this. I try and eat DF/GF, but sometimes you just miss things and make exceptions. None needed here! I used fresh gf lasagna noodles from Whole Foods because it sounded fun, and I cubed/roasted zucchini and eggplant for a layer on top of the tofu ricotta. I also added a tiny bit of df sour cream to the tofu for texture/flavor. And I added onion/garlic/peppers/mushrooms to the sauce (sautéing before adding the lentils), because I always do.
Your instructions were great, and I would proudly serve this to meat eaters/vegetarians.

My new staple veggie lasagne recipe!

I went a bit rogue on the recipe and did roasted eggplant, zucchini and capsicum as well as lasagna noodles.

I DIY’d the marinara sauce and fried an onion, garlic and mushrooms before adding passata and the red lentils.

And finally I added cashews to the tofu ricotta to give it a bit more creaminess.

Even with all my modifications it still worked beautifully. Thanks MB!

Made this with the Almond Ricotta and it was super tasty and felt so healthy. Compared to making a meat lasagne it also felt like a bit less effort so I am definitely sticking with this. I’d be proud to serve this at a gathering as a main entre.

Delicious textures!

I don’t know where I went wrong, but my lasagna looked not that great. Didn’t matter, though – it was the most delicious thing I’ve had in awhile. I threw some breadcrumbs on top when baking and it tasted like eggplant parmesan lasagna.

The prep time was significantly longer and could be cut down by cooking the lentils sooner. I’ll remember that for next time. I will definitely be making this again.

Loved this, thanks for these yummy recipes!😊

This is one of those recipes that I often get out if I’m trying to impress guests, and it never fails! Absolutely delicious.

My only feedback would be that it normally takes me about 2 hours start to finish. Even when everything is ready to go into the oven at the end, it’s an hour before you can eat it!

I think given the timings, step 5 could actually move to step 2, as when I follow these instructions exactly the aubergine is cooked way before the lentils, where if you started the lentils first they’d be done at about the same time.

Anyway, amazing recipe, thank you!

AHHHmazing! Assembled yesterday and cooked tonight for dinner. I let the lasagna come to room temperature a bit while oven was reheating. I made exactly as the recipe suggests but may have cooked my eggplant a bit longer to make sure it was nice and tender. Would definitely make again and I am looking forward to leftovers this week! Thanks for the recipe!!

I think this is my first time to give less than 5 stars on this website! The recipes are THAT GOOD!!! This one won’t make the repeat list and I think for me it came down to texture. I don’t recommend the eggplant. If I made it again it would be with the lasagna noodles and I’d add other things to pump up texture and flavor. Mushrooms, a little tamari, red pepper flakes. It was mealy and mushy and lacked flavor. But thank you; you really do have the best vegan recipes on the planet.

The amazing Minimalist Baker does it again! Flipp’in Fantastic!! The tofu ricotta was rich, creamy and flavorful. Everyone ❤️ it.
I did a few additions…added Gluten Free no boil lasagna noodles, sliced zucchini (on top of eggplant) and one layer of Mikoso Cashew Mozzarella cheese. Cooked for about 45 minutes covered, another 20 minutes uncovered. When I served, ladle some sauce over each piece. Can’t wait to make it again!

WOW was this delicious! I mostly followed the recipe as written but decided to saute red and yellow pepper and mix them into the red sauce after the lentils were cooked. I then added just a little more sauce and it was deeeeelicious! I can’t wait to serve this to company. I serviced it with a salad and garlic bread. Gotta go – reheating for lunch now:)

Because of the many 5-star ratings, I forced myself to try this recipe. (Most things don’t sound very appealing post-COVID but normally I’d love something like this.) So glad I did! I don’t eat tofu so swapped out for cashew (kinda combined your cashew ricotta recipe and this one.) I’m also a lazy eggplant “prepper” (or I’d never eat eggplant) Didn’t do the pre-salting/squeezing step. Still fabulous – looking forward to leftovers!!

I can never seem to find fresh basil at my local store, but I found the kind that’s sold in a tube like a paste? I’ve never purchased that before but it seemed to work well in the recipe. Also, I haven’t entirely cut dairy from my diet so I used regular parmesan cheese (the first time I ever made this I used the powdery kind the recipe calls for, but this time I used shredded parm in both the tofu layer and on top, and I still really loved the way it came out!)

I love this recipe. It is healthy and pact full of protein. All the recipes I have tried of Minimalist Baker are always good so I know when I try a recipe I haven’t used before, it will be good. Thank you.

So good! I used half noodles and half eggplant and the non-vegans were impressed. I even got one grudging “I think it’s better than the normal kind”. I also managed to use 16 oz of firm tofu and really squeezed the water out of it. It’s involved but totally worth it. Thank you!!

Made this as written and it was delish! Reheated well for lunch the next day as well. The tofu ricotta was so good and so simple!!

One piece of feedback I would give is that I think marinara is no longer sold in 28oz jars. Most of the jars in my grocery store were either 24 or 25 ounces. I used the 24oz and made no other adjustments and it turned out just fine.

This was really good, but took me much longer than was indicated. I don’t think I will be motivated enough to make the whole thing again. But I will keep the tofu ricotta recipe, which is flavourful AND easy/quick! Thank you Dana.

This recipe was pretty good, I do plan to reuse the ricotta tofu on a flat bread vegan pizza recipe. The only downfall for us was the eggplant skin, it seemed to have been tough and almost plastic like after roasting / baking. If I was to redo this recipe I’d either do pasta noodles or peel the skin on my eggplant. Either than that, very tasty and filling.

Yet another win from minimalist baker! My carnivore parents even dug into this dish! I didn’t make the Parmesan cheese (lazy) and I skipped the entire salting/rinsing eggplant thing (lazy) (I still dried the eggplant slices but just pushing them between two towels with my hands as hard as I could) and it turned out great! I don’t feel like it would have needed any Parmesan it’s so good as is. I’ll definitely be making this another staple in the house. My lentil/marinara kept drying out so I had to add a little more marinara—when she says in the instructions to keep stirring she means it! Keep stirring lol

I made this with regular wheat no-boil noodles, and the lasagna turned out a bit dry and salty – and when I say dry, I mean the meal as a whole, because the noodles themselves were soft as they should be. Not the recipe’s fault, though, as I oversalted it, and the recipe specifically tells you to boil the noodles.

However, if anyone wants to make this with no-boil noodles like me, I would recommend not boiling the noodles and instead adding a bit of water to the marinara sauce. I added some, but it wasn’t quite enough. That said, it wasn’t a disaster by any means – I decided to serve it with gravy, and everyone loved it. So the recipe itself is perfect, just make sure to add water to the sauce if you use wheat no-boil noodles :-)

I love this recipe! I have made it twice now and it was gone within a few days both times (and my non vegan consumers were happy with the creamy results!). I made the ricotta ahead the second time otherwise it a bit to make everything at one time. I added more basil and a scoop of miso to the risotto for extra flavor. I also found my lentils needed to cook for more like 25-30 minutes and I added extra water the second time to compensate and that turned out more moist. Thanks for the great recipe!

I’ve made this twice and it’s definitely time consuming for all the prep but it’s soooo cozy and delicious! My family and I absolutely love it. So great on macros as well.

YAS this was so delicious on all fronts. Flavor, texture, tasting like the real deal… mmmm. So good. I sautéed onion and garlic with the tomato sauce and did Beyond meat instead of lentils. Made a double batch of this cause I could tell it’d be something we could eat for days and I was right. Husband and so both agreed this will be in our fall and winter mix for food now.

My boyfriend is gluten free and we both try to stay dairy free- which is difficult when Italian food is so delicious! I’d been craving lasagna for a while when I came across this recipe.

The whole thing took quite some time to prepare, hopefully we are faster the next time we make it!

I really hate the taste of nutritional yeast so I added a tablespoon of miso like some people in the comments suggested and the ricotta was perfect! I didn’t have any oregano so I used two tablespoons of Penzey’s Italian Herb mix (oregano, basil, marjoram, rosemary and thyme) to really boost the Italian flavors.

Before putting the eggplant in the oven we dusted it with roasted garlic powder for more depth which I definitely recommend.

For the sauce I lightly fried up a shallot and two cloves of garlic for even more flavor and added hot chili flakes. Once those flavors got going I added the lentils and store bought marinara. I also added some mushrooms for extra meatiness.

As I was assembling the lasagna I felt like I didn’t have enough of the yummy marinara so maybe make extra if you want your dish extra saucy.

Sometimes vegan/vegetarian lasagnas can be watery and mushy but this dish held its shape pretty well and had just the right texture.

This recipe was fantastic and I can’t wait to make it again!

I LOVE this recipe and the ricotta recipe; both are DELICIOUS!! I did alter the lasagna recipe to include vegan mozzarella, though. I will definitely make this again with the parmesan! Thanks for sharing!

Wanna let y’all know that if those are red lentils in the picture of the lentil marinara, they aren’t cooked all the way and can cause flatulence. Red lentils if cooked properly completely loose shape and get mushy. The reason they did not cook all the way is because you cannot cook lentils in tomato sauce. Too acidic. I cooked mine in water and added it to marinara after trying your method and was left with a big pot of wasted homemade marinara with uncooked lentils 😩.

I’ve made this a couple times and even my meat loving dad consistently compliments it. Lovely recipe, thank you for this welcome addition to the dinner recipe rotation :)

I’m a vegan who just made this for her omnivorous family, and they adored it. I didn’t have any nooch so I brightened the tofu ricotta with rice vinegar and white miso, I omitted the vegan parmesan, and I made your marinara recipe with canned tomatoes. It turned out fantastic, thank you!

Made this for Mother’s Day for my wife and mother-in-law, and it totally stole the show! I was out of nutritional yeast so I subbed it with miso paste (2tbs). Was afraid that this would pull away from other Italian-inflected ingredients (oregano, marinara), but it just gave the dish a tang that sang with the slightly bitter eggplant–just beautiful!

I LOVE this recipe and have been making it for the last year but only just getting around to commenting. This recipe actually made me like eggplant after some shocking experiences! I’m not Vegan so just use dairy-based ricotta, but gosh it is honestly AMAZING. ‘Comfort’ food at its best.

I made this last night and it’s amazing!

For some reason, the page won’t accept my 5-star rating. If you’re able to add it to this review on my behalf, please do. =)

Best. Recipe. EVER!!! OMG it is sooo goooooood. I’m telling all my friends about it. Thank you so much!

Wow. I’m currently self-isolating to due to quarantine and on my own. This is the highlight of my week. Fantastic flavors and texture. I used home-made marinara sauce I had in the freezer from a large batch I made a while back. I also added a shallot and mushrooms to the lentil “bolognese”. My final results was not as well set as the photo, but perhaps it was down to my layering, or because the pan I used was too large (the only one I had on hand). Not a problem. It was so good.

I just did this recipe without the lentils (started as zucchini lasagna, but my zucchinis were a bit too old) and it was amazing! Definitely took longer, around 2,5 hours (I made the vegan parmesan also), and though it was a bit watery, it tasted great. Thank you!

Howdy. The red lentils didn’t soften at all until I added about a quart of water to the sauce. Only then did they cook up. (Maybe old lentils?) Now we have the start of a fantastic soup. Next time I will cook the lentils before adding to the marinara. I broke out our reserve jar of marinara and made your lasagna roll ups instead. Yum! Thanks. Will definitely try this lasagna again!

We made this dish last night (along with the chocolate muffins OMG). It was fantastic. Definitely a bit longer to prep but it came out wonderful. I didn’t have vegan parmesan but will try that the next time. The tofu ricotta was so good. We’ll be enjoying the leftovers today!

Dana,
Where to I begin?
Firstly THANK YOU for changing my life for the better.
You have opened my eyes up to a diet with nutrition, flavour and excitement for cooking.
I made this lasagna last night. My goodness I couldn’t stop making sounds about how awesome it tasted.
Thank you for your constant satisfying and tasty recipes.

This was delicious! I have lots leftover and will look forward to eating it for the next few days. Yum!
Thank you for all your great recipes!

I made this for my carnivore family. They loved it! My hubby even asked me to make more so that he can take it for lunch. :)
My only point would be to perhaps cut the eggplants a bit thicker or reduce baking time. Maybe it’s just my oven, but I found that the eggplant slices became quite thin and dried up after the 425 in the oven, and it stuck to my baking sheet. I think I will try to cut it a bit thicker and reduce time/heat next time.
Thank you for this healthy alternative!

Just made this tonight – amazing! I agree with the other posters regarding the prep time, you need a solid two hours. I followed your instructions as written to get the water out of the eggplant and tofu – both turned out amazing. The end result was not watery at all but very well set. I added some sauteeed/browned onions and mushrooms. We used actual parmesan for the tope and I added two tablespoons of kirkland pesto to the tofu ricotta instead of the oil and basil, kept the lemon juice and nutritional yeast. Great dish! My husband had no idea the ricotta was tofu and he loved how the lentils made the sauce “meaty”. Thanks for a great recipe! I made my first tart today, a lemon curd tart with homemade short crust, so we had what felt like quite an indulgent meal but I know the eggplant lasagna was packed with good stuff!

This is amazingly good! I dare say that I prefer it to traditional lasagna.
I am a new vegan and am so grateful to you for all of your vegan recipes!

Amazing how the texture of the eggplant is so similar to pasta! And the cheese substitute is awesome too!

My new go-to! SO DELICIOUS. I also layer in some spinach just because

I was torn with which eggplant recipe of yours to try for my eggplant lovin’ vegan friend last nite and ended up with this one. It was sooo delicious-she asked if she could take some home with her!! I made it with your 1-pot Marinara instead of store bought so I started that before the eggplant prep. I served it with your lemony Arugula Salad w/ Crispy Shallots which complimented the lasagna well. I turn to your recipes often because your detailed instruction gives me confidence to try them. I love that you post photos of the process and the videos help a lot too!!! Look forward to making it again, thanks so much!

This recipe was amazing!! It firmed up into such a solid, flavour packed casserole. It did take me about 1 hr prep time not 30 min as the recipe suggests however I’m new to eggplant and I used green lentils because I already had them on hand. The green lentils took a solid 40-45 min to cook in the tomato sauce but turned out wonderfully. I started with a plain tomato sauce and added my own herbs, spices, and salt. I also swapped the tofu ricotta for the cashew cheese filling from your simple vegan lasagna adding basil, it worked perfectly! Will definitely be making this one again just prepping ahead of time.
Paired with your Green Salad with Lemon Dressing and some toasted sourdough you have a gourmet vegan meal that my omnivore family loved! Thank you Minimalist Baker!

This dish is a hit! I made it for a small potluck with meat-eaters and veggie people alike, and it was gone by the end of the night. The tofu ricotta is perfect and the lentils/red sauce combo is delicious too. My only criticism is that I made an extra batch to freeze, and when I cooked it the eggplant got very tough and honestly not edible. I had to throw it away. I would recommend baking and eating the dish fresh.

After a semi long day, I did end up making this fairly quick and easy recipe. After several bites, I totally forgot this was vegan and the ricotta like texture was tofu! It was so great and I feel great afterwards.

I’ve made this before (loved it), but have recently suffered a heart attack, and can’t eat salt. Please note that salting eggplant makes it VERY SALTY, which can’t be washed away. I washed & drained, but it was so salty that I had to throw it away. Next time I’ll skip the salt part.

I am not a vegan, but my hubby and I loved this recipe. I did take me about 2.5 hrs to make, and was a bit labor-intensive. But definitely worth it. I used real parmesan, not the vegan variety.

LOVE THIS!!! I used lentil lasagna pasta (no boil) and layered the lentil lasagna, tofu ricotta, spinach, and roasted eggplant and smothered it all with my hubby’s family pasta sauce ( I didn’t do the lentil sauce per the recipe but will have to try it that way sometime). I was told this was the best dinner EVER!!! Thank you so much for continuing to inspire amazing healthy food that is easy to prepare, it’s been life changing for me and my family.

This was amazing and John and I have decided that it would legitimately fool a lot of meat eaters…it tastes, quintessentially, of classic lasagne flavors and was well worth the extra time to squeeze out all the water in the eggplant. This is the longest I’ve ever gone as a vegan and I’d chalk it up to the recipes on this site. I’ve been disappointed in the past about how vegan food turns out or how much sugar or other unhealthy nutrients are used to make vegan food taste healthy. This site has none of that! I’ve tried 5 recipes so far, and every single one has turned out amazing!

This lasagna is delicious. It’s so good that even the biggest plant-based skeptic will be asking for seconds! The only thing you should note before making it is that if you choose to use eggplant instead of noodles, it will take you way longer than 30 minutes for prep. I’ve made this recipe a dozen times now and have never been able to finish all the prep in under an hour. So plan accordingly.

OMG perfecto! I’d be lost without you Dana! I did change it a bit though by preparing the eggplant using your method for eggplant parmigiana. It was loved by all. Thank you.

I have made this recipe at least 3 times now, and the eggplant rollups recipe a couple times as well!! Amazing. Last time I made it I used half eggplant and half zucchini and really rushed the sweating part. It turned out super watery but still delicious.
I have one in the oven right now where I followed all the directions and did lots of eggplant sweating. I doubled the recipe… one thing that could use tweaking is upping the sauce a little more. I did not have quite enough for the top layer and needed to add some more jarred stuff from the fridge. The tofu ricotta is incredible.
This is the perfect dish to serve to non vegans, family gatherings, holidays etc. SO GOOD!
Definitely labour intensive though. Took me almost 2.5 hours start to finish this time. Worth it but not really a casual weekday meal type recipe.

This was absolutely fabulous. I will definitely make this again. Thank you for making and sharing your magic in the kitchen!

Oh man! Made this recipe tonight and it was delicious! Being part of an Italian family, I was spoiled with home cooked meals filled with pasta and cheese. I’ve been trying to cut out dairy and this recipe for tofu ricotta tastes just like the real deal. Thank you.

This has become one of my new fav recipes! As well as my husband’s!

I used the Macadamia Ricotta recipe instead of Tofu… BUT! I couldnt imagine adding three cups of nuts to a dish (WAY too many calories), so I subbed for 2 cups of chickpeas, 1/2 cup of cashews and 1/2 cup of Almonds (Both nuts soaked and dehydrated previously. I Keep them always at hand in my kitchen). Ricotta comes out PERFECT!

Thanks for making adding this new staple to my kitchen!

Absolutely amazing. So glad I took the time to make this. My non vegan family raved about how delicious this was.

Just made this and it was DELISH. I added sweet potato in the marinara sauce to add a bit more veg and flavour. Awesome recipe if you don’t want pasta belly after (so uncomfortable).

This is a delicious recipe – even my most resistant non-vegetarian friends love it! That said, if someone can actually prep the whole thing in 30 minutes I would love to know their secret! Just cutting, sweating, pressing, and cooking the eggplant takes a half an hour. It’s totally worth the effort but prepare for at least 45-60 minutes of prep before you make this dish.

Made this last night! Loved it and got great reviews. Brought a few pieces to share with friends. All have requested the recipe! Another WINNER from this website. I will be bringing this to a family Thanksgiving!

Wonderful recipe! I’m not vegan, so I used ricotta cheese in place of the tofu ricotta cheese and still kept the lemon juice (2 tbsp), 1.5 tbsp fresh basil, 1 tbsp parsley, 1/2 tbsp oregano, olive oil.
And I added mozzarella on the top and broiled it for all the bubbly browny goodness.
I did need to use more sauce for the layering, but that might be because I used green lentils instead of red. Overall, amazing recipe, and the lentils made it extremely filling!

This was an awesome recipe! I’m usually intimidated by anything with multiple steps but it turned out perfect. The texture and flavor are so unbelievably similar to regular cheese lasagna. It’s crazy. It was filling, healthy and delicious. I didn’t quite have enough eggplant so I used noodles for the first layer and I think that actually made it even more substantial. Next time I make it, I’ll definitely go the alternating eggplant and lasagna noodle route again. I also only had 1 tbsp of nutritional yeast and no vegan parmesan cheese and it still tasted fantastic. I’m adding this to my rotation.

On a side note: The only things my toddler has eaten willingly besides PB&J in the past year are your vegan lentil sloppy joes and this. So thank you!

This was awesome!!! The tofu was great instead of fattening dairy or cashews- healthy and creamy! And the lentils made it super meaty. Great vegan dish!

Just made this recipe – definitely adding it to my list of go-to meals! Super easy to make, hearty, healthy, and delicious! Texture is perfect, and tons of protein! Anything with the tofu ricotta is bound to be good!

Made this Delicious -ness! Wish there was a place to post photos! Eating the leftovers for breakfast ;)

I made this and was blown away! Full of flavor and so filling!! Even my cheeseburger loving boyfriend couldnt get enough! Thank you for this amazing recipe!!!