Lasagna Rollups with Homemade Pasta

Egg Pasta

4 cups of flour 

1/4 cup (or more) milk

1 tablespoon olive oil

4 eggs

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon italian seasoning

In a very large bowl, mix 3 cups flour, milk, oil, eggs, salt and seasonings.  Mix to make a soft dough.  Add more milk or flour if necessary.  Cover and refrigerate.  

Set up the pasta machine with its rollers, and sprinkle some flour on your work surface where the roll of pasta will come out. 

Take a ball of dough about the size of a lemon, and then roll first through the thickest setting, and then progressively through the thinner settings until you are at the second thinnest setting.  Cut pasta into 6” lengths.  Start with the next ball of dough.  It should make approximately 30 6” lengths of pasta.

 Meat and Spinach Filling 

• Four cups of fresh ground meat (beef/pork/veal/italian sausage).  
• 1 cup panko breadcrumbs
• 1 cup of cooked spinach  (A package of fresh spinach will cook down to a cup)
• 2 tablespoons fresh basil
• 1 ¼ teaspoons nutmeg (or, and this is better, grate half a nutmeg)  
• 1 ¼ teaspoons pepper
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 eggs, added when the meat and spinach are no longer hot.
• 1 cup parmesan cheese
• 6 cups (48 oz) of marinara sauce (or your favorite canned pasta sauce)
• 1 cup parmesan, grated
• 2 cups mozza cheese, grated

Sauté meat, garlic and onions till brown, remove from heat and drain off most of the fat.  Add bread crumbs, spinach, basil, nutmeg, salt and pepper to the meat.  Mix till blended and let cool slightly.  Once the mixture is no longer hot, add eggs and parmesan.

Preheat oven to 350 F.  Oil two 9 x 13” casserole dishes. Pour one cup of marinara sauce in the bottom of each casserole dish.  Spoon 3 tablespoons of the meat filling along one of the 6” edges of the pasta, rollup like an enchilada and place lengthwise into the casserole dishes (2 x 8), and keep going till you run out of pasta, filling or space.  Top each casserole dish with two cups of sauce and sprinkle with parmesan and mozza.  Bake for 30 to 40 minutes.