Live Lasagna - Fresh, Local, and In Season

I was inspired by this dish when I planted my garden last year.  I had almost everything to make this dish in my garden last year except the cashews and the garlic.  This year I have homegrown garlic too.  I Can't grow the cashews for the cheeze, but in a couple weeks, I will have most all the ingredients for this lasagna ripe and ready.   I bought some tomatoes and peppers from the local produce store for this one.  They were grown in WA, that's as local as I can get right now and in season.  I've been looking forward to tomatoes this year.  I've been pretty good about not buying them out of season. I have some tomatoes and peppers, but they aren't quite ripe yet. 

Live Lasagna

 This is a raw vegetable lasagna using fresh chard leaves, thinly sliced zucchini, portabello mushrooms, and eggplant as lasagna noodles.  I slice them lengthwise and absorb the moisture between paper towels.

Golden Zucchini slices drying

Portabello Slices drying

The cheeze is made with cashews pureed in filtered water and left in a jar overnight. The next day it's added to: diced red bell pepper, fresh basil, oregano, rosemary, cilantro, green onion, garlic, and jalepeño. It's seasoned with sea salt, shoyu, and a dash of crushed red pepper flakes.  It's creamy and zesty and makes a good cheezy filling.

The sauce is very simple, fresh tomatoes, seeded, olive oil, sea salt, shoyu, freshly ground black pepper, and fresh herbs from my garden, basil, oregano, rosemary, and parsley.  I put all but the herbs in the blender and pureed until smooth.  I stirred in the herbs and let it rest awhile.  When my tomatoes ripen, I'll make batches of this sauce and freeze it.

Once I have all three parts prepared, I put it together just like a lasagna in layers.  First the chard leaves, then the zucchini and eggplant slices, half of the cheeze, the mushroom slices, and then sauce.  I repeat this until the pan is full. 

I made some garlic toast with some garlic I roasted in the oven and a dab of olive oil.

Live Lasagna Close Up