I've always used ricotta in my mix, but I don't see why you couldn't mix the sour cream with the eggs, fresh grated parmesan and mozzarella.

I love the zucchini version of lasagna.

Zucchini Lasagna

2 pounds ground pork
1 onion chopped
1 stalk celery chopped
2 to 3 cloves garlic
Italian parsley
1 to 2 tablespoons basil
1 teaspoon oregano
salt,
pepper
2 cans tomatoes
1/2 cup cream

1 pint ricotta
1/2 cup fresh grated Parmesan cheese
1 egg mixed together.

2 cups shredded mozzarella

2 medium size zucchini sliced into thin rounds

Bechamel Sauce (seasoned with a garlic clove and fresh grated Parmesan)

Directions

Saute onions and celery in olive oil. When tender add the garlic and the ground pork. Cook until meat starts to brown and is no longer pink. Add the salt, pepper, basil, oregano and parsley. Add the cream and simmer until evaporated. Add the tomatoes and simmer for at least one hour.

Spoon meat sauce into the bottom of a deep casserole. Place layer of zucchini over sauce. Top with 1/3 or 1/2 of the ricotta mixture (depending on whether you are making two or three
layers). Sprinkle with mozzarella. Top with more meat sauce and another layer of zucchini. Repeat. Finish with a layer of the meat sauce and then top with the bechamel. Bake in a 375°F oven for 45 to 60 minutes. Cover the top with foil if the lasagna starts to brown to much

Lasagna is more about a method than a recipe. All of your ingredients sound good except for one thing: Moisture. You have lots of moisture and nothing to sop it up with--or, that is, I took this to mean that you want to use zucchini instead of pasta. The pasta is what soaks up the excess moisture, as well as the ricotta (if you use it well drained).

Why does it have to have sour cream? Just because you have it? I think your ingredients sound fine except for the sour cream. The dish is light on protein if you don't use the meat. You could try draining the sour cream, or even adding some heat and acid to separate it from from the whey, but you don't need it to make lasagna.

Okay, this might work if you really want to use the sour cream. Instead of making a tomato sauce, per se, use it to make a cream tomato sauce. Use your thicker canned tomato products, like some whole or diced tomatoes, drained, and some tomato paste.

Recipe-ish:

Slice the zucchini thin, lightly oil with cooking oil, and lightly season. Lay on baking sheets lined with parchment paper and roast or broil at 375-400° (depending on your oven) until well dry and just starting to get dark edges.

Set the sour cream out on the counter to warm up some.

Sauté a couple diced onions (or a giant one like they had at my store the other day), a diced red pepper or two, and 6 large cloves of garlic to a whole head, pressed or minced, depending on your preference as to quantity. Add any of the other vegetables you mentioned, cut to the same size as your onions and pepper--or steam them separately, and mix with dried herbs to use instead of meat. Be generous with the oil, which will help the viscosity of the sauce. Add chopped or dried Italian herbs: a spoon or two of oregano, thyme, basil, parsley, etc., plus some black pepper and, if you like a little heat, crushed red pepper. Stir in a can or two of tomato paste until you have a very stiff chunky sauce. Add the solids from your diced or whole canned tomatoes. Add salt to taste, but there may be plenty in the cans. Remove from heat.

When the sauce has cooled down to no more than slightly warm, stir in the sour cream. Beat in an egg or two.

Do you have any more cheese than the half lb. of mozzarella? Some bread crumbs?

If you have bread crumbs--if this isn't meant to be a starch free dish--toast them on your baking tray. You're just drying them out. Or, if you have matzah meal or matzah (Cuisinart is great for grinding matzah) you can skip the toasting. The bread crumbs are there to soak up moisture and help with the gluing since there isn't much cheese.

If you're making a meat version, brown the ground beef and add seasoning, herbs (try tarragon, for instance) and some tomato paste, or use crushed tomatoes and reduce out the extra water.

If you're using the spinach feta chicken sausage, and it's already cooked, tear it up, or else cook it in crumbles. Make a béchamel, including the nutmeg, and stir the sausage into it. The apple sausage isn't a good idea with tomato.

Or prepare the broccoli, cauliflower, maybe some carrots, and any other veg you want, as stated above, by steaming and dressing with a little olive oil and plenty of dried herbs. S&P to taste. You can use béchamel instead of the oil, but I'm losing track of whether or not there can be wheat in this dish. The trick is to chop small. Bigger than minced, but small enough not to be chunks that need to be chewed separately.

Put a big spoon of sauce, without many chunks in the bottom of the pan and spread it all around, or oil the pan well. Lay out the zucchini slices to cover as much as possible. Spread on the sauce with a soft baking spatula. Sprinkle with bread crumbs, if you're using them, enough cheese to cover but being careful to leave plenty for the layers and a goodly amount for the top.

Add a second layer of zucchini and sauce and a layer of your saucy meat, or steamed veg mix, or another layer of the tomato sauce, bread crumbs and cheese. Repeat the first layer and cap with a fourth layer of zucchini, or go straight to the topping, depending on the height of your dish. You can go five or six layers if you have enough zucchini, filling and dish.

If you have any sauce left, coat the top layer of zucchini with it. If not, slightly dilute some tomato paste with wine and oil until it's just spreadable and use that. Sprinkle with herbs. Cover liberally with the rest of your cheese.

Cover very loosely with foil and bake at 350° for about 35 minutes. Remove the foil and finish baking for another 10-15 minutes until nicely browned and bubbling hot.

An alternative would be to make béchamel (besciamella) out of the sour cream. It's possible. I've done it. But it's so so so easy to make it go wrong and have it curdle or split that I don't really recommend it unless you feel very comfortable doing it. That is, it's possible if it's pure cream (ingredients says cream and enzymes). If there are stabilizers or even just added milk solids or something, don't even try. That's traditional lasagna, the besciamella is.

Good luck! Buon appetito!

Wow, thanks so much Ann. I would have thought the zukes would be sliced in planks but I sure like doing rounds, easier and more uniform. That sounds like a wonderful, flavorful recipe.

Ok, it's got meat so I get to keep it, and, ok, share it with my son's family. Neighbor is out.

i will look on your blog for bechamel. Thanks again.

I devoured your babka, with my eyes. And each and every crumb of bread. I love your big holes and what seems like a crackling, thin crust. Artisan, all the way. Your photos are awesome as is your skill.

Thanks very much, Plllog. Yes even without meat there is mozzarrella, sour cream, eggs for protein. 15 grams of protein in the container of sour cream. So it's ok. I'd rather do without any flour/carby stuff. I was thinking to use the sour cream with eggs, parsley, etc as in a usual layered manicotti and as Annt stated.

Thanks for the method, jc. Yes, I am on a mini mission to use that sour cream, sell by date of november 20 but we are going out of town.

And re the apple chicken sausage-I was thinking some kind of light no-tomato casserole with mozz, sour cream, perhaps layered apples sliced thinkly and even carmelized first, but I was making that up. All in my head. Had never heard of any recipes similar but I bet there are recipes out there like that. Just because there are so many on the planet eating every day, there's gotta be a concoction for every combination.

Thanks very much again for delicious help.

Westsider, I cook like that all the time! Look at the ingredients and go from there. Sour cream just isn't something I'd ordinarily put in a lasagna. Or manicotti. I tried looking up "layered manicotti" but still couldn't find sour cream in it. That's a whole set of knowledge I don't have.

Béchamel is white sauce, and a traditional component of lasagna. Cook equal parts of flour and butter (or oil) but don't brown it. Whisk in about 12 times as much milk. That is, a ratio of 1:1:12, or one tablespoon each of fat and flour, and 3/4 cup milk. You can make it thinner or thicker by adjust the amount of milk and the amount you reduce it. After the first bubble, reduce the heat and continue to whisk until it reduces to the consistency of heavy cream to clotted cream, depending on the use. Add salt & white pepper to taste, and for lasagna, nutmeg, if you want to be traditional.

If you're going to make the apple dish, why not use the sour cream in that instead of the lasagna? Sour cream and apples go together well and are commonly used together. Do you have any cheddar? Half a pound of mozzarella is barely enough for a small lasagna and isn't the first flavor I'd choose for the apple dish. Fontina would be good with apples. You could put one or two anise stars in the butter you're caramelizing your apples in. You could add some mushrooms too, and just a little chili powder.

There are actually a number of recipes on line, if you google, for lasagna using sour cream.

~Ann

Here is a link that might be useful: Sour Cream Lasagna

Wow, thanks, Ann, that is about perfect. I will sub some zucchini for some of the lasagna noodles. And I get to use sour cream. I can buy some more mozz. Maybe I will delay putting on the top layer of cheese so the zukes and other moisture can dry out and then, later, add the cheese to brown and crunch a bit.

Plllog, thanks. I should not have said 'layered manicotti when I meant stuffed manicotti and is usually stuffed with ricotta, not sour cream. And it is placed, often with red sauce like a lasagne, in an oblong dish. Ricotta and egg and parsley, nutmeg, etc. for the filling for pasta.

i just wnted to know if anyone had a recipe with sour cream and zucchini. And I think I can put something together now.

Oh, I get it! Yes, your description sounds like manicotti. :) I also found manicotti pie recipes called "layered manicotti" (that is, similar to tamale pie, where the ingredients are layered instead of assembled in the traditional manner). I don't get what the big deal is about stuffing the manicotti, but if you only have zitti but want a taste of manicotti, it makes sense for a family dinner.

Regarding the linked recipe, it has the problem I started out trying to address. It's too wet. You can tell in picture, too. I think your idea of including some pasta (don't boil it first--soak in hot water if you want it to be pliable, but don't get it waterlogged) and leaving off the cheese for awhile to let it steam out are good ones. You might even crack the oven door once or twice, before the time to put on the cheese, just for a few seconds, to let accumulated steam out.

Good luck! I'll be interested to hear how it turns out.

You are welcome Westsider. Looking forward to hearing about your results. I'm sure it will be delicious.

~Ann