My husband and I have been married for a little over 5 ½ years. Through that time we have had 3 babies, moved 3 times, 2 surgeries, bought 2 cars; I have taught Special Education, written for the best cooking newsletter ever, gotten amazing books into the hands of children through Usborne Books and More, my husband has worked as a water technician, stacked produce at a grocery store, worked at a support desk for a K-12 tech company, and now manages the app configuration team at that company.

Through all of this, we’ve had to adjust our habits with meals, meal planning, and eating in general. My meal planning skills looked very different as a newlywed working as a schoolteacher compared to now, where I am working 2 stay at home jobs while being a mommy to 3 young children aged 4 and under. I have learned a lot, and I can happily say my cooking skills have definitely improved over the years. However, I have only recently learned probably one of the most important lessons I could learn.

True love comes in the form of lasagna.

You see, I hate lasagna. I really do. I’m a diehard Alfredo fan, but if you set a plate of spaghetti, lasagna, pepperoni pizza, or anything with marinara type sauce in front of me, I’m likely to gag. I haven’t liked tomato sauce for years, and I highly doubt that will be changing anytime soon.

So my poor husband has to deal with this. This is a man who LOVES marinara/tomato sauce. If I open a can of spaghetti sauce, heat it up over the stove and serve it over soggy noodles, he treats me as if I just made a meal fit for a king. He can never say no to pizza, and he loves a good plate full of lasagna.

I have only ever made lasagna one time in our marriage, a few years ago when I was trying to stock up on freezer meals. My husband thought he had died and gone to heaven. Unfortunately for him, lasagna is kind of a lot of work, so I haven’t made it since.

That is, until this past week. I have been making it a goal to include more meals in our meal plan that are ones that my hubby particularly enjoys. We’ve been eating a lot more spaghetti, because he loves it, and it’s so easy to open a can and heat it up:). However, this past week, we were going to have company over, and I asked him what he thought I should make.

“You know what sounds really good? Lasagna”. But then he started listing off other options because he knows I don’t like lasagna and probably thought I wouldn’t even entertain the idea.

But I realized that that’s exactly what I should make. My hubby works so hard. He is only 26, but has to solely provide for a family of 5, which is almost unheard of in this day and age. Yet he does it without whining and he is such a hard-worker. If anyone deserves a hot plate of homemade lasagna, he does. So I decided to hold back the gag reflexes, pick up some ingredients from the grocery store, and get to work. I already had a pretty packed day, but I wanted to make sure this was a priority. Because he’s my husband and I love him:).

When he came home that night, he was genuinely shocked that I had actually made lasagna, and looked as excited as if I had just told him we were going to Disneyland. He couldn’t stop raving about how amazing I was and what a great meal it was. I could tell that making that simple pan of lasagna meant the world to him.

So you can bet your bottom dollar we will be having more lasagna at our house. No, it’s not the easiest or quickest meal on the planet. Yes, I would rather eat almost anything else. But I love my husband, and I love doing things that make him happy, even when it means putting his needs before mine. I can gag down a plate of lasagna for that ;).

If you want to show someone how much you love them, make their favorite food. Or make this lasagna, because I’ve heard from more than one person that it’s fabulous (and I can actually swallow this recipe haha ;) ).

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