Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Baked Manicotti for Mom

This is a post I wrote in July but never finished writing until now. It's crazy how busy life gets when you have kids. Now I know why it was so hard to make plans with my friends that had kids. So here is a post from a while ago...

I love my mother-in-law! She is more than I could ever ask for in a second mom. Her birthday is coming up but since she will be out of town for it, we won't be able to celebrate together.

Tonight I've invited her over for an early birthday celebration. One of her favorite things is manicotti. So manicotti it is! This is what I came up with on my own after reading about eight different recipes online and not being happy with any of them.

I served the manicotti with grilled sweet Italian sausage, sauteed peppers and onions, grilled asparagus and garlic bread. Not a bad Italian meal made by an Asian gal!!!

Baked Manicotti

  • 8 oz manicotti shells (12-14 count)
  • 15 oz ricotta cheese
  • 1/2 cup marscapone cheese
  • 2 1/2 cups shredded mozzarella
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 tsp chopped garlic
  • 1 tsp dried basil
  • 1/2 tsp kosher salt
  • 1/4 tsp pepper
  • two 24 oz jars of good marinara sauce or make your own!
  • 1 cup of Parmesan cheese
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add manicotti shells and cook for 4 minutes; drain.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (175 degrees C).

In a small bowl, beat eggs, garlic, basil, salt and pepper together until well blended.

In a medium bowl, add 2 cups shredded mozzarella, ricotta, and marscapone. Add egg mixture and mix everything together until well combined.  Gently stuff cooked manicotti with the mixture. Easy way to do this: Fill a Ziploc bag with the filling, and then cut a medium sized whole in one of the bottom corners of it (large enough for the filling to easy come out). Then seal the top of the bag and squeeze it into the pasta.

Spread one jar of pasta sauce over the bottom of the prepared baking dish.

Arrange stuffed manicotti in the dish, and cover with remaining sauce. Sprinkle with remaining mozzarella cheese and Parmesan cheese.

Cover with foil and bake 25 minutes in the preheated oven. Uncover and continue baking 15 to 20 minutes, or until mozzarella is melted and bubbly.

Remove from the oven and let rest for about 5 minutes. Serve hot.

    1 comment:

    1. I found this on pinterest and cooked it last night, it turned out awesome! Thank you for posting this recipe!

      ReplyDelete