Recipe Background
Ready for the tastiest trip of a lifetime?! Taste-of-Italy Casserole invites you to jump into its gondola (meaning the big, bouncy shells) and experience the creamiest, meatiest flavor you've ever come across! There really isn't anything quite like exploring the globe from the comfort of your kitchen table. Cheesy, delicious, and straight from the beautiful country itself, Taste-of-Italy Casserole is an amazingly scrumptious dish you'll love to frequent all the time!
Ready for the tastiest trip of a lifetime?! Taste-of-Italy Casserole invites you to jump into its gondola (meaning the big, bouncy shells) and experience the creamiest, meatiest flavor you've ever come across! There really isn't anything quite like exploring the globe from the comfort of your kitchen table. Cheesy, delicious, and straight from the beautiful country itself, Taste-of-Italy Casserole is an amazingly scrumptious dish you'll love to frequent all the time!
Ingredients
- 1 pound ground chuck
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 small yellow onion diced
- 1 clove garlic minced
- 1 (26-ounce) jar marinara sauce
- 1 large egg lightly beaten
- 2 cups small curd cottage cheese
- 2 cups mozzarella cheese shredded, divided
- 3/4 cup parmesan cheese grated, divided
- 20 jumbo pasta shells parcooked and cooled
- fresh basil leaves to taste, for garnish
Directions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Coat a 9×13-inch baking dish with nonstick spray.
- In a large skillet over medium heat, cook the ground chuck, while crumbling, until it is no longer pink. Drain the excess grease.
- Reduce the heat to medium-low. Add the olive oil and add the onions to the cooked ground chuck and cook until the onions are translucent, about 3 minutes.
- Add the garlic to the ground chuck mixture and cook, about 30 seconds.
- Reduce the heat to low. Add the marinara sauce to the ground chuck mixture and simmer, stirring occasionally, about 30 minutes.
- In a medium bowl, add the egg, the cottage cheese, 1 cup of the mozzarella cheese, and 1/2 cup of the parmesan cheese and mix to combine.
- Evenly spread about 3/4 of the meat sauce in the bottom of the prepared baking dish.
- Stuff each of the cooked pasta shells with 1 rounded tablespoon of the cheese mixture, then arrange them open-side up in the meat sauce in the dish.
- Evenly spoon the remaining meat sauce in between the shells but not directly on top of them.
- Cover the baking dish with aluminum foil and bake the stuffed shells, about 30 minutes.
- Discard the foil and sprinkle the remaining mozzarella and the remaining parmesan cheeses over the shells.
- Bake the stuffed shells until the cheese is melted, about 5-7 minutes.
- Serve the stuffed shells garnished with the basil leaves.
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