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Message
Stuffed Pasta Shells (photos - long post)
Posted on 5/14/20 at 10:25 am
Posted on 5/14/20 at 10:25 am
Stuffed Pasta Shells
I love pasta and this meets all my requirements for a nice pasta dish. It has lots of thick pasta, a nice flavorful meat filling, lots of cheese, and two sauces. By assembling the shells, meat filling and adding the sauces below and above the filled shells, then topping with lots of cheese before cooking, the dish has a nice separation of flavors that I like. I want the dish to be dryer than lasagna, with distinctly separate flavors on the fork. This method assures that I achieve that. For me, a nice serving is three of these stuffed pasta shells, using the size shell I was able to find. Had I been able to locate the large pasta shells, I would have served two stuffed shells.
This dish is shown, served with poached Asparagus and butter toasted Pane de Casa bread.
This is a long post, but here is how I did it.
Needed:
The pasta I used:
Conchiglioni Rigati – I wanted to make the dish with the very large shells, but I hardly ever see any in the market anymore and was not able to find any. These are medium large. If using Large shells, I would use 6. I used 12 of these medium/large shells.
Needed for Marinara Sauce:
Tomatoes – 28 ounce can of whole tomatoes in sauce
Onion – 1/2 of a medium onion, cut into two pieces, cooked in sauce and removed
Oregano – 1 Tablespoon
Anchovies – 1/2 of a 2 ounce can
Olive oil – 1 Tablespoon
Salt – 1/2 teaspoon
Black Pepper – 1/4 teaspoon
Needed for Béchamel Sauce:
Butter – 2 Tablespoons
AP Flour – 2 Tablespoons
Black pepper – 1/8 teaspoon
Milk – to achieve a relatively thin sauce
Needed for meat filling:
Beef – 1/2 pound - I wanted veal and settled for sirloin
Italian Sausage – 1 link, removed from casing – I used precooked/frozen
Onion – 1 1/2 Tablespoons small diced
Green Bell Peppers - 1 1/2 Tablespoons diced
Lawry’s Garlic Salt – 1 Tablespoon
Spinach – 5-7 ounces
Green onions – 3 or 4, sliced tops and white portions
Ricotta Cheese – 7-8 ounces (half of a 15 ounce container)
Parmesan Cheese – 2-3 ounces, shredded
Egg – 1 large egg
Black Pepper – 1/4 teaspoon
Cheese topping for filled shells:
Mozzarella Cheese – 3 or 4 Tablespoons
Parmesan Cheese - 4 or 5 Tablespoons
I plated my dish, garnished with green onion slices, poached Asparagus, with butter, and butter toasted Pane de Casa bread
I love pasta and this meets all my requirements for a nice pasta dish. It has lots of thick pasta, a nice flavorful meat filling, lots of cheese, and two sauces. By assembling the shells, meat filling and adding the sauces below and above the filled shells, then topping with lots of cheese before cooking, the dish has a nice separation of flavors that I like. I want the dish to be dryer than lasagna, with distinctly separate flavors on the fork. This method assures that I achieve that. For me, a nice serving is three of these stuffed pasta shells, using the size shell I was able to find. Had I been able to locate the large pasta shells, I would have served two stuffed shells.
This dish is shown, served with poached Asparagus and butter toasted Pane de Casa bread.
This is a long post, but here is how I did it.
Needed:
The pasta I used:
Conchiglioni Rigati – I wanted to make the dish with the very large shells, but I hardly ever see any in the market anymore and was not able to find any. These are medium large. If using Large shells, I would use 6. I used 12 of these medium/large shells.
Needed for Marinara Sauce:
Tomatoes – 28 ounce can of whole tomatoes in sauce
Onion – 1/2 of a medium onion, cut into two pieces, cooked in sauce and removed
Oregano – 1 Tablespoon
Anchovies – 1/2 of a 2 ounce can
Olive oil – 1 Tablespoon
Salt – 1/2 teaspoon
Black Pepper – 1/4 teaspoon
Needed for Béchamel Sauce:
Butter – 2 Tablespoons
AP Flour – 2 Tablespoons
Black pepper – 1/8 teaspoon
Milk – to achieve a relatively thin sauce
Needed for meat filling:
Beef – 1/2 pound - I wanted veal and settled for sirloin
Italian Sausage – 1 link, removed from casing – I used precooked/frozen
Onion – 1 1/2 Tablespoons small diced
Green Bell Peppers - 1 1/2 Tablespoons diced
Lawry’s Garlic Salt – 1 Tablespoon
Spinach – 5-7 ounces
Green onions – 3 or 4, sliced tops and white portions
Ricotta Cheese – 7-8 ounces (half of a 15 ounce container)
Parmesan Cheese – 2-3 ounces, shredded
Egg – 1 large egg
Black Pepper – 1/4 teaspoon
Cheese topping for filled shells:
Mozzarella Cheese – 3 or 4 Tablespoons
Parmesan Cheese - 4 or 5 Tablespoons
I plated my dish, garnished with green onion slices, poached Asparagus, with butter, and butter toasted Pane de Casa bread
This post was edited on 5/14/20 at 11:42 am
3
Posted on 5/14/20 at 10:25 am to MeridianDog
Making the Marinara:
Add tomatoes, olive oil, onion, and oregano to a suitable pan
Canned, crushed tomatoes would be fine, as would be sauce cooked from fresh tomatoes. I like to use whole tomatoes, crushed with my hands
Break then up pretty good and add the salt and black pepper. They will break up more as the sauce cooks.
I like the flavor that anchovies add to a marinara sauce.
I added 4 anchovies to my sauce. They will break apart as the sauce cooks and add a nice level of flavor (not fishy at all) to the finished sauce
The sauce is brought to a low simmer.
And cooked with a lid for maybe 2 hours. Some will use fresh tomatoes, add more liquid, and cook their marinara for 4-6 hours. I will occasionally do my sauce in this time-consuming manner. Maybe it is better, but my pallet is not that sophisticated.
When my sauce is done,
I remove and discard the onion.
The intent is to achieve a thick sauce, with a bright flavor and a nice color.
Making the meat filling:
I would have liked ground veal in this dish, but after failing to locate any at four different markets, I settled on ground sirloin
My intent was to make 12 shells, which would produce four servings, so I only used 8 ounces of the sirloin. There are many ingredients in my stuffing, so after stuffing the 12 shells, I still had enough meat filing for another 3-4 shells. The sirloin, onion, Lawry’s garlic salt, and black pepper go into the pan.
I forgot to add the green peppers, so in they go. We chop fresh peppers and freeze them for later use. These are some of those frozen chopped green peppers. They work fine most of the time. I eventually realized the chop on these was bigger than I wanted, so I cut them up as they cooked with a pair of kitchen shears, to get smaller bits of green pepper.
I like Italian Sausage in meat sauces, and since I was unable to find veal, I decided to add some Italian Sausage to my meat filling. We use this on pizzas and keep a bag of frozen sausage bits in the freezer. I used an amount probably equivalent to a single sausage link and added it when the sirloin was cooked.
The pieces were bigger than I liked, so I broke them up with my spoon.
The cooked meats go into a mixing bowl to cool.
Spinach:
I like baby spinach, so that is what I used. I eventually added half of my small package (in two additions) to the pan.
When the spinach has yielded all the water and the color has changed to dark green, it is ready. The yield, after the sauté was about 1/4 cup.
It went into the bowl with the meat to cool
Add tomatoes, olive oil, onion, and oregano to a suitable pan
Canned, crushed tomatoes would be fine, as would be sauce cooked from fresh tomatoes. I like to use whole tomatoes, crushed with my hands
Break then up pretty good and add the salt and black pepper. They will break up more as the sauce cooks.
I like the flavor that anchovies add to a marinara sauce.
I added 4 anchovies to my sauce. They will break apart as the sauce cooks and add a nice level of flavor (not fishy at all) to the finished sauce
The sauce is brought to a low simmer.
And cooked with a lid for maybe 2 hours. Some will use fresh tomatoes, add more liquid, and cook their marinara for 4-6 hours. I will occasionally do my sauce in this time-consuming manner. Maybe it is better, but my pallet is not that sophisticated.
When my sauce is done,
I remove and discard the onion.
The intent is to achieve a thick sauce, with a bright flavor and a nice color.
Making the meat filling:
I would have liked ground veal in this dish, but after failing to locate any at four different markets, I settled on ground sirloin
My intent was to make 12 shells, which would produce four servings, so I only used 8 ounces of the sirloin. There are many ingredients in my stuffing, so after stuffing the 12 shells, I still had enough meat filing for another 3-4 shells. The sirloin, onion, Lawry’s garlic salt, and black pepper go into the pan.
I forgot to add the green peppers, so in they go. We chop fresh peppers and freeze them for later use. These are some of those frozen chopped green peppers. They work fine most of the time. I eventually realized the chop on these was bigger than I wanted, so I cut them up as they cooked with a pair of kitchen shears, to get smaller bits of green pepper.
I like Italian Sausage in meat sauces, and since I was unable to find veal, I decided to add some Italian Sausage to my meat filling. We use this on pizzas and keep a bag of frozen sausage bits in the freezer. I used an amount probably equivalent to a single sausage link and added it when the sirloin was cooked.
The pieces were bigger than I liked, so I broke them up with my spoon.
The cooked meats go into a mixing bowl to cool.
Spinach:
I like baby spinach, so that is what I used. I eventually added half of my small package (in two additions) to the pan.
When the spinach has yielded all the water and the color has changed to dark green, it is ready. The yield, after the sauté was about 1/4 cup.
It went into the bowl with the meat to cool
This post was edited on 5/14/20 at 10:38 am
Posted on 5/14/20 at 10:25 am to MeridianDog
I was unhappy with the size of my sautéed spinach, so eventually, I cut it up with my kitchen shears. I should have chopped it before the sauté, but cutting it into smaller pieces in the bowl as it cooled worked fine.
I wanted the flavor of green onion I my meat filling, so I chopped 4 green onions and added them to the mixture in the bowl.
Then, after cutting the spinach up with my kitchen shears, I mixed everything together.
After the mixture had cooled, I tasted for seasoning (needed none), then added my ricotta cheese, parmesan cheese and the egg. A quick mix and the filling was ready.
Assembling and cooking the dish:
The pasta
Is cooked in salted water until a little before it reaches al dente stage. I looked at the directions on the bag and pulled it about a minute early. I didn’t want my shells to be over cooked, so I pulled them early.
After draining,
I held the shells in cool water until needed.
Next, I made my béchamel sauce by adding an equal part of AP flour to melted butter in my pan.
The flour was cooked for a couple of minutes. Béchamel is a white sauce, and the flour should not be cooked until it begins to change color, but it needs to be cooked long enough to take away the raw flour taste.
Add milk to the white roux and stir until you get a medium thick béchamel.
As my béchamel cooked, I preheated my oven to 350 degrees f and buttered the oven dish.
Then I added some béchamel and marinara sauce to the bottom of the dish and mixed them slightly.
The shells are stuffed – in this case, with a little over a tablespoon of meat stuffing and placed into the oven dish.
Then béchamel is added over each shell.
Then marinara over the shells
Then Mozzarella cheese
Then Parmesan cheese
The dish is cooked with a lid. I added 2 Tablespoons of water to the dish before it went into the oven.
The dish is cooked long enough to cook the egg in the filling and set the sauces. I cooked it for 30 minutes at 350 with a cover and then for 20 minutes with no cover.
Plating the dish:
I served the dish with buttered, poached asparagus
Fresh Market had no veal, but they did have some Pane de Casa bread in their bakery section, so I butter toasted some to go with my pasta dish.
Here are some shots of the finished dish.
The leftovers reheated nicely (in the oven at 275 degrees F, for 30 minutes, covered, with a tablespoon of water) the next day.
Thanks for looking at my post
All my stuff
I wanted the flavor of green onion I my meat filling, so I chopped 4 green onions and added them to the mixture in the bowl.
Then, after cutting the spinach up with my kitchen shears, I mixed everything together.
After the mixture had cooled, I tasted for seasoning (needed none), then added my ricotta cheese, parmesan cheese and the egg. A quick mix and the filling was ready.
Assembling and cooking the dish:
The pasta
Is cooked in salted water until a little before it reaches al dente stage. I looked at the directions on the bag and pulled it about a minute early. I didn’t want my shells to be over cooked, so I pulled them early.
After draining,
I held the shells in cool water until needed.
Next, I made my béchamel sauce by adding an equal part of AP flour to melted butter in my pan.
The flour was cooked for a couple of minutes. Béchamel is a white sauce, and the flour should not be cooked until it begins to change color, but it needs to be cooked long enough to take away the raw flour taste.
Add milk to the white roux and stir until you get a medium thick béchamel.
As my béchamel cooked, I preheated my oven to 350 degrees f and buttered the oven dish.
Then I added some béchamel and marinara sauce to the bottom of the dish and mixed them slightly.
The shells are stuffed – in this case, with a little over a tablespoon of meat stuffing and placed into the oven dish.
Then béchamel is added over each shell.
Then marinara over the shells
Then Mozzarella cheese
Then Parmesan cheese
The dish is cooked with a lid. I added 2 Tablespoons of water to the dish before it went into the oven.
The dish is cooked long enough to cook the egg in the filling and set the sauces. I cooked it for 30 minutes at 350 with a cover and then for 20 minutes with no cover.
Plating the dish:
I served the dish with buttered, poached asparagus
Fresh Market had no veal, but they did have some Pane de Casa bread in their bakery section, so I butter toasted some to go with my pasta dish.
Here are some shots of the finished dish.
The leftovers reheated nicely (in the oven at 275 degrees F, for 30 minutes, covered, with a tablespoon of water) the next day.
Thanks for looking at my post
All my stuff
This post was edited on 5/14/20 at 5:05 pm
Posted on 5/14/20 at 10:27 am to MeridianDog
Posted on 5/14/20 at 10:33 am to MeridianDog
Feast for the eyes! Bet it was tasty.
This post was edited on 5/14/20 at 3:10 pm
Posted on 5/14/20 at 10:42 am to MeridianDog
I’ve been holding onto a can of anchovies. I might make the sauce tomorrow. Thanks for sharing!
Posted on 5/14/20 at 12:31 pm to MeridianDog
That recipe would probably win you a free trip to Italy.
Posted on 5/14/20 at 12:35 pm to Bill Parker?
Posted on 5/14/20 at 12:46 pm to MeridianDog
thanks as always MD
Posted on 5/14/20 at 1:08 pm to MeridianDog
That looks outstanding!
Posted on 5/14/20 at 4:20 pm to MeridianDog
Posted on 5/14/20 at 4:22 pm to Bill Parker?
After that lady whipped my butt, we went on my nickel.
This post was edited on 5/14/20 at 4:25 pm
Posted on 5/14/20 at 4:40 pm to MeridianDog
You went to Italy after all?! Fantastic!
Also, the dish looks pretty damn good.
Also, the dish looks pretty damn good.
Posted on 5/14/20 at 4:45 pm to MeridianDog
No throwing pasta against the wall? No rotten cheese? No bugs?
I've been told those are all key ingredients for a pasta dish.
ETA: Looks awesome MD. IWEI
I've been told those are all key ingredients for a pasta dish.
ETA: Looks awesome MD. IWEI
This post was edited on 5/14/20 at 4:48 pm
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