Stuffed Shells I

After reading ALL the reviews I consolidated the good advice into the following: used small curd cottage cheese; upped the garlic powder to 1 full tsp.; added one package frozen chopped spinach (thawed, liquid squeezed out); added 2-3 tbls. fresh parsley and same amount of FRESH basil; added a healty grind of black pepper; blended filling in the cuisinart; used plenty of spaghetti sauce; added extra mozzerella on top. Baked 20 minutes covered to keep from drying out and 20 minutes uncovered to brown. Served with green Tabasco at the table for those who wanted more zip - it was awesome. My die-hard carnivore of a husband liked it a lot but would welcome hamburger or sausage added to the filling or spaghetti sauce. My vegetarian daughters were deliriously happy. I'm great either way. Will definitely make again. In fact, I will make some to freeze for those hectic nights. Real yummy. Oh... one more thing... as recommended by others I boiled the shells 2.5 minutes less than directed, plunged into cold water and let dry. They were easy to handle and didn't tear. I didn't try piping filling in from a zip-loc but it sounds good. **************** U P D A T E ************ Made again and piped from a gallon size zip-loc bag. Loved it, loved it! The whole recipe of filling was too cumbersome to handle in the bag, about 1/3 at a time worked best for me. Also, too small is hard work and too large a hole is hard to control. A hole about the size of a dime worked great.

I have not made this yet...but plan on doing so this week sometime! I just wanted to share this tip that I use with EVERY lasagna & manicotti recipe. I have never pre-cooked the noodles. Make everything up the night before, pour about 1/2 cup of water over the whole thing, cover with foil, and refrigerate till supper the next night. The shells cook in the extra water and sauce, and its not the least bit runny! No worrying about tearing the shells again!

So. I don't like cottage cheese but wanted to give this a chance, so I made half the shells with ricotta instead, in case we didnt like the cottage cheese ones. Oh and I used small curds (in the snack packs) instead, cause I thought the large ones might be gross! It turned out after eating the cottage cheese ones, I couldn't go back to the plain ricotta ones! The cottage cheese ones were so much richer and had good texture, I start thinking about the leftovers at like 10:30, when lunch is at 12, and cant wait until that time to eat them. We had extra filling left over, and some extra manicotti shells; it made a really good manicotti filling too. The only suggestion I would make is to season the filling a little bit with Italian seasoning, but other than that this dish is EXCELLENT.

Easy and tasty. I made some adjustments for my picky husband's (and mine too) tastes. I used Ricotta instead of cottage cheese, added some garlic to the cheese mixture and some ground beef to the sauce. I used a jarred Arribata (spelling?) sauce which went well with it. It could have used more sauce we thought, maybe a jar and a half. Hubby requested that this be added to the regular rotation, always a sign of approval.

Awesome filling. I whiz the whole mixture in my food processor to get a great texture. To fill the shells easily, scoop all of the filling mixture into a zipper bag. Just snip the tip off one corner of the bag and squeeze the mixture out of the hole into the shells. Much tidier!

This is an absolutely wonderful dish, and it freezes pretty well. Stuffing the shells is the biggest challenge.....I think next time I'll put the filling into a ziplock bag and cut the corner off and fill them pastry bag-style.

I have been making this recipe for decades, but I always add chopped spinach to the filling. I thaw and drain it before adding. I figure that this addition makes me think that I'm eating something healthy!

Replace cottage cheese w/ricotta cheese, no egg in mixture makes stuffing to heavy. Add a little of the tomato sauce to mixture to smooth.

This recipe was a big hit with my young daughters, vegetarian (adult) niece and the rest of the family. Everyone asked for the recipe. I did add a little basil to the recipe in addition to the other spices. Since we were going to be gone all day and needed an easy dinner that evening, I stuffed the shells in the morning and refrigerated the dish all day. When I baked it, the cheese mixture was a little watery on top... but that may because I didn't let the dish warm to room temperature before baking. It was still delicious - just looked a little runny. Next time, I let the dish warm up before baking.

Excellent recipe, thank you for sharing! I will make this again and again! I used the advice of another member and put the cheese mixture in a ziplock plastic bag and then snipped the end off when stuffing the shells. It worked great, no mess!!!