Last Night's Dinner: Stuffed Shells

     What drool worthy concoction did I make NOW, do you ask? Stuffed shells my peoples. And here is a tantalizing photo for you:

I love cheese.

   

    It was only, the second time I think, that I have ever made this dish. Never for Jeremy, so he was pleasantly surprised. But, how can you go wrong with all that cheesy gooey-ness? I'll give you the short version of this recipe because really, you can choose to make you own sauce and meatballs, you can use store bought sauce with no meatballs, a meat sauce, a cream sauce, etc. etc... the possibilities are endless. I also saw on one of my favorite blogs The Girl Who Ate Everything Christy even made a Mexican Stuffed Shells version which looks oooh so good (not to mention her picture quality, I'm just a tad jealous(I'm lying I'm extremely jealous)) So really, get creative! Cooking is about making it your own, live a little!
     Soooo, Start off by cooking off your shells to the directions on the package. I think my shells were cooked for 14 minutes. In this time go ahead and heat your pasta sauce and mix the filling for the shells. While I was letting the shells cook I was actually doing the, i don't know.. TENTH load of dishes for the day and actually had about 1/3 of the shells stick to the bottom of the pan and rip apart to shreds. Don't do that. Moving on... back to the filling:

• 24 oz         ricotta cheese 
• 1 ea           egg
• 1 tsp          dried oregano
• 1/2 tsp       garlic powder
• salt and pepper to taste

     If desired you can add some shredded mozzarella or goat cheese or fresh basil or unicorns...whatever you want! But this is all I added. Put all ingredients into a bowl.

      Mix it up!

If it wasn't for the raw egg I would just eat this as is...who am I kidding, I'd still eat it...

     By this time your shells should be done and if you were a good culinarian your shells wont be massacred like mine were. Drain the water and then place the shells individually on a cookie sheet and let cool. Make sure they aren't touching or else they will stick to each other.

     Once cool enough to handle now is time to marry filling to shell. I greased the glass dish I was using and put enough sauce to cover the bottom. Then, just fill the shells and line them up all nice and pretty like little soldiers and top off with some more sauce.

     Now, I topped mine with some provolone cheese, I was going to get mozzarella but I had a coupon and provolone is kick-a anyways. Put everything in a 350 degree oven with foil on top for 30 minutes. Make sure foil is not touching the top or all your beautiful cheese will stick to it. After 30 minutes take off the foil and let the cheese brown under the broiler. Keep watch at this point or it will burn. Should like something like this:

     I could live in there. Serve immediately! I accompanied it with some meatballs and garlic bread, parmesan cheese and of course extra sauce for the hubby, he loves the sauce. Enjoy!

--Dana