Temporary? Insanity

I am currently recovering from a long weekend. And much as I adore him and love having him around, things get a little discombobulated around here when Neil is home. Add to that the fact that we went away for a couple days, I had a mild back injury that incapacitated me for half the day on Sunday, that there is so much smoke from forest fires right now that we don’t dare open our windows (and the kids are going cabin fever nutty), and things are a wee bit chaotic here at Chez VanderHorst. In fact, my spirits have been a little low because of complete and utter overwhelm-ment.

I just deleted a long post categorizing all my many woes because when I read it back I laughed at myself. A lot. I’m mean like that.

So now I’ve decided the best way to combat the chaos is to pretend it doesn’t exist and write a blog post instead of facing it. Besides, I’m quite enjoying my recipe series. It gives me the illusion of competence. And Neil is enjoying it as well because I’m cooking and baking more, and culinary variety is Neil’s idea of Utopia.

This week, I’m tackling one of my absolute favourite “company meals”, Cheese Stuffed Manicotti. It’s a little more work than I usually put into a meal, being the lazy chef that I am, though naturally I have found ways around this. Like buying oven ready noodles and making Neil shred the cheese for me the night before (I’m devious like that). In the end, I have a meal to serve to guests that looks far more complicated than it is. I freely confess that this is my goal when having dinner guests. To amaze and delight them with my culinary skills, without having to work myself into a tizzy in the process.

One of my favourite things about Manicotti is the options. It’s like the muffin of main courses. You can use different cheeses, different seasonings, different fillers. I’ve listed a few possible choices in the recipe but there are far more possibilities (I’m just too lazy to list them all).

Bon Appetit!

Ingredients
• 1 8 oz. pkg. oven ready manicotti
• 16 ounces ricotta cheese
• 6 ounces shredded mozzarella
• 6 ounces shredded Monterey Jack
• 2 tablespoons sour cream
• 1/3 cup dried bread crumbs, seasoned, OR 2 eggs, beaten
• 1 1/2-2 Tbsp seasoning
Seasoning Options:
Basil and Nutmeg
Basil and Garlic
Garlic and Italian Seasoning
• salt and pepper to taste
• 2 cups spaghetti sauce
(I’ll share my favourite sauce recipe next week)

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. In a large bowl, combine ricotta cheese, 4 ounces mozzarella cheese, Monterey Jack cheese, sour cream, bread crumbs (or eggs), seasoning, and salt and pepper to taste; mix well.
3. In a 9 x 13 inch baking dish, spray dish with non-stick cooking spray and cover bottom of dish with a thin film of spaghetti sauce.
4. Fill each manicotti with cheese mixture and place in dish; cover with remaining sauce. Sprinkle remaining mozzarella cheese on top of sauce.
5. Bake in preheated oven uncovered for 40 minutes; serve.

Tips and Tricks

Cover with foil but during the last ten mins of bake time remove the cover and top with lots of mozzarella then bake uncovered ten minutes more.

Put cheese filling in a plastic bag (ziploc or its equivalent) and snip a corner off. Squeeze filling out of the hole and into the shells.

Throw a very small portion of grated asiago on the dish in the last ten minutes, and finish off uncovered. The cheese will brown slightly.

Try different additions to the cheese filling: Spinach, ground beef, sausage, grated carrot, etc…

If you’re using a store bought sauce, try this to give a fuller, richer flavour:
Chop up some onions, and saute them in olive oil for a couple of minutes on high heat, throw in minced garlic for another minute. Add some fresh basil for one more minute, and top with shredded or julienned carrot. Stir in your saute with the sauce before adding to the pan of pasta.

Have a recipe to share? Feel free to link up!