Cookin' with Wood

Stuffed Manicotti

Believe it or not, this recipe has built-in adjustments for the mistakes most people make when preparing this dish. I'll point them out when we come to them, but in the meantime, get a large pot of water boiling on the stove. It's got to be big enough to fit all of the manicotti. There were sixteen of them in my box. While the water's coming to a boil, brown the sausage in the small frying pan over medium-high heat. While all that's happening, have your pet octopus combine the ricotta cheese, mozzarella cheese, Parmesan cheese, parsley, salt and pepper in the bowl. Mix well. If you roll the container of ricotta cheese between your hands for about 30 seconds, it should fall right out of the container, then you won't have to spoon it out. It worked for me, anyway.

When the water is boiling, add a little salt, and carefully put in the manicotti. Cook to al dente, about 8 minutes. When they're done, drain them in the colander, then place them on the waxed paper so that they're not touching, or they'll stick together. While they're cooling, remove the sausages from the frying pan and split with a knife. Scrape the sausage from the casing and crumble into small pieces. You can fry the pieces a bit more if they're not done. Discard the casings. Add the sausage to the cheese mixture and mix well.

Now comes the fun part. Put the cheese and sausage mixture in the zip-top bag and seal. Use the scissors to cut off a bottom corner of the bag. Make the hole about 3/4th of the diameter of the manicotti.

Spread a thin later of the spaghetti sauce on the bottom of the baking dish. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees F. One at a time, fill the manicotti with the cheese mixture by sqeezing the mixture out of the bag and into the manicotti. Fill one side until it's about halfway full, then turn it around and do the same thing to the other side. Be careful to not push the bag into the manicotti too far, or you'll split the manicotti. Arrange the filled manicotti in the baking dish as you fill them.

Here's where the common mistakes come into play. First of all, not all of your manicotti will come out of the pot in good shape. But that's o.k., because there's not enough filling to fill them all, and they won't all fit into the baking dish anyway. I had one bad one. I was able to fit the remaining 15 of them into the baking dish, and I had to really squeeze the last cheezy goodness out of the bag to fill the last one. So don't worry if all of your manicotti doesn't come out perfect.

Pour the rest of the first jar of spaghetti sauce and the second jar of spaghetti sauce over the filled manicotti. Cover tightly with aluminum foil and bake for 40 minutes. Remove the foil, and bake another 15 minutes. Remove from the oven, and let stand for about five minutes and serve.

These go great with a salad and garlic bread. Like many pasta dishes, they also seem to taste better the next day. They microwave very well, so don't be afraid to save some for later.

Bob is the author of "Don't Fry Bacon with Your Shirt Off!  A Single Man's Guide to the Kitchen" a PublishAmerica book.