• Recipes
  • Equipment Reviews
  • Taste Tests
  • How to Cook
  • Videos

Make-Ahead Stuffed Shells

From

October/November 2007

Make-Ahead Stuffed Shells

Being able to prepare a satisfying weeknight pasta dish recipe ahead of time is a lifesaver for any time-crunched cook. We wanted to freeze the shells in a stuffed shells recipe, but we didn’t want to lose flavor and texture during freezing, thawing, and heating. While developing our Make-Ahead Stuffed Shells recipe, we found that ricotta loses moisture when frozen and reheated, but adding extra fat and emulsifiers (two extra egg yolks) to the cheese stuffing helped it stay creamy. When the freezer washed out the flavor of our sauce, we simply upped the amount of garlic and added red pepper flakes. To bring more moisture to the sauce in our Make-Ahead Stuffed Shells recipe, we added some chicken broth. We froze the mozzarella topping separately and added it at the end of baking so it melted into a bubbling, golden crust.

Serves 8

Assembled shells may be frozen for up to 2 months. You need two 8-inch-square baking dishes (preferably microwave- safe) for this recipe. If you want to pull the baking dishes from the freezer individually, divide the tomato sauce and cheese into smaller containers.

Ingredients

The recipe you requested is for
Members Only.

Start Your 14-Day Free Trial Membership

Every Recipe. Every Rating. Every Video from
Every Magazine & Every Episode!
  • 8 years of Cook’s Country Foolproof Recipes
  • Complete Cook’s Country TV Video Library
  • 2,900+ Equipment Ratings and Ingredient Taste Tests
  • Step-by-Step Technique Photos
  • Save Favorites, Create Menus, Print Shopping Lists
How we use your e-mail address
Christopher Kimball, Founder and Publisher

Dear Home Cook,

If I were new to CooksCountry.com, I might think, "It's easy to get free recipes on the Internet. What makes your recipes different?" Well, unlike recipes from blogs, message boards, and other recipe sites, our recipes are exhaustively tested by our team of full-time test cooks until they offer consistently great results. That means fried chicken with a crunchy coating and moist meat, a low-fat recipe makeover for macaroni and cheese that’s as creamy and cheesy as the full-fat version, and fork-tender slow cooker pot roast.

We're obsessive in our quest to find and foolproof the best of American home cooking, from fuss-free weeknight dinners, to updated, simplified versions of regional specialties, to slow cooker and make ahead meals. CooksCountry.com is the only place you can find every foolproof recipe published in Cook’s Country magazine since 2005, plus objective ratings and test results from both Cook’s Country and Cook’s Illustrated for cookware and supermarket ingredients.

Let me make a simple, no-nonsense offer. Try out our website FREE for a 14-Day, No-Hassle Trial Offer. I’m pretty confident that CooksCountry.com will quickly become an invaluable resource for everything from a quick Tuesday supper to your next get-together with family and friends.

Thanks for your consideration,

Christopher Kimball

Christopher Kimball
Founder and Publisher

How we use your e-mail address
Related Content
© 2013 America’s Test Kitchen. All rights reserved.