Why you’ll love this recipe

• It’s a delicious meal the whole family will love (I have never met anyone that didn’t love pasta). 
• It is an easy recipe that doesn’t call for a long list of ingredients.
• Easy enough for a busy weeknight yet fancy enough for special occasions.  
• Leftover spinach ricotta manicotti is perfect for lunch the next day. 

Grocery Shopping Tip

This is one of my favorite recipes to make towards the end of the week because all of the ingredients needed to make it have a fairly long shelf life. We make all the recipes that have fresh produce and meat towards the beginning of the week so they don’t go bad before we use them. Then we make recipes like this that have more shelf stable ingredients the days right before we go grocery shopping again. 

Ingredients

See recipe card for exact amounts. 

Ingredient Notes

Just a few simple ingredients that you can keep on hand are all you need to make this Italian recipe. 

pasta sauce – any brand and variety is perfect. We use store bought but homemade marinara sauce works great too. 

manicotti noodles – we buy regular manicotti noodles and cook them first. I have not made this with uncooked manicotti shells and I haven’t seen oven ready manicotti pasta. 

mozzarella cheese – I like to make this dish as easy as possible so I buy pre-shredded cheese. It comes in a package that is the exact right amount, so why not? You can shred your own from a block of mozzarella if you want. 

ricotta cheese – we get the part-skim type unless it isn’t available. Full fat ricotta works great too. 

Parmesan cheese – either pre-shredded or freshly grated off the block will work. 

spinach – I buy frozen spinach, we have not made this with fresh spinach. 

spices – dried oregano, salt and black pepper. 

cooking spray – regular vegetable oil, canola oil or olive oil spray is perfect.

How to make spinach and cheese manicotti

1. Preheat the oven to 375°.
2. Bring a large pot of water to a boil, once boiling add the pasta and cook 4 minutes less than the least time on the package instructions. Drain and rinse with cold water then spread the noodles out on a rimmed baking sheet so they don’t stick together. 
3. While the pasta cooks combine ricotta, 1 ½ cups mozzarella, spinach, Parmesan cheese, oregano, salt, and pepper together in a large mixing bowl. 
4. Spray a 9″ X 13″ casserole dish with cooking spray and spread enough sauce in the bottom to cover it, roughly one cup. 
5. Fill pasta shells with the ricotta mixture using a spoon, piping bag, or Ziploc bag with the corner cut off. Place the stuffed manicotti shells in the baking dish in a single layer.
6. Cover tightly with aluminum foil and bake for 30 minutes. Remove the foil, top with the remaining mozzarella cheese and return it to the oven to melt the cheese, about 5 minutes.
7. Let stand about 5-10 minutes before serving so that some of the excess water from the spinach is absorbed. 

Tips

• Make sure to squeeze as much water as possible out of the spinach. We use a clean tea towel that we only use for food.  
• This dish comes out of the oven with a bit of water in the bottom of the casserole dish, this is from the spinach. Most of the water will be absorbed into the dish while it is resting (for about 5-10 minutes) after you take it out of the oven. 
• I have a fairly new oven and it seems to cook food very efficiently and quicker than the last oven I had. If you find your dish isn’t hot enough after 30 minutes then let it cook with the foil on it a little longer. You want it to be hot and bubbly when you take it out of the oven. 

Storage & Reheating

Store leftover pasta in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. Warm in the microwave.