Manicotti

Manicotti is hands-down my favorite baked pasta dish and comfort food. So I gave it a go last night. I also did this while getting drunk of margaritas.

Ingredients were purchased from the local farmer's market and Kroger, both of which were madhouses yesterday. But after battling the hordes of yuppie Decaturites and I found success.

Here is the recipe I followed
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Three-Cheese-Manicotti/Detail.aspx

It's the basic recipe you will find on any box of manicotti pasta - mostly.

1 package of manicotti pasta - while I could *attempt* to make that fresh, NO.
16 oz of ricotta cheese - I've seen this hand made before without too much difficulty, but I just bought some from the store
6 0z of mozzarella, shredded
6 oz of monterey jack, shredded
2 tbsp of sour cream - this I've never seen before but I assume it helps with the consistency of the cheese mix
1/3 cup dried breadcrumb - I got plain instead of seasoned and I don't think it made the slightest difference
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
2 cups Spaghetti sauce.

I decided to make my own spaghetti, cause I see my roommates do it all the time and I know it can't be that *hard*. Plus, they laughed at me last time I bought sauce in a jar.

So I poked my roommate on how to make spaghetti sauce:

Can of tomato paste, can of tomatos, can of mushrooms, onion, group beef, spices, chianti

brown the mushrooms and onions in oil with some pepper and garlic and salt

1:31 PM put them in a pot with the tomato paste and tomatos

mix/crush everything up

brown beef with some chianti, salt, papper

drain it

mix it with tomato sauce

let simmer for a bit

Alright, no problem.

I made this sauce to go with my manicotti - it was delicious.

Made the sauce, boiled the pasta - I should have added oil to the water because some of the tubes stuck to the bottom of the pot.

Made the cheese stuffing,, stuffed the tubes - any that split and many did, I just put the split side down.

Covered the manicotti with sauce and cheese and baked. And here's where I learned a basic cooking lesson. I should have added the sauce, covered it with tin foil, baked it for 30 minutes, added the cheese, and finished it off.

My manicotti had some burnt cheese on top, but otherwise was absolutely delicious.