Looking for the ultimate stuffed shells recipe? These cheesy, meaty stuffed pasta shells are packed with ground beef, spicy chorizo, and a rich tomato sauce, finished with melty mozzarella, Parmesan, and fresh parsley. Perfect for family dinners, weeknight meals, or special occasions, this baked stuffed shells recipe skips the ricotta but still delivers creamy, comforting flavors. In this video, I show you step-by-step how to make homemade stuffed shells with a flavorful beef and chorizo sauce, topped with gooey cheese and baked to golden perfection. Whether you’re a beginner cook or a pasta lover looking for new dinner ideas, this stuffed shells recipe is easy to follow, incredibly satisfying, and full of bold flavors.
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Ingredients:
Conchiglioni
Ground beef
Chorizo
Canned tomatoes
Mozzarella cheese
Heavy cream
Parmesan
Onion
Garlic
Celery
Worcestershire sauce
Cumin
Salt
Pepper
Basil
Chili flake
Garlic powder
Oil
Recipe:
– Chop chorizo into bite sizes chunks. Heat a pan over medium-high heat and cook the chorizo until it’s seared and has released its oils. Add ground beef to the same pan we cooked the chorizo. When most of the pink has cooked out, season it with salt, pepper, garlic powder and cumin. Let that cook in then remove from the pan.
– Finely dice an onion and celery and add oil to the same pan. The veggies go in and you let it sauté for 5-7 minutes. Throw in the garlic and sauté until fragrant. Season everything with chili flake, pepper and salt.
– The meat goes back in the pan, mix it in with the vegetables and let it all cook together for a minute or two. Splash in a couple glugs of Worcestershire sauce and let cook in for a minute.
– Pour in the canned tomatoes and some water, just to clean out the can. Bring to a simmer and lower the heat. Let it simmer away and reduce until it thickens, about 10 minutes. Taste for seasoning, finish with a couple tablespoons of heavy cream and you’re set.
– Cook Conchiglioni in salted boiling water according to package instructions until it’s al dente.
– Put a thin layer of sauce on the bottom of a baking tray. Take each pasta shell and fill it with the sauce. Top each shell with shredded mozzarella cheese, then top it all with more sauce. Sprinkle more cheese to finish it all off
– Place it in a preheated oven set to 400°F (204°C) and let it bake until the cheese is melted and golden brown. Turn on the fan to speed up the process, keep an eye on it so that it doesn’t burn, though.
– This is rich, warm, and so filling. Make it!
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It’s cheesy, meaty, and spicy. These stuffed
shells have it all. Walk with me now. A few minutes ago, when I was prepping everything, a
thought occurred to me. Stuffed shells to me is kind of like making lasagna, but just stuffing it
inside of pasta. Now, it’s not like that’s some sort of grand revelation to me, but it’s just
something I thought about a few minutes ago. There’s also a chance that I’m just talking out
of my ass. With our sausage chopped up add it to a very hot pan. Now, I know I’ve said this before,
but this is the reason why that we render off that chorizo first. It releases all of its oils and it
establishes an amazing base to cook our beef and just for the dish overall. Now, if you know
anything about making a tomato-based sauce, you know good and hell well you’re going to need
yourself an onion. It really gets to a point where I’m dicing so much onion on this channel, I feel
like I’m just in a constant state of deja vu. Now, if you want a super simple and easy way to level
up your tomato sauce game, go ahead and finely dice some celery. It’ll give your sauce a nice
natural sweetness and just help balance it out. Now, when you look in this pan, all you should see
is liquid red gold. And we add even more red to that with our ground beef. And what you’re going
to want to do is leave it alone so we can try to get some of that browning on the bottom. Now that
I flipped the beef, you can see that on the bottom side, we’ve got a nice browning. So, I flipped it
over. We’re going to try to get the same thing on the other side. And then, we’re going to season
it up. Now, both sides of the beef have seared and most of the pink has cooked out. I’m happy with
where we’re at, but you’re out of your mind if you think I’m going to leave this plain. This is salt.
This is pepper. More specifically, the black kind. I’m not going to tell you what seasoning this is,
but just know it’s my favorite one. That should be a dead giveaway. One day, I’m going to start
calling cumin the way I call it off camera. Give this a mix. Let it finish cooking, and you’re all
good. Boy, am I happy. We’ve already established so much flavor in this pan, but go ahead and
add some oil to it. And the best thing about onion and celery is that it can go in the pan at
the same time. What’s also neat is that it only takes seconds for your kitchen to start smelling
incredible. You know, I’m starting to get tired of needing to shred things, but I suppose you
could say it’s for the greater good. Oh, brother, this guy stinks. Please don’t click off the
video. Anyways, we’re topping this with mozzarella cheese. So, grate yourself some mozzarella cheese.
Now, however good you think your kitchen smells, that’s about to be multiplied by a thousand
because of fresh garlic. You sauté it until it becomes fragrant. Now, up until this point, all
we’ve done is maximize flavor, and we’re not going to stop now. We’re seasoning the vegetables. And
that starts with salt. You add some more of the powdery black stuff. Now, I know that chorizo is
spicy. I don’t give a damn. We’re adding chili flake to this. I’m not going to lie, I added a
lot of chili flake. I might come to regret that later. Now that our seasonings have cooked in,
we go back in with the meat. Please mix it in with the vegetables. After letting the meat and
vegetables get to know one another, we’re going to go in with a couple of dashes of that W sauce.
That umami flavor boost is never going to hurt. Then I’m going to pour in some canned tomatoes.
And of course, a little water to clean out the can. Nothing goes to waste. Gonna be honest, this
is kind of simmering a little bit too much as you can see, but I’ve already reduced the heat. Once
it starts simmering, you’re going to let it reduce until it thickens. The water for our shells have
started boiling, so go in with the shells. Quick FYI on the pasta. You’re going to want to cook
it until it’s al dente. My sauce has been cooking away. It’s coming along nicely, but damn it, it
needs help. So, I’m starting with the pepper. More of my favorite seasoning. I’m still not going to
tell you what it is. Imagine making a tomato based sauce and you don’t add basil. Give it a mix. Let
your sauce keep simmering and reducing and taste as you go. All right, coach. Everything is done.
But before we start stuffing, we got to go down with a light layer of sauce on the bottom. So,
what do we do is we take our shells like so and we stuff it. I mean, it’s kind of self-explanatory.
It’s stuffed shells, right? And we rinse and repeat until they’re all stuffed. Stuffing all
these was too much of a process, but you know what? We’ve made it and we’re done. So now we
sprinkle across some mozzarella cheese. This goes without saying, but please be generous with the
cheese. And we go across the top with more sauce. And before it goes in the oven, we’re going to top
that with more cheese. Now we got a hot preheated oven. Guess where this is going. This comes out
when the cheese is melted and golden brown. Oh, boże. That’s pretty. I hope you didn’t think I was
skipping the grated cheese either. I don’t really have much else to add. I’m going to turn off
the camera and stuff myself with stuffed shells.
1 Comment
Stuffing shells is a process, but worth every bite! Would you ever skip the ricotta like I did, or keep it classic? 🤔