by Alyssa RiversThis website may contain affiliate links and advertising so that we can provide recipes to you. Read my privacy policy.
Best Three Cheese Stuffed Shells Recipe
You really can’t go wrong with a good lasagna. Rich red spaghetti sauce, Italian seasoning and lots of cheese all layered between pasta noodles… It’s heavenly! But when I feel like something EXTRA cheesy, I make these stuffed shells! They are similar to your classic lasagna, but with a triple dose of cheese and stuffed inside a jumbo pasta shell.
This Italian cheese stuffed shells is all things delicious.
What you need to make Stuffed Pasta Shells:
This delicious cheese stuffed shells recipe comes together quickly and easily. You can’t go wrong with baking stuffed shells with all the
Before you bake the shells, add more red sauce on top and extra cheese. You can never have enough cheese! After about 40 minutes in the oven, you will have an incredible Italian dinner that is sure to be a big hit! I like to serve these with a nice salad and garlic bread, and they make a beautiful presentation for guests too!
- Jumbo Pasta Shells
- Ricotta Cheese
- Mozzarella Cheese
- Parmesan Cheese
- Basil
- Italian Seasoning
- Egg
- Salt
- Black Pepper
- Spaghetti Sauce
How to Make Cheese Stuffed Shells:
And this recipe really couldn’t be any simpler to make: Boil the pasta shells until just shy of al dente (I did 9 minutes). Mix together all the yummy cheeses along with some seasoning, fresh basil for color and extra flavor, and an egg to bind it all together. Then spread your favorite red sauce in the bottom of a baking dish, stuff your shells with the cheese mixture, and add them to the dish. I usually take a shortcut and use a good pasta sauce from the grocery store, but feel free to use your favorite homemade recipe too! I have a spaghetti sauce recipe with Italian sausage that is out of this world!
-
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cook pasta shells according to package directions for al dente, about 9 minutes. Drain and rinse in cold water.
- In a large bowl, combine the ricotta, 1 ½ cups of the mozzarella, parmesan, basil, Italian seasoning, egg, salt and pepper. Spread ¾ of the spaghetti sauce on the bottom of a 13×9 inch baking dish.
- Spoon the cheese mixture into the pasta shells and place in the baking dish. Pour remaining spaghetti sauce over shells and sprinkle with remaining mozzarella. Cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Uncover and bake for 5-10 minutes more.
What to Serve with Shell Pasta:
Stuffed shells taste great with bread warm from the oven. Serve them with buttery garlic bread or parmesan breadsticks. A crisp green salad with a zesty homemade vinaigrette is always welcome with any cheesy Italian dish like this.
More Delicious and Comforting Pasta Meals:
- Creamy Garlic Shrimp Alfredo Pasta
- Instant Pot Chicken Alfredo Pasta
- Cheesy Chicken, Bacon and Broccoli Ranch Pasta
- Easy Pasta Carbonara Recipe
- Creamy Pork Carnitas Pasta
Three Cheese Stuffed Shells Recipe
Ingredients
- 20 uncooked jumbo pasta shells
- 15 ounce container ricotta cheese
- 8 ounces 2 cups grated mozzarella cheese
- 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
- 2 Tablespoons chopped basil
- 1 teaspoon Italian Seasoning
- 1 egg
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
- 1 - 26 ounce jar spaghetti sauce
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cook pasta shells according to package directions for al dente, about 9 minutes. Drain and rinse in cold water.
- In a large bowl, combine the ricotta, 1 ½ cups of the mozzarella, parmesan, basil, Italian seasoning, egg, salt and pepper. Spread ¾ of the spaghetti sauce on the bottom of a 13x9 inch baking dish.
- Spoon the cheese mixture into the pasta shells and place in the baking dish. Pour remaining spaghetti sauce over shells and sprinkle with remaining mozzarella. Cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Uncover and bake for 5-10 minutes more.
Video
Nutrition
Serves: 6
All nutritional information is based on third party calculations and is only an estimate. Each recipe and nutritional value will vary depending on the brands you use, measuring methods and portion sizes per household.
I adore stuffed shells, it is the perfect family-centered meal!
I think that the recipe is great except for the basil being mixed in with the ricotta cheese. Typically, fresh herbs are not cooked as the tend to turn an unappetizing dark green/black when heat is put to them. As you can tell from the picture of the finished product, the basil pieces in the cheese mixture are no where near as bright as the ones sprinkled on top after the dish was served. This advice goes for any fresh herb such as parsley and cilantro. The brighter your herbs the better the presentation will be!
I totally agree with you on the Basil
But does it change the taste?
Great recipe! My family loved it and we’re a household of 8! My one daughter didn’t care for it but my boys ate it all up. I probably didn’t have to make the whole larger box of shells as a handful was left over and I ran out of filling. I forgot to add the egg and I ran out of mozzarella cheese and topped it with monterrey jack cheese, but it still turned out phenomenal. I also forgot to add spinach but I cut it up and added it on top once I plated it. I used prego meat traditional sauce. I served it with a garden salad. Next time (and there will be a next time) I’ll add meatballs to the dinner. Just the frozen ones. Pop them in the oven and I’ll be good to go. Thank you so much for this recipe, super easy, and super cheap!
Love stuffed shells! The more cheese the better!
Pasta stuffed with cheese … it doesn’t get much better than that! I love the photos too!
I made these the other night and they were DELICIOUS! We had some left overs because I made WAY too much, and those were eaten the next day! Sooooo tasty and easy! 🙂
I had pinned a cheesy chicken stuffed shell recipe and bought everything to make it. Then it just didn’t look as appetizing to me, so I didn’t make it and I was stuck with a container of ricotta cheese. I was trying to figure out what I could use it for so it doesn’t go to waste. I’m so glad I found this because it calls for ricotta cheese. I’ll post a comment after I make it. Thanks!
This has got me craving pasta. I’ve got all the ingredients on hand except the ricotta. Gonna use goats cheese instead and add sausages. Thanks for the idea
How did this go?
I was thinking of subbing ricotta for cream cheese and adding ground turkey or sausage
This recipe is lacking MEAT, you must add ground beef for this to be a REAL dinner meal.
rid the egg, cut the ricotta by half, add ground beef and this will be superb.
Don’t get rid of the egg; it helps to bind the rest of the ingredients together, and if you remove it, the recipe will flop.
(And really, no meat means a dish isn’t a dinner meal? Wow.)
I’m adding meat to the sauce and leaving the rest of the recipe as-is.
Amazing! I made it for my house and it’s delicious. Thank you!!
I make these every so often. On occasion I add ground Beef and sausage(finely ground) to the cheese mix.. It is usually 25% meat to 75% cheese. It is a more substantial meal that the men in my family really like..
Two words: Yee. Um. (Or is that hyphenated?) I had to use manicotti because I couldn’t find the large pasta shells (and heck if I was going to more than one store), but my family loved these. There are three of us total (one aged six), I made a dozen, and they’re gone (the kid ate the same amount I did, despite declaring during the preparation process that the cheese mix looked “icky”). Unfortunately, my husband won’t stop calling it lasagna, which for some reason is cheesing me off . . . Thanks for this recipe!
These are so good. I make them with some spinach mixed in with the ricotta mixture to add more veggie goodness in them. Whole family loves this one! Thank for sharing.
I add hamburger in the spaghetti sauce and it’s perfectly Devine!
I added spinach and it was delicious! Great vegetarian meal that my toddler loves. Even my meat loving husband loves this meal.
Love these. I always do Italian Meatballs with these. I just layer it. Sauce,Stuffed shells, meatballs, & then more sauce. Top with shredded mozarella. Bake. EXCELLANT!!!!
This is such a great idea!!!!!!!!
Doing it now lol
Great meal. Made enough to freeze for another meal.
I tried to sign up to receive emails but a user name similar to mine pop up and ask for my password which I don’t have
I like this recipe a lot. I may cook my pasta a little longer because I don’t want to taste the noodles over the cheese. I also mix and cook my own sauce.from scratch and so it will taste wonderfully different every time, yet the same. I learned this from my mom and three little old Italian ladys from little Iataly
If you make any additions, I see only two things that could make it more substantial. Add spinach to cheese and a little mixture of ground beef/ground turkey to spaghetti sauce. I made large portions and was able to get 15 shells out of the cheese mixture. A keeper!
Just wanted to say thank you! I found this on a Google search for stuffed shells and it really made my night. So comforting and good; definitely the best stuffed shell recipe I’ve tried. I used dried basil instead of fresh since it’s expensive in winter, and I also chopped some mushrooms to lay on top of the shells as they baked. Yum!
Easy and delicious, my favorite kind of recipe!
Used this recipe for a family dinner and it was fabulous! The adjustments I made to it were to add more basil and used a thirty ounce container of ricotta with a little parmesan instead of what the recipe called for. Had to bake it a little longer but it was totally worth it.
Tried this out on my friends last night. We all loved it 🙂 Simple to make.
I used Barilla’s Traditional spaghetti sauce. And for the meat lovers, I served Aidell’s Italian Sausage on the side.
Definitely a keeper!
I am making this for dinner tonight as we love this recipe exactly as is. I do make the homemade spaghetti sauce from the recipe provided in the link. I use 1 Pound turkey Italian sausage and 1 Pound regular sweet Italian sausage so that provides plenty of protein and meat. The recipe is perfect as is but may consider adding spinach on a future batch to switch it up a little. We love this recipe and have made it several times for company who loved it as well and always get asked for the recipe.
Made this Stuffed Shells recipe for my daughter’s 1st Holy Communion and everyone LOVED it! Prepared and stuffed the day before. Baked day of. Delicious! THANK YOU! The photos you posted were very helpful also.
That is great to hear! I am glad it was delicious and everyone loved it! Thanks for sharing! Xo
Your Recipe Critic,
Alyssa
Very easy to prepare. They are in the oven as I type :0) I can’t wait to try it! Its smells awesome as well. I love anything cheese and this has it all. I don’t eat alot of meat so this is perfect for me..
Hi! Could you please post the calories per serving for this recipe?
Thanks!
PS
I added 2 chicken breasts & 1 thigh cooked & shredded and about 2.5 cups steamed spinach-mixed together- atop the sauce (before the shells). Delicious!
I like to use myfitnesspal.com or skinnytaste.com for nutritional questions. Hope that helps! XOXO
Hi, I have been using a recipe every christmas and everyone loves it. I tried to search it on the internet every year and still cant find it. So I wonder maybe it is because it came from a very small town in viterbo , italy and my aunt showed me how to make them when I was very young. I call it cannelloni al formaggio. sure there are many types but not the way I make them. I wonder if I can make it a signature dish and have it posted as well? Thank you kindly.
I’ve done these twice now and they’re always a big hit! Thank you so much!!
I made a pan of these for my son’s co-Ed Ultimate Frisbee team’s carbo feed because some of the girls were vegetarian and they were a huge hit! The girls said it was some of the best pasta they had ever had! Also, my husband usually doesn’t love when I make a vegetarian meal at home but loves these. A big favorite and I don’t make any changes to it.
This is great recepie and I am going to give this a shot, Ricotta is awesome as I am a big fan in any dish….looks yum!
I made these shells today for lunch and they were awesome! Not only were they easy to make, they were delicious!
Does this freeze well? Should I freeze the filling separately? Should it be frozen before or after cooking?
I really want to try this but I am only one person. I would rather make the recipe and freeze some than cut the recipe.
Thanks.
Can you use any kind of cheese?
Yes, if you prefer a different cheese that sounds great! Let me know how it turns out!
You used to have your pasta sauce with Italian sausage recipe on here but I can no longer find it. We love it! I’d love to have it, please!!
Hi Terry,
I do have this Italian orzo and sausage skillet or sausage tomato gnocchi. If these are not one of them, explain a little more of the ingredients and I will see what other recipes match that description.
Thanks,
Alyssa
This was an instant hit at our dinner table. All of the boys (3) plus my forth child (husband) loved this. I quickly made my own sauces with crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce, diced onion, red and yellow peppers, Worcestershire, garlic, and salt and pepper. I went to three store for the large or jumbo shells and was unable to find them:( I bought manicotti noodles instead and filled those. I cannot wait to make these again!
Meat, no meat it’s all personal preference. Another option is to serve some large meatballs or Italian sausage, (simmered in sauce), on the side if you feel the need to include meat in your meal. Either way this sounds delicious!
Amazing recipe, my picky kids even liked it! Super easy, fast. Bake some frozen meatball and served it with a salad. Definitely will be in rotation! Thank you
Excellent 😘