This Spinach and Cheese Stuffed Manicotti is a favorite family recipe. Watch the video in the post showing you how to make manicotti, then scroll all the way to the bottom of this post and print out a clean copy of the recipe so you can make it at home.
Spinach and Cheese Stuffed Manicotti
Manicotti is a dish of great comfort. It makes plenty, it’s filling, it’s completely family-friendly, and the leftovers are even better than the freshly made batch. We make this when we have a handful of friends or family around. It’s a nice, no-fuss recipe that everyone seems to love. Make it ahead, keep it in the fridge and toss it in the oven when everybody is ready to eat.
If you didn’t know, manicotti is a pasta noodle shaped like a tube. It’s about 4-inches long, and 1-inch in diameter. Usually it’s boiled until al dente, then cooled, filled with some kind of cheese filling, covered with sauce and baked. In this recipe, you don’t have to bake the noodles before filling them. They’ll cook in the sauce when you bake the manicotti in the oven.
🛒Ingredients needed:
- ricotta cheese
- mozzarella cheese
- cream cheese
- parmesan cheese
- frozen spinach
- eggs
- salt & freshly ground black pepper
- manicotti noodles
- marinara sauce
✏️How to make Spinach and Cheese Stuffed Manicotti:
*The complete, printable recipe with all ingredients and instructions is at the end of this post.
The filling is very simple to make. Just mix it all up in a bowl until it’s well-blended. If you (or your kids) don’t like spinach, you can always leave it out… though I’ve found that you don’t really detect it all that much with all of the other wonderful things and sauce in the recipe.
You might consider it a good way to “sneak” some good stuff into dinner.
A layer of sauce goes into the bottom of a 13×9-inch pan.
The easiest way to stuff manicotti shells is the put the mixed filling into a plastic bag. You can use either a frosting piping bag or a gallon zip bag. Snip the corner, gather the top and squeeze the filling into the corner.
Hold an uncooked manicotti shell in your hand and squeeze the filling inside the shell. Let it overflow on both sides.
Place the filled shell into the sauce-lined pan.
Repeat with remaining manicotti and fill the pan with the stuffed shells, until you run out of shells and filling.
Cover with a generous layer of marinara sauce.
Sprinkle cheese on top. At this point, you can cover with foil, refrigerate and then bake when you’re ready. It’s ok to leave it in the refrigerator overnight.
Cover and bake for about an hour.
Pop open a bottle of red wine and eat! This Spinach and Cheese Stuffed Manicotti recipe will feed 6 or 7 hungry people- 2 stuffed shells each is plenty when served with salad and garlic bread. And lighter eaters will be plenty full with just one shell.
★How to Store:
Store leftovers in the refrigerator and enjoy over the next few days. I guarantee they won’t last long. Manicotti also freezes well. Just place leftovers in an airtight container and you can keep them in the freezer for up to 3 months.
❤️Why I love this recipe:
- My family has been loving this recipe since I was a kid. At our house it’s always been our traditional Christmas Eve meal.
- It’s a crowd pleaser. Even people who say they don’t like spinach love these manicotti!
- I love that it can be made ahead of time and stored in the refrigerator until I’m ready to bake it. Makes getting dinner together so simple.
The Best Manicotti Recipes:
- Pumpkin Manicotti with Bechamel Sauce
- Chicken Manicotti
- Ham and Cheese Manicotti
- Chicken Manicotti Alfredo
Spinach and Cheese Stuffed Manicotti
Ingredients
- 15 ounces part skim ricotta cheese
- 8 ounces shredded mozzarella cheese
- 4 ounces cream cheese
- ½ cup shredded Parmesan cheese
- 10 ounces frozen spinach, thawed & squeezed dry
- 2 large eggs
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 1 box (12 to 14 shells) manicotti noodles
- 4 cups marinara sauce (jarred or homemade)
- ½ cup shredded Parmesan cheese, for topping
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350℉.
- In a large bowl, mix the cheeses, spinach, eggs, salt and pepper. Stir together until well blended.
- Place about 1½ cups of marinara sauce in a 9x13-inch pan. Spread it around to cover the bottom.
- Place the mixed filling into a plastic bag. You can use either a frosting piping bag or a gallon zip bag. Snip the corner, gather the top and squeeze the filling into the corner. Hold an uncooked manicotti shell in your hand and squeeze the filling inside the shell. Let it overflow on both sides. Alternately, you can stuff the uncooked noodles with a small spoon or fork. Place the filled shell into the sauce-lined pan. Repeat with remaining manicotti and fill the pan with the stuffed shells, until you run out of shells and filling. You should be able to fill 12 to 14 shells- if you run out of room in your pan, use a separate smaller pan to accommodate the extra.
- Cover the pasta completely with marinara sauce, using about 2½ cups of sauce. Sprinkle ½ cup Parmesan on top. At this point, you can cover with foil and refrigerate until you're ready to bake, or you can cover with foil and place it in the oven immediately.
- Bake, covered with foil, 50 minutes. Remove foil and bake an additional 10 minutes.
Notes
- It's perfectly okay to use low fat ricotta and low fat cream cheese.
- If you don't wish to use the spinach, it's ok to leave it out and just turn this into a cheese-stuffed manicotti.
- If you don't wish to use the plastic bag method of squeezing the filling into the shells, you can use a very small spoon or fork to stuff the filling-- it will just take a bit longer and might be a little messy.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
looking for something to do with my ‘famous’ spaghetti sauce that is different. Thanks for the recipe.
Awesome hit–have made it twice and smiles all around. Quick tip: After thawing the spinach and squeezing it, chop it finer with a knife. My brand of chopped spinach is chopped too coarsely, which gave me issues with clogging the piping bag. Chopped finely, though, filling the shells was a breeze.
Have also used this filling for a lasagna with browned jalapeno chicken sausage in the meat sauce. Gave it a small kick which everyone raved about. Thanks for the recipe!
Great tips!
This was absolutely delicious! My dad boyfriend his brother and grandpa “all picky eaters” loooved it! In my cook book great job!
I’ve made manicotti before, but have always used a spoon to stuff them. It’s always messy, the pasta normally tears (from boiling them only 2-3 minutes,) and takes a really long time. When I saw this I felt so inspired to try it for dinner tonight because it looked so easy! I added very small bits of chicken, sundried tomatoes, and kalamata olives. Well, it wasn’t as easy as I expected. I think my first problem was that I cut the hole in the bag too big! The second problem was that as I squeezed the bag it actually slid out from the tube, even when I was holding the noodle firmly around the bag. My husband had to help me hold the bag, and together we manged to stuff all the noodles.
It was a fun experiment. I may try it a few more times until I master the bag technique. Thanks for the idea!!
I made this last week and it was such a hit that I just put another batch in the oven as we speak!!!! Thank you do much for the recipe, my family thanks you as well!!!!!
You’re welcome- it’s a family favorite of ours too!
Are you married to Monte Lange from Billings?
Nope!
I intend on making this recipe this weekend! I am considering making my own sauce as well as using shrimp as well. Excited to make it
New noodle tip for everyone – Lasagna noodles work great for easy manicotti.Cook noodles till aldente, use pastry or ziploc bag as stated to make a line of filling across the noodle shortways, roll, cut with knife or pizza cutter (easier) place seam side down. Each noodle makes 3-4 cute short manicotties depending on how thick you pipe the filling. Bake for about 30 min or till bubbly. Then add cheese till melted.
This was SOS delicious! We all loved it. Thanks so much. I pinned it!
sorry whats a sieve? is it a strainer? i could just do that, thanks!
sorry- it’s a very fine strainer. If you just use a pasta strainer, frozen spinach is chopped into such small pieces that they might sneak through the holes. Give it a shot.