Baked Mostaccioli

Baked Mostaccioli is loaded with ooey, gooey cheeses and packed with meat thanks to RAGÚ^® Homestyle Thick & Hearty Meat Sauce.  It’s the perfect comfort food any night of the week and sure to become a family favorite!

 Bring on the comfort foods!  It’s a rainy, gloomy day today and this baked mostaccioli is hitting the spot!  Soon the house will be filled with casseroles, soups and pasta.  I like to check out the Ragu Pasta Sauce Recipes page to get a jump-start on my menu early in the month.  Tis the year for down home comfort foods most of which I do not eat in the summertime.  It’s already hot outside so I’d rather just have a burger off the grill or a cold sandwich.  But when fall and winter roll around, bring on the hot dishes.

I love pasta and often times make it myself with the fancy Kitchenaid attachment my dad gave me a few years ago for Christmas.  It certainly is a labor of love.  However, you will find every type of pasta shape available in my pantry because let’s face it, boxed pasta is just easy and simple to make.  But when I do have time, you’ll find homemade fettuccine, ravioli and gnocchi in my kitchen.

We ate baked mostaccioli all the time when we were kids…but it was takeout.  It was from our favorite restaurant.  I think we had it once a week. It’s absolutely delicious.  My mom, sister and I recently went back after not having it for 10 years and it was just as tasty as I remember.

It also brings me back to the table and when we would share family dinners.  We’d gather around the table, pass the salad bowl, pasta dish and garlic bread and eat to our heart’s content.  We’d replay our day and what happened at school.  It was the one time of day where our family would sit together and reconnect.  Mornings are busy, afternoons are spent with homework and after dinner is relaxation, leisure activities and getting ready for bed.  So it was the dinner table in which we spent the most time conversing.

It’s one of the moment’s I now look forward to as a mother.  I love to cook dinner.  Being the foodie and food blogger that I am, cooking is second nature to me.  I’m relaxed when I’m in the kitchen…until I see the pile of dishes, LOL!  But it’s a time we all sit down together and discuss what happened in preschool, 1st grade and work.  We recall our day to each other while enjoying our meal.

I mentioned my dad’s amazing pasta sauce in my Veggie Stuffed Shells post. It’s my favorite but when I don’t have time to prepare it, I reach for RAGÚ^® Homestyle Thick & Heartys Sauces.  To be completely honest, they are my favorite pasta sauces you can purchase in a grocery store.  They are robust, full of amazing flavor, bold and thick!  They offer a variety of flavors, so say goodbye to boring pasta sauce flavors!

And like our tradition of sitting around the family table, RAGÚ Homestyle is simmered in rich tradition.  They don’t use artificial flavors, artificial colors or high fructose corn syrup in their sauces which is a huge win in my book.  I fell in love with their Homestyle Thick and Hearty Roasted Garlic Sauce but wanted to try something new for this baked mostaccioli recipe.  

For this Baked Mostaccioli, I had about 45 minutes for my family to come bursting through the door so I was in a hurry.  I grabbed some meat out of the fridge, grated up as much cheese as I could possibly find and grabbed a jar of RAGÚ^® Homestyle Thick & Hearty Meat Sauce.

I quickly browned up chorizo, pork and beef.  Then pour in the meat sauce. My meat loving husband would soon be in Heaven.  I grated 4 different types of cheese because what is Baked Mostaccioli without a heap of cheese.  I sprinkled in 3/4 of the cheese into the pot with the noodles and sauce, stirred it up and thew it into a 9 x 13.  Then I sprinkled the top with the rest of the cheese and baked it in the oven for 35 minutes.  After it was done baking, allow it to cool so it’s a little easier to cut.

Not only is baked mostaccioli my favorite thing in the World, my family LOVED it too.  My kids were over the moon with all the ooey gooey cheese. My husband loved the amount of meat and I was just happy watching them eating dinner.  When you need a meal on the table with a short amount of time, RAGÚ Homestyle to the rescue!

5 votes

Print

Baked Mostaccioli

Prep 10 mins

Cook 30 mins

Total 40 mins

Author Strawberry Blondie Kitchen

Yield 10 -12

Baked Mostaccioli is loaded with ooey, gooey cheeses and packed with meat thanks to RAGÚ® Homestyle Thick & Hearty Meat Sauce. It's the perfect comfort food any night of the week and sure to become a family favorite!

Ingredients

• 4 tablespoons butter
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 medium onion, diced I used Vidalia
• 12 ounces ground beef
• 16 ounces pork sausage
• 7 ounces chorizo
• 23 ounce jar RAGÚ Homestyle Thick and Hearty Meat Sauce
• 16 ounces Mostaccioli Pasta
• 2 ounces Parmesan cheese, grated
• 2 ounces Asiago cheese, grated
• 2 ounces Colby Jack cheese, grated
• 2 ounces Mozzarella, grated
• 8 ounces Fresh Mozzarella, grated

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and spray a 9 x 13 pan with cooking spray and set aside
2. In a large pot, melt butter. When melted add in garlic and saute for 30 seconds, add onion and saute until translucent.
3. Meanwhile, bring a pot of water to a boil and add in your pasta. Cook 8 minutes or until al dente.
4. Next, add in all 3 meats to the garlic and onion and cook until browned.
5. Add in RAGÚ Homestyle Thick and Hearty Meat Sauce and stir to combine. Set aside.
6. Grate all 5 cheeses and mix together. Take 3/4 of the cheese mixture and combine with meat sauce when slightly cooled. If you add all the cheese in now, it'll all melt and clump up so it's best to wait until sauce is slightly cooled.
7. Drain pasta and add to pot with meat sauce and cheese. Combine well and place into prepared 9 x 13 pan.
8. Top with remaining grated cheese, cover with aluminum foil and bake for 30 minutes or until cheese is melted.
9. Remove from oven and allow to cool slightly so it's easier to cut into pieces.
10. Serve with a salad and garlic bread.

Courses Pasta

To my knowledge, there are no shortcuts when making my dad’s pasta sauce.  It’s a minimum of 2 hours and you can really tell it took time to simmer and develop flavors in that amount of time.  What I really love about RAGÚ^® Homestyle Thick & Hearty Meat Sauce is you can really taste the love and care that went into making their sauces.  No shortcuts were taken in the RAGÚ kitchen either. That’s a superior sauce in my opinion.

What is your family’s favorite pasta dish?  What RAGÚ Homestyle sauce are you most looking forward to trying first?  I’ve got my eyeballs on the four Cheese sauce next!

still hungry for more?

follow me on facebook, pinterest and instagram for more deliciousness!

pin this recipe on pinterest!

subscribe!  sign up for easy + delicious recipes delivered weekly-straight to your inbox!