Baked Pasta With Spinach, Ricotta, and Prosciutto

Submitted by Redsie

"From Everyday Food. This is such an easy and tasty dish!! Did add some red bell peppers and tried it with cottage cheese instead of ricotta. Mmmm good!!"

 

• Ready In: 1hr
• Ingredients: 9
• Serves: 6

ingredients

• 1 lb gemelli pasta or 1 lb other pastas
• 6 ounces sliced prosciutto
• 2 (10 ounce) packages frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed of excess moisture
• 2 cups low-fat milk
• 2 cups low-fat ricotta cheese
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• coarse salt
• ground pepper
• 1⁄2 cup grated parmesan cheese

directions

1. Preheat oven to 400°.
2. Cook pasta a few minutes less than package instructions suggest.
3. Cut prosciutto into thin strips.
4. In a 9-by-13-inch baking dish, toss pasta with spinach, half of prosciutto, milk, ricotta, and garlic.
5. Season with salt and pepper.
6. Top with remaining prosciutto and Parmesan.
7. Bake until golden, 30 to 40 minutes.

Reviews

[PaulaG]

What's not to like? I had prosciutto and ricotta that I needed to use. Found this recipe and am glad I did. The recipe was reduced to 4 servings. I love having the ability to adjust serving sizes. I used gluten free brown rice spirals for the pasta. The prosciutto was crisped before adding to the casserole. A touch of nutmeg was added. This was served with a side salad for a wonderful meal. Thanks for posting.

 

[bluemoon downunder]

Delicious. And since I LOVE spinach, certainly a recipe I'll happily make again. I increased the garlic to three cloves and added one onion - both of which I minced. Having several times been surprised - and most disappointed - that onion had not fully cooked in a dish baked in the oven, I sauteed the onion and garlic until just softened. I then added the other ingredients in step four to the pan, and added a pinch of nutmeg while seasoning with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Only then did I transfer the ingredients to the baking dish. I followed KITTENCAL's recommendation and halved the pasta. Inspired by dicentra's photographs, I used penne. I added 2 handfuls of chopped baby spinach leaves (which I always have a plentiful supply of on hand) to the 2 packets of frozen (thoroughly squeezed) spinach. I used low-fat milk and low-fat ricotta (as specified) and added a tablespoon of Greek yoghurt. I also added about 1/2 cup of pine-nuts, an obvious addition in a recipe with spinach and ricotta! Thanks for sharing this delicious recipe, Redsie. We all thoroughly enjoyed this dish. Made for 1-2-3 Hit Wonders 2008.

 

[Kittencalrecipezazz]

If I didn't reduce the pasta amount this would definately have been to dry, I only used 1/2 pound of pasta which was just fine, I used 1 cup whipping cream with 1 cup half and half, also added in some cayenne pepper and 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese into the cream mixture, thanks for sharing hon!...Kitten:)

 

[dicentra]

This is good. I used penne and followed the recipe, except I only used half of the spinach. Very easy to make. I thought it was really good, but DH wouldn't eat it. (b/c of the spinach??) DD picked out the noodles.

 

[Meredith C-ville]

I tried it, and it was indeed easy (except that I almost forgot to add the spinach!) and a great make-ahead (covered and refrigerated for 1.5 days). I added a few more garlic cloves, some shakes of dried oregano and basil, and some fresh parsley. I also subbed turkey pepperoni for the proscuitto, mainly because it's cheaper, and this worked fine. The red (meat), white (pasta and cheese and sauce), and green (spinach and parsley) were very pretty together. BTW, it may be obvious, but I did my stirring in my noodle-boiling pot, and then poured this into my casserole pan. Otherwise I'd have had most of it on the counter! I baked it covered for all but about 7 minutes of the cooking time, and since I had REALLY drained my spinach, this turned out fine with respect to the moisture level. It went over well with everyone here, and we'll definitely have it again.