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You don't have to pre-boil pasta for baked dishes



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The model baked ziti recipe I used in this video is from Chrissy Teigen’s first cookbook, “Cravings: Recipes for All of the Food You Want to Eat” (2016):

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43 Comments

  1. Well, I have only done a traditional Finnish "macaroni casserole" a couple of times (and it is good), and my recipe says first boil the macaroni as instructed in its packet. And frankly I feel more comfortable doing this because mixing cooked pasta with the minced fried meat and spices for baking is just more… comfortable and confident than doing it with hard uncooked pasta. And the one extra kettle to cook the pasta in and mix it with the other ingredients before dumping it in the oven dish is really almost no burden to wash 🙂

  2. I didn't know that people didn't know this until a few years ago when a coworker complained about his mother-in-law boiling lasagna noodles before baking the lasagna. I had him repeat it to me a few times because i was certain i had misunderstood.

  3. Idk, I'm a bit torn on this technique.. I think there's just too many variables.
    Like.. to just barely cover the pasta in my big wide baking dish, I end up needing waaay more liquid than the pasta can absorb.
    Maybe I messed it up somehow and probably should've used more pasta, but I've tried this technique twice now and it came out watery both times..🤷🏻‍♂️ It's prob my fault but just a heads up.

  4. I love the fact you told us all the information in the first MINUTE, I absolutely hate when YTs hide their information over a 20 minute video to make you “watch it all”

    This channel has become one of my favourites 😍

  5. 9:55 it's probably not from that time, since that time didn't exist. Alex (French Guy cooking) investigates that well and shows that there is traditional dried flower/water pasta such as orecchiette.
    I assume it just comes from using leftovers in a baked pasta dish. Therefore recreating pasta leftovers.
    But that's just another guess, maybe there is some inherent advantage in pre-boiling pasta?

  6. Welp. I’ve got an eggplant in my fridge I need to use, I’ve got a ton of basil I need to use, and I’ve got 8oz of fresh mozz I need to use. I don’t have any ricotta, but I have some Rao’s vodka sauce, which i think will work just fine. So I guess this is dinner. Thanks Chrissy + Adam!

  7. I tried this with a large (16 oz?) can of tomato sauce, cooked ground pork, maybe 8 oz of dried pasta, and a lot of cheese. I used a grated cheese mix I bought from the store and some shaker parmesan. I baked it for about half an hour with the lid on to begin, and maybe another 20 minutes with it off. It turned out really good.
    Now I am trying it again, this time with tomato sauce I made using tomato paste, water, and herbs. I've never actually made tomato sauce from scratch like this from scratch. Another difference this time is that I am using some roasted chicken which I picked off of the bones instead of using ground pork. Also, this time I am not cooking it with the lid on because I want to see what happens if I don't. I put in a little extra water as well. It is now in the oven, so I will see how it turns out soon.

  8. Good tip but usually I minimize dishes to clean by boiling the pasta first then letting it sit in the strainer while I put all my other ingredients in that same pot. Either way It does make things a bit easier.

  9. This is pretty similar to an Italian technique called pasta "risottata", where you cook the pasta directly in your sauce. You can eyeball the extra amount of water directly or you can add a little at a time, making it somewhat similar to making risotto, hence the name. It's usually helpful for making thicker, more emulsified sauces, since the pasta releases some of their starch as they cook directly in the sauce.

  10. What if, no, dont do this, and…. your food is always good. Instead of trying to figure out how to make this okay?

    If you do this, your food might be too watery, MAYBE it'll absorb enough water. Maybe when the water is gone you'll have extra chewey pasta, maybe you'll have an over done dish. Who wants to roll the dice? Do you want your food to maybe suck? Or you could ignore adam this one time and have your food not suck all the time. all for the price of rinsing out a pasta pot.

    IDK about you all, but if I only use a pot for pasta I rinse and wipe it, it doesn't need a real wash. BUt if that will break your life, and overly chewy food, or overly watery food wont, like… eat gross food and dont spend literally 30 seconds wiping out a pot. I'd rather eat good.

    Adam is dead wrong here.

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