Meat Stuffed Rigatoni

Ingredients:
Meat Filling:
1 lb lean ground sirloin
1/2 yellow onion, chopped in small pieces
2 cloves garlic, grated
1 cup part skim ricotta cheese
1/4 cup shredded mozzarella
2 tbs fine bread crumbs
1 tsp salt
1 tbs ketchup
1 tbs worstershire
2 tsp dried oregano
2 tsp dried parsley
2 tsp dried basil

Pasta:
8 oz large rigatoni (Italian speciality food store is a great place to find them...the largest you can get)
2 tbs olive oil + 1 tsp salt
4 ozs fresh mozzarella (in a ball...the kind you can slice)
1 jar tomato sauce (I used Ragu Roasted Garlic and Tomato)

Fill a pot with water and add the oil and salt. Boil. Cook the rigatoni (don't cook it too long because you don't want it to fall apart when you're trying to stuff it).

Cook the meat in a non stick skillet and half way through cooking add the onion. In a large bowl mix all the "meat filling" ingredients, including the meat and onion you've cooked. Mix thoroughly and let cool.

Drain the pasta and rinse with cool water.

Once everything is cooled, you can start filling the shells. I just did this by hand. The meat mix was too thick to go through a pastry bag.

You could put all the noodles in one large lasagna pan, or you can use gratin bakers. I used the all-clad ones with the handles. I just kept it to basically one layer of noodles in two gratin dishes, and then I went ahead and layered the rest in another dish.

Back in your non stick skillet heat the tomato sauce and add any lefter over meat mix. Add any seasonings that you think it needs. Then pour the sauce evenly over the filled pasta. You definitely don't need it swimming in sauce, and if you've used shallow bakers this won't be an issue. Then top with sliced mozzarella.

At this point, you can either cover everything and put it in the fridge, or you can go ahead and bake it immediately. Bake at 375. If you've refrigerated, bake for about 20-30 minutes (if the cheese browns too quickly, cover with foil sprayed with cooking spray). If you bake it immediately, cook for about 15 minutes, until heated through.