Say Cheese to a healthy 4 cheese Baked Pasta Shells

This girl chewed my brains out, threatened me, argued endlessly to make me take part in this particular event. Me - being as strong and level headed that I am - I remained steadfast. Hmph! What did you think ? As if I could give in easily ..mmm... But cunning girl from that special corner very sweetly said - Ok Ok dont take part - I am going to go ahead and announce the theme "Cheese". Ha ha - as if that would make me succumb to that bait.



(cough) (cough) Darn! This girl knows me so damn well...anyways she sure knows to make me do things which I would make a face that would not improve with any makeover - even as seemingly good as this. Siri - U owe me girl ( Oh well why so much for the event - u ask? Thats a secret thats going to die a brutal death between her and me! But I sure made u curious dint I ? ;-))

I had about 3/4 cup of cottage cheese left in my fridge for a while and I dint want to test its patience anymore from not going yellow, so was thinking of what to do with it and googled for something simple and quick for dinner when I chanced upon this recipe for Lasagna which used Cottage cheese. I was like yeah, why not and decided for pasta then and there. But there is only one hitch. Its hard - no make it almost impossible for me to stick to a recipe verbatim. Do you have this problem too? I consider myself the "customization queen" :) :)- so made some changes to incorporate my needs - High Protein, Less Fat, Healthy But Simple and Fast! And the following is what I ended up making.

Ingredients
1 pkt Jumbo Pasta Shells ( use about 10-15 shells for 2 ppl)
1 1/2 cup home made Marinara sauce ( or go for store bought like Prego!)
2-3 tsp approx Italian seasoning, as per taste ( Its a mix of dried herbs like Marjoram,Basil,thyme,rosemary etc)
3/4 cup of Cottage Cheese, low fat (less fat, more protein.)
1 cup Ricotta cheese, low fat
1 cup Mozzarella, grated, part skim
1/4 cup parmesan, grated
handful of cilantro/Parsley, chopped
1 onion,chopped finely
2-3 garlic, minced
salt and pepper to taste

Method

1.Cook the Pasta shells in large pot, so that they dont stick to each other. Cook only for about 10min till slightly soft since it would cook more in the Oven.Drain.



2.In a skillet, cook the onions and garlic in 1 tsp of Olive oil and then add the marinara sauce.



Add seasoning and the salt/pepper if needed. bring to a boil.



3.Mix the 4 cheeses along with cilantro/parsley.



4.Spray non stick oil spray in a shallow baking pan and ladle some of the sauce at the bottom. Now pipe the cheese mixture into the jumbo shells one by one and place in the pan. Once done, pour rest of the marinara on top.



5.Bake at 350F for about 15-20min and serve hot.



This goes off to my dear Siri for her MBP : Cheese Event :) Say Cheese along with me will you :) :)