Cheesy Stuffed Shells

Here is the Cheesy Stuffed Shells recipe that I referred to in my last post.  I originally got this recipe from the Kraft food and family magazine, Spring 2006 issue.  These are so good.  Last time we made them my husband suggested that I make him a pan all for himself.  We DO qualify for the WIC program.  Any family of six that makes less than $54,000 per year qualifies (and has children under 5).  This program gives our family free cheese and milk and eggs.  So I don't hesitate to use recipes with cheese.  If you don't qualify for this program, Target often has coupons at coupons.target.com for $1/2 of their store brand cheeses.  I usually use these if I need more cheese during the month than WIC allows. 

1 container (16 oz.) low fat cottage cheese
1 pkg. (10 oz.) frozen chopped spinach, thawed, well drained
1 cup mozzarella cheese, divided
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 tsp. Italian seasoning
20 jumbo pasta shells, cooked, drained
1 jar (26 oz.) spaghetti sauce
1 large tomato, chopped

(We are not big tomato eaters in my family, so I often omit the tomato and don't use the whole jar of spaghetti sauce). 

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.  Mix cottage cheese, spinach, 1/2 cup of the mozzarella cheese, Parmesan cheese and Italian seasoning until well blended.  Spoon 1 heaping Tbsp. of the cheese mixture evenly into each pasta shell.

Combine spaghetti sauce and tomatoes; spoon half of the sauce mixture into 13x9 - inch baking dish.  Place shells, filled sides up, in baking dish.  Spoon remaining sauce mixture over shells (again, my kids don't really like the sauce, so I put the sauce in half of the pan and don't put nearly.  I would prefer that they get all of the nutrients out of the tomato, but I'm just happy that they're eating spinach).  Cover with foil.

Bake 25 minutes or until heated through.  Uncover; top with remaining 1/2cup  mozzarella cheese.  Bake, uncovered, an additional 2 min. or until cheese is melted.