three cheese manicotti

are you hungry? good. because my image-hosting finally works again and i re-sized my photo to display properly. so finally, as promised earlier�here's a photo of the manicotti i made three weeks ago (followed by the recipe below). although filling each shell by hand took longer than expected, it's actually a very simple recipe. and everyone loved it, so i guess that means it was a success. enjoy! perhaps i'll drop in for an update or two this weekend. or not. enjoy your friday!

THREE CHEESE MANICOTTI

Ingredients:
14 pieces (8 oz.) uncooked manicotti shells
3 cups (1 26 oz. jar) spaghetti sauce
1 cup water
2 cups (15 oz. each) ricotta cheese
2 cups (8 oz. each) shredded mozzarella cheese
1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
2 Tbsp. chopped fresh parsley
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. ground black pepper

Instructions:
Cook manicotti pasta according to package instructions. Do not overcook. [Hint: add a drop of olive oil to the boiling water. This helps prevent cooked pasta from sticking together]. Spread a sheet of aluminum foil on a flat surface. Lay pieces of manicotti on the foil to cool. Make sure they are not touching each other. Heat oven to 400 degrees. Combine spaghetti sauce and water in a saucepan and heat it until it boils, stirring frequently. Reduce heat and simmer to keep warm. In a separate bowl, stir together the three cheeses, parsley, salt and pepper. Spoon the cheese filling into cooked manicotti tubes. Pour 1 cup sauce onto the bottom of a 13x9x2-inch glass baking dish, and spread evenly. Arrange filled pasta tubes in a single layer over the sauce. Then pour the remaining sauce over pasta. Cover with foil and bake 40 minutes or until bubbly and hot. Then remove foil and bake 10 more minutes.
*(Serves 6-8 people)< br>