Tex Mex Pasta Bake Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Why is my pasta bake still hard? ›

“It's my first time cooking baked ziti and when I took it out the oven, the top layer of pasta was a little hard/dry. Why?” It should be a little dry and crunchy. But if it is excessively hard, then the most likely cause is that it was cooked for too long or at too high a cooking temperature.

Dried pasta needs to be par-boiled, then drained before using it in baked dishes. Just boil for half the time specified on the package. There is a type of dried no-boil lasagna sheets that don't require par-boiling, but they need extra water added to the sauce.

Pasta absorbs liquid from the sauce as it cooks. If there's too much pasta and not enough sauce, you can end up with a dry bake.

Because the pasta's going into a hot sauce in a hot oven, it'll continue to cook long after it's been drained. You're looking for a semi-raw texture—even firmer than al dente pasta.

Pasta that is soft and mushy is usually overcooked, while if it's crunchy and hard, this is a good indication that you haven't cooked it for long enough. Pasta cooked perfectly tends to be tender on the inside and a bit firm on the outside.

Flour-Based Thickeners

A general ratio to work with is 2 tablespoons flour for every cup of liquid. Start by adding a little bit, then cook, stirring, for a few minutes to allow the sauce time to thicken and cook off the raw flour taste; if the results are minimal, add more.

The assembly of this pasta bake takes about 5 minutes. Blend the sauce, stir in the uncooked noodles, and bake covered (and unattended) for 40 minutes. Finish it off with melty mozzarella and parsley.

PREHEAT oven to 425 degrees. COMBINE uncooked pasta, 1 jar of Sauce and 1 jar of water in a 13 x 9 inch baking pan. Cover with aluminum foil. BAKE 30 minutes.

By skipping the separate boiling of the pasta and instead adding the dried noodles straight to the sauce, you can make a weeknight-friendly meal in just one pot. Bonus: It makes the pasta more flavorful, too.

For Baked Pasta Dishes

As for picking the perfect pasta shape, we recommend choosing a short cut—like Penne, Shells or Rigatoni—with hollow middles, twists or scoop-like shapes to capture all the goodness of your baked pasta: sauces, small ingredients and melty cheeses galore.

How do you keep pasta bake moist? ›

Secret to Moist Baked Pasta

Make the sauce little goey, add reserved pasta cooked water then add pasta and toss well. Adding pasta cooked water does the trick of keeping the paste moist even after baking.

When using pasta in a casserole it's a good idea to 'undercook' it, depending on how long the baked dish is cooked and how much liquid is in the recipe. So if you start with pasta that is already overcooked it's not going to be pretty when it's done.

First, you can use any type of short pasta for this (examples, rigatoni, penne, macaroni, shells) but just don't try to use spaghetti or something huge! Second, if you live alone you can make this recipe as-is, but if you have a parter, simply double it. If you're feeding a family, just quadruple it!

Add enough liquid

Even though we're not boiling a pot, our pasta still needs liquid to cook. In your baking dish, combine your noodles with all of your other ingredients and around ½ a cup of water. The noodles will absorb the water as they cook. The final dish will be saucy and moist, but not watery.

Too much flour makes the pasta tough.

Sounds like you are using a pot too small for boiling. Pasta needs room to boil. And you need to boil at least 10 to 12 minutes with SALTED WATER. Pasta takes a lot of water to cook.

If you're worried about your leftovers being too dry, you can add an extra dollop of pasta sauce or even a few drops of water to the baking dish. This will revamp your leftovers and keep the taste and texture the same as the first time you enjoyed the meal.