Instant Pot Spinach Ricotta Stuffed Shells - Dump and Go Dinner
Filled with a delightfully creamy blend of flavorful cheeses and fresh spinach these Instant Pot Spinach Ricotta Stuffed Shells make a comforting pasta dish you can toss into your Instant Pot frozen and still have a hot meal on the table fast.
Ingredients
- 15 ounces Ricotta Cheese
- 1 cup chop Spinach
- ½ teaspoons Garlic Powder
- ¼ cups Parmesan Cheese, Grated
- ¼ teaspoons Salt
- ⅛ teaspoons Black Pepper
- 12 individual cook Jumbo/Large Shells
- 12 fluid ounces Marinara Sauce
- ½ cups Water
- ¼ cups Mozzarella Cheese, Shredded
Containers
Supplies
Cooking Instructions
Freeze For Later Cooking Day Directions
These directions help you cook or prepare this meal PRIOR to being frozen for serving later (see Serving Day Directions when you are ready to prepare it to eat).
Why would I want to freeze this?
- In a bowl, combine the ricotta, spinach, garlic powder, Parmesan, salt and pepper.
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Make From Frozen Serving Day Directions
These directions help you cook or reheat this meal AFTER it's been frozen for when you are ready to eat it.
- Prep from frozen
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Make It Now Cooking Directions
These directions are for cooking this recipe to serve immediately and NOT to freeze for later.
- **Due to the nature of pressure cooking there is always room for inconsistency. The times given here are based on 4 servings fresh. If you are using more servings you may need to increase your cooking time.**
- Spread half of the marinara sauce in the bottom of the Instant Pot. Add water.
- In a bowl, combine the ricotta, spinach, garlic powder, Parmesan, salt and pepper.
- Spoon the mixture into the shells and place them on top of the sauce.
- Cover the shells with the rest of the sauce.
- Lock lid into place and seal steam nozzle.
- Cook on high pressure for 12 minutes.
- Quick release pressure.
- Sprinkle with mozzarella cheese and let melt.
17 Comments
Join the discussionDo I cook the shells before freezing for this recipe?
Yes, you should. The ingredient calls for 12 cooked shells.
I tried this and only used 8oz marinara sauce, but my shells came un-stuffed and they were swimming in the sauce. What did I do wrong? I’m new to pressure cooking, so trying to learn from my mistakes!
Hi Erica, I’m so sorry your shells came unstuffed. I think pasta is tricky with your Instant Pot. A couple things to keep in mind 1) try not to over stuff the shells and make sure they are closed and tight and 2) try flash freezing them first to firm them up before putting them in your Instant Pot. Hope this helps! Happy Cooking.
I had the same unstuffed issue as above, but I don’t mind!
My issue is that the bottom of the pot (and consequently the bottom of the pasta) gets burned. I initially thought it was because I left the pot on keep warm, but on the second batch of pasta, the same thing happened even when serving immediately. Any tips?
Angela, have you tried using a trivet to place the pasta on to keep it off the bottom of your Instant Pot? Might be worth a try.
So far, I have only done this recipe in the “make it now” version. I just cooked it for 2 min in the instant pot. It didn’t seem right to me that it should have the same cook time as the frozen method. I also added some oregano and parsley to the ricotta stuffing. Next time, I’d add basil too. The 12 shells fit perfectly in the bottom of my instant pot and did not unstuff. Soaked up a lot of sauce, so we added more afterwards.
Great additions, Lindsey! And to your comment about frozen versus fresh — you will set your pot to the same amount of time, but it will take your pot longer to come to pressure for frozen ingredients than fresh. Thus taking longer overall to cook. Does that make sense? You may find this post helpful as you continue to cook and attempt frozen items specifically in your Instant Pot >> https://onceamonthmeals.com/blog/series/instant-pot/instant-pot-tips-tricks-201/
I followed this recipe to the T. Got the burn notice, twice, I tried to add more water. Had to throw out the whole thing.
Amber, we’re so sorry to hear that. We have test cooks who test all of our recipes, and none of them reported having an issue getting a burn error with this recipe. You included, the marinara and water listed under “serving day ingredients,” correct? If so, it’s possible that either some of the cheese got on the bottom of your pot and burnt (dairy burns quite easily). This recipe has plenty of liquid, so you definitely shouldn’t be getting a burn notice. If you’d like additional help troubleshooting what may have gone wrong, feel free to hit that little orange chat icon in the bottom corner to chat live with our Customer Engagement team!
Some of the shells stuck (and burned) to the bottom, I had the 1/2 cup water and 1/2 jar of sauce with the other 1/2 poured over the top in the pot. I’ll probably use my trivet next time. Yes I used the proper recipe and I am not a new user of the IP. No cheese leaked also.
Amber, we’re so sorry to hear that you’re having difficulties with burning. As you stated, we would suggest trying the trivet for help. Although you are a vetted IP cook, you still might find this to be helpful: https://onceamonthmeals.com/blog/series/kitchen-tips/troubleshooting-instant-pot-recipes/
serving day ingredients noted are not frozen with shells right? So what is step 5 on prep?? thanks!
Step 5 is when you’ll want to divide & freeze your sauce separately so it’s ready for you on your serving day. We hope this helps!
After reading the comments I was hesitant to try this recipe. I decided to make some changes so it wouldn’t burn. I used uncooked manicotti for the recipe. I did not boil the manicotti. I followed the filling just like it says above. (I think next time I will add some basil and oregano to the filling.) Then I used 2 pans the size of a cake pan and poured a little marinara sauce on the bottom of each. I filled the uncooked manicotti and placed 6 manicotti in each pan. Then I poured about 12 oz of marinara sauce on top of manicotti in each pan…..total of 24 oz. of marinara. (I did not add any water to this cuz I don’t like it watery.) Then I topped it with shredded mozzarella cheese and froze it. I cooked one (unfrozen) pan in the Instant Pot. I poured 1 1/2 cups of water in bottom of Instant Pot and put a trivet inside the IP. I placed the foil covered cake pan on the trivet and cooked it on Manual for 20 minutes and let it natural release. The pasta was cooked perfectly!!!! The manicotti did not fall apart. It was so good!!! If cooking a frozen pan of Manicotti I wouldn’t think it would take much longer to cook…..maybe increase time by 5 minutes to make total cook time 25 minutes. I will have to experiment with that. Should be able to use the jumbo shells with this recipe too if you wanted to.
Just made this and it’s pretty good. But I just went back and reread it and noticed “blend of flavorful cheeses and fresh spinach”. So I’m guessing “Chop spinach” in the ingredients didn’t mean frozen chopped spinach, but chopped up fresh spinach leaves. Oh, still good.
Hi Jay! You are correct – it was intended for fresh spinach – but I’m sure it was still delicious with frozen – just possibly a bit more liquid. As a hint – to avoid this mistake – any time there is an action in front of the ingredient that tells you it is something that should be done the night before. So if you put this in a meal plan you would see this chopping action appear on your prep instructions and also find the shopping list indicate purchasing this in produce. BUT we understand that sometimes you just want to make 1 recipe on the day you want to serve it – so hopefully that above info is helpful. Thanks!