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Giant Stuffed Pasta Shells

"Yummy and easy shells, stuffed with garlic, thyme, mushrooms, and spinach ricotta. Perfect for a weeknight dinner! Add more cheese or any kind of meat! A lamb/pork mixture is really good; get a nice sear on it and add it to the spinach and mushroom (sans ricotta) maybe some goat cheese? Have fun with it!"

By allrecipes · From Open Recipes · 13 ingredients
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Giant Stuffed Pasta Shells

Why it works: Pasta and spinach match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 376 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓

Giant Stuffed Pasta Shells

6 servings
Prep15 min
Cook45 min

Ingredients

Directions

Step-by-step directions aren't available for this recipe. See the full recipe at the source →

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

744Calories
39 gProtein
39 gFat
57 gCarbs

Counts 11 of 12 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 11 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Pasta1 cup cooked (140g)220
Ricotta Cheese1/2 cup (124g) part-skim174
Olive Oil1 tbsp (14g)119
Parmesan Cheese1 oz (28g)110
Mozzarella Cheese1 oz (28g)85
Mushroom1/2 cup sliced (35g)15
Spinach1 cup raw (30g)7
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Garlic1 clove (3g)4
Thyme1 tsp dried (1.4g)4
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Saucenot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By allrecipes. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Pasta + spinachtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together376 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  2. Garlic + spinachtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Pasta + garlictop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,079 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Olive + garlictop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,665 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pasta, olive, mushroom, garlic, spinach, thyme, pepper):

  1. Oreganofits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Basilfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pasta, olive, mushroom, garlic, spinach, thyme, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.