Pizza Casserole

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Roxy

Senior Cook
Joined
Aug 14, 2007
Messages
153
Pizza Casserole:

Prep: 20 minutes
Bake: 30 minutes

3 cups uncooked spiral pasta
2 pounds ground beef
1 medium onion, chopped
2 cans (8-ounces each) mushroom stems and pieces, drained
1 can (15 oz.s) tomato sauce
1 jar (4 oz.s) pizza sauce
1 can (6 oz.s) tomato paste
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspon onion powder
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
4 cups (16 oz.s) shredded mozzarella cheese, divided or part-skim mozzarella cheese
1 package (3-1/2 oz.s) sliced pepperoni
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Cook pasta according to package directions. Meanwhile, in a Dutch oven, cook beef and onion over medium heat until meat is no longer pink; drain. Stir in the mushrooms, sauces, tomato paste, sugar and seasonings. Drain pasta; stir into meat sauce.

Divide half of the mixture between two greased 11x7x2-in. baking dishes; sprinkle each with 1 cup of mozarella cheese. Repeat layers. Top with pepperoni and Parmesan cheese. Cover and bake at 350 for 20 minutes. Uncover; bake 10-15 minutes or until heated through. Yield: 2 casseroles (8 servings each).
 
Pizza Casserole?

Re Pizza Casserole - had to copy it off - Roxy you better slow down girl, I can't keep up with your good ideas - looks like I will have to make a Roxy notebook cookbook. :ermm: Question, to go along with all the good advice I'm getting on Dutch Ovens - with the tomato sauce type ingredients in this, can I do it in my proposed to-buy plain cast iron Dutch Oven? :) Or will I need one of the enameled jobs?:neutral:
 
My big splurge was buying Rachael's cookware..have to start over and start saving again to buy decent bakeware. I haven't made this yet..but..want to real soon. I don't have alot of bakeware..so when I do get it made...I will probably use my cake pan or long, rectangular glass dish. I don't have alot of bakeware..so not sure on what to tell you. My guess would be to make it and then decide what to put it in. Glad you like my recipes I have posted. I know everyone can't like the same thing..but..I hope my posts are useful to someone..even if it is just one recipe:) I like to save money and then reward myself on something to buy lol
 
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Re Pizza Casserole - had to copy it off - Roxy you better slow down girl, I can't keep up with your good ideas - looks like I will have to make a Roxy notebook cookbook. :ermm: Question, to go along with all the good advice I'm getting on Dutch Ovens - with the tomato sauce type ingredients in this, can I do it in my proposed to-buy plain cast iron Dutch Oven? :) Or will I need one of the enameled jobs?:neutral:

You can use the cast iron DO as long as you have seasoned it. Once you’ve cooked this, I’d suggest lightly seasoning the DO again by heating it in the oven and just wipe some oil on the inside and let it cool. With new cast iron, I typically heat it and apply oil after every use for the first month or so, after that, I just add a little oil every now and then depending on what I’ve cooked.

I’ve got a fairly new DO, and the thirds or fourth thing I cooked was Chili (lots of tomatoes!) and I had no problems at all, and it tasted great!
 
Wow, it's pasta and pizza all rolled together in yummy cheesey goodness! I am going to try it with roasted red peppers instead of mushrooms though cause I'm the only one in the house that likes mushrooms :(

Av
 
I don't know that a CI DO would do well with this recipe. Even if it is seasoned I think the acid from the tomato sauce would leach the CI. I have tried stuff a time or two in very well seasoned CI (like 40+ year old CI) and found a distinct metallic flavour to the food. Its a big NO in our house.
 
Thanks for the great recipe!! Husband's favorite pasta shape is Rotini (spiral), & this is easily adaptable to his diet. I can sub ground turkey for the beef & turkey pepperoni for the regular pepperoni.

I'm also thinking that to cut down on cleaning chores, I can cook the pasta first & leave it draining in a colander while I cook the meat sauce in the pasta-cooking pot. It all gets combined & re-baked in casseroles in the end anyway, right?
 
I don't know that a CI DO would do well with this recipe. Even if it is seasoned I think the acid from the tomato sauce would leach the CI. I have tried stuff a time or two in very well seasoned CI (like 40+ year old CI) and found a distinct metallic flavour to the food. Its a big NO in our house.

Since I tend to be anemic, I actually deliberately cook recipes containing tomatoes in my cast-iron cookware, to get extra iron into the food. :) Never noticed an off flavor.
 
We do this quite often and call it pasta bake.

Another verions we do is called meatball surpise. The ground meat is made in to meatballs which are fried off. Make a batch of tomato sauce and a batch of bechamel sauce. Mix the whole lot togetheer and bake. It sounds disgusting but tastes really good. Sometimes I just mix the meatballs and tomato sauce and put the bechamel layer over the top.
 
Since I tend to be anemic, I actually deliberately cook recipes containing tomatoes in my cast-iron cookware, to get extra iron into the food. :) Never noticed an off flavor.

Its all about your own personal taste of course. I guess I must have particularly keen taste buds since it is quite an obnoxious flavour to me. Isn't it wonderful that there are so many different opinions out there and we have a place to share them all so when someone asks a question they can go through many people's experiences and decide what they want to do? David, you now know that some of us find that plain seasoned CI imparts a metallic flavour to tomato based food and yet it is not noticable to other folks. Guess you may have to try it for yourself and see which category you fall into. Good luck, and please, let us know what you did.
 
Its all about your own personal taste of course. I guess I must have particularly keen taste buds since it is quite an obnoxious flavour to me. Isn't it wonderful that there are so many different opinions out there and we have a place to share them all so when someone asks a question they can go through many people's experiences and decide what they want to do?

Absolutely :) I used to work with someone who salted her food rather heavily and other co-workers warned her practically every day that it was bad for her, but her blood pressure was normal, no health problems. I told her I had read that salt counters the bitter flavors in food and some people are more sensitive than others to bitter flavors - some like them, some don't. I think she didn't and salting heavily was one way to get rid of at least some of it. Or maybe she was a super-taster.
 
I have a question about this. It says one jar of Pizza Sauce, but then says (4 oz) The jar of Pizza Sauce I picked up is 14 oz. Is this a typo or do I really only need 4 oz of Pizza Sauce?.... Sorry if this is a stupid question. I just don't want to mess this up.
 
I am glad you liked it and thx to the member who answered your question. I don't log in here much due to some things. Glad you liked it. Sorry for the mistake I made.
 
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