# Cannelloni



## marissa82

well tonight was a disaster...i was feeling all excited abt making canelloni pasta for the first time and had great expectations, but when i took the pasta out it was still very hard an not edible hence we had to throw it out and eat leftovers from the fridge.
can someone tell me what i did wrong as i followed the recipe but it didnt come out right.
the recipe said not to cook the past tubes but merely to place them in a dish and pour white sauce,( even though i rarely make white sauce and sprinkled cheese instead, i always do that so thats not the problem)
is it possible to make cannelloni without cooking beforehand


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## Aurora

Dried pasta of any type requires cooking before consuming.

The dried pasta dishes which have not required pre-boiling pasta have all specificed that the pasta be cooked in the oven after combining with other ingredients such as lasagna or casseroles.

I can imaging that trying to eat uncooked pasta was less than pleasant.

Perhaps the recipe called for fresh pasta and not dried.  Fresh pasta is now very very popular and very much available in even large chain groceries.


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## urmaniac13

If you used a dried version of pasta, you need to check on the instruction on the package. Certain dried pasta can be cooked in the oven directly but not all of them, and if they are for this purpose it should say so on the cooking instruction on the packagae. If not you should boil it not all the way, but just to the point it is flexible but a little too tough to eat as is. (the following baking process will take care of that). If you go through this process you need to make the cannelloni as soon as the pasta is safe enough to touch, otherwise they will stick to each other and become unmanageable. In any case I would suggest using fresh pasta for cannelloni, they are definetely to be baked without preboiling, and taste better... good luck for the next time!!


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## mish

Marissa, can you show us the recipe?

Yes, you can bake uncooked pasta (i.e. lasagna, ziti), but you need to add enough sauce and sometimes add water to the sauce, and cover the dish so it will make enough steam/heat to cook the pasta through.  I have some example recipes I can give you some links to.


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## simpleisgood

Hi marissa, by coincidence I got a "recipe" for canelloni wrappers from a Marissa.  Her mom used to cook our family wonderful Italian meals for our family when I was growing up.

Although I don't have exact proportions for the ingredients it has always come out great when I have made it and is very easy.  Just beat up flour, egg, and milk into a thin pancake batter mixture and fry like a pancake.  They should come out like thin pancakes.  You can then add your filling and roll it up.  

Very easy and very tasty!


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## mish

Here are some easy examples of no-cook/no-boil pasta recipes:

http://www.eat.com/recipes/DisplayRecipe.asp?RecipeID=5271&Version=1

I think the trick here is over 2 lbs of sauce was added to have enough liquid to cook the noodles. I don't know how it would translate for a white sauce, unless you use a jarred sauce, perhaps.

Here 2 lbs of sauce plus water was added:

http://www.eat.com/recipes/DisplayRecipe.asp?RecipeID=4504&Version=1


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## foodaholic

> the recipe said not to cook the past tubes but merely to place them in a dish and pour white sauce,( even though i rarely make white sauce and sprinkled cheese instead, i always do that so thats not the problem)


I'm not really clear if you made a white sauce or just used cheese.

Mish is right,you need a liquid,and for most of these pasta recipes it's generally a tomato or white sauce (Bechamel)If the tubes were submerged in a sauce,then you didn't cook them long enough.If you did use a sauce was the sauce preheated or cold?If cold then quite a bit of the instructed cooking time was taken up just to get the sauce hot,just a possibility.


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## marissa82

no i've never used white sauce, i always use cheese by itself...i made it once and failed badly so i never tried again.
does it add lots more flavour?

and in regards to the recipe i'll type it up later my scanner isnt workin at the moment and its in a book

the brand of the pasta was barilla i think and it had a recipe on the pack which didnt call for the pasta to be boiled either so i thought it would work

the recipe called for dried pasta...dumb question, but is that the regular pasta u buy off the shelf in packets?


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## urmaniac13

marissa82 said:
			
		

> no i've never used white sauce, i always use cheese by itself...i made it once and failed badly so i never tried again.
> does it add lots more flavour?
> 
> and in regards to the recipe i'll type it up later my scanner isnt workin at the moment and its in a book
> 
> the brand of the pasta was barilla i think and it had a recipe on the pack which didnt call for the pasta to be boiled either so i thought it would work
> 
> the recipe called for dried pasta...dumb question, but is that the regular pasta u buy off the shelf in packets?


 
In your case I bet the problem was the lack of moisture.  If you are not comfortable with white sauce (do you mean bechamelle? and what exactly was the problem?) you could try quattro formaggi (4 cheese) sauce, or regular tomato based sauce as well, but in any case *the pasta should be well covered with the sauce*, then bake it covered first, and for the last few minutes, take off the cover, sprinkle grated parmigiano and broil until the cheese is golden brown.  If you are interested and tell me exactly how you would like it, I could send you a detailed recipe.  I hope it will work out well for you the next time!!


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## mish

Dry pasta is the pasta you buy on the shelf, as opposed to REFRIGERATED or FRESH pasta, in the refrigerated section. If you just cover dry pasta with cheese, the noodles will not cook and burn.


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## Michael in FtW

You can cook some pasta without boiling it first ... but it will have to be a thinner pasta baked in a very wet sauce. There are some lasagna noodles that do not require cooking first - but they are pretty thin. "Hamburger Helper" also uses uncooked noodles - but they are cooked in plenty of liquid in the dish. You can't just stuff uncooked shells with something and sprinkle on some cheese and expect them to soften up (that requires plenty of moisture) during cooking.

I don't have a package of Barilla manicotti (cannelloni) but I did look at the instructions and recipes on their website. While the recipe may not say to cook them first - somewhere on the box it does (the recipes on the website do). I have a box (different brand) where the ingredients calls for a box of uncooked noodles - but then the first line of the recipe says to cook them according to package instructions. 

Yes - regular pasta is the dry stuff you get off the shelf. Fresh pasta will be "refrigerated" - but even that will not cook without enough moisture - just stuffing it and sticking it in a baking dish with a sprinkle of cheese on top will just dry it out as it "bakes". Even if you boil the noodles first - without enough liquid during cooking they can dry out and become brittle. Right, urmaniac13?


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## urmaniac13

Yes that's right, Michael.  Even if you use a fresh version of pasta, it requires plenty of moist sauce to cover to be cooked in, sprinkles of cheese will not be enough, unless you happen to like your pasta "crunchy"...(I do like many things crunchy but pasta, no!!)  
You are also right about the thickness of the pasta.  For instance, the type of pasta often used for lasagne in some parts of the world (particularly in the US), the one with wavy edges, is much thicker than the lasagna pasta we use in italy, which is flat and no wavy edges.  I don't believe the version with wavy edges will cook sufficiently without preboiling.  But if you are used to this and see the flat version of the lasagna pasta, you will see the difference.  this kind of dried pasta WILL cook without preboiling perfectly, WITH SUFFICIENT AMOUNT OF SAUCE TO COVER IT AND COOK IN.


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## foodaholic

Right then,it's unanimous,need a liquid to cook pasta,who would have thought.


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## mish

foodaholic said:
			
		

> Right then,it's unanimous,need a liquid to cook pasta,who would have thought.


 
Couldn't have said it better myself   Oh wait, I did say it myself -- several posts up.


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## jennyema

The Barilla website has a few recipes for canneloni (manicotti) and they all say to boil the pasta first.

Barilla makes both boil and "no boil" pasta, but the no boil (like their lasagna)is made differently than the type that has to be boiled.  Their maincotti is a boil-first noodle.

You can bake "raw" pasta that is supposed to be boiled first (like lasagna) without boiling but you need to bake it in a lot of sauce, which hydrates the pasta.


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## licia

A couple of recipes I've seen using "no boil" pasta even call for making the dish a few hours or the night before. To me that would defeat the purpose of using it in the first place.  I've used the lasagna and always make it a point to put more sauce than in a cooked pasta.


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## jennyema

Licia,

That does seem weird.  I use Barilla no boil lasagna noodles regularly and they are great.  But I don't make the dish up ahead of time.  Just use as though they were already cooked.


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## Ishbel

Jenny - I use those lasagne sheets, too.  I haven't used the pre-cook before baking type for many years.  I like the Barilla products.


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## Constance

Am I wrong, or is there a cannelloni made with crepes?


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## Michael in FtW

Constance said:
			
		

> Am I wrong, or is there a cannelloni made with crepes?


 
You're right. I've seen 3 methods. First uses the extruded pasta tubes, second uses a square or rectangle of pasta rolled over the filling and placed in the baking dish seam side down (like making enchiladas), and the third is like the second only using crepes instead of pasta. From the recipes that I have seen (the two books that I have that mention using crepes), the crepes are either a regional thing or used with a more delicate filling and sauce - such as a simple ricotta or ricotta and seafood, and covered with bechemella.


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## Chief Longwind Of The North

I have sucessfully made manicotti without preboiling the pasta.  But I make mine with a sauce/meat/cheese filling, and cover with a tomato sauce before baking.  If making without pre-boiling the noodles, then I make the sauce very wet.  The extra moisture is absorbed into the pasta and softens it, just as if it were pre-boiled.

I wouldn't make a cheese-filled manicoti this way as the cheese would be overwhelmed by the extra moisture and I would think it would become too runny.  But I've never tried the no-boil method for cheese manicotti or canolli so this is just a guess.

The only advantage to making manicotti without pre-boiling is that it's easier to stuff the tubes without breaking them.  So if filling with anything other than the sauce/meat/cheese filling, I would pre-boil them.

Oh, and a tip; if you have a cookie press that has interchangeable tips, leave the tips off and use the press to "inject" the tubes with the filling.  The is so much easier than trying to spoon the filling into the tubes.

Seeeeeya; Goodweed of the North


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## mish

Another easy tip for (not) stuffing manicotti etc. - Boil the noodles and cut them in half lengthwise.  After you spoon the filling on, place cut seam side down (edges tucked under) in baking dish.  Saves lots of time and effort.


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## DampCharcoal

Another way to fill the tubes is to put the ricotta mixture in a large ziploc bag, seal it and then cut one of the corners of the bag off, essentially a piping bag. It's always worked well for me!


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## mish

Damp, you read my mind. The turkey baster method really got clogged up.


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## DampCharcoal

You must not be doing it right, Mish!


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