When my son was little, spaghetti pie was his most requested meal. As he got older and his appetite grew, I adapted that recipe to make baked spaghetti. A baked spaghetti casserole is just what you need when you have a house full of hungry teenagers.
One of the things I love about bakes spaghetti is how well it freezes. Assemble this dish in square foil pans and freeze for a ready-made dinner on a busy weeknight. Oh, how I love a good freezer meal recipe like this.
I have to warn you that this recipe makes A LOT of pasta. If you have a large family or enjoy leftovers, I say go for it. Otherwise, freeze half for later use. I sometimes freeze all of it for later use.
Related Recipe: Freezer-Friendly Shepherd’s Pie
Baked Spaghetti Recipe
Ingredients:
1 box spaghetti noodles
1 pound lean ground beef
1 pound Italian sausage
1 small onion, diced
2 jars marinara sauce
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 cup sour cream
1 egg
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons milk
2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees and lightly grease a 9×13 baking dish set aside.
Bring a pot of well salted water to a boil. Cook noodles, stirring occasionally until cooked through and firm to the bite, about 12 minutes. Drain. Place noodles into bottom of prepared pan.
Meanwhile, in a large skillet over medium heat, cook and stir ground beef, sausage and onion until browned and onions are soft. Drain off any excess grease. Stir in marinara sauce and garlic powder.
In a bowl, combine the sour cream, egg and Parmesan cheese. Spread over the top of the spaghetti noodles. Sprinkle on 2 cups of mozzarella cheese.
Top with meat sauce and remaining cheese. Cover with foil. Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for an additional 15 minutes, until cheese is melted and bubbly.
Related Recipe: 5 Healthy Slow Cooker Freezer Meals
To Freeze
When preparing this recipe for the freezer, I use (5) 8-inch foil pans. I follow the recipe above, dividing the ingredients equally between the pans. Once the pans are ready I wrap in foil and then twic in plastic wrap. Be sure to add a label with the name of the dish and cooking directions. Before serving, thaw overnight in the refrigerator and bake using the above directions. You might have to add on an additional 5-10 minutes.
My family just loves this recipe. This is my favorite way to make spaghetti. The sour cream and egg mixture seeps down into the spaghetti while baking, and binds the noodles for a creamy and delicious casserole.
Related Recipe: You might also like this Freezer Lasagna recipe!
Baked Spaghetti
Ingredients
- 1 box spaghetti noodles
- 1 pound lean ground beef
- 1 pound Italian sausage
- 1 small onion diced
- 2 jars marinara sauce
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 cup sour cream
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
- 2 tablespoons milk
- 2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and lightly grease a 9x13 baking dish set aside.
- Bring a pot of well salted water to a boil. Cook noodles, stirring occasionally until cooked through and firm to the bite, about 12 minutes. Drain. Place noodles into bottom of prepared pan.
- Meanwhile, in a large skillet over medium heat, cook and stir ground beef, sausage and onion until browned and onions are soft. Drain off any excess grease. Stir in marinara sauce and garlic powder.
- In a bowl, combine the sour cream, egg and Parmesan cheese. Spread over the top of the spaghetti noodles. Sprinkle on 2 cups of mozzarella cheese.
- Top with meat sauce and remaining cheese. Cover with foil. Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for an additional 15 minutes, until cheese is melted and bubbly.
- To Freeze When preparing this recipe for the freezer, I use (5) 8-inch foil pans. I follow the recipe above, dividing the ingredients equally between the pans. Once the pans are ready I wrap in foil and then twice in plastic wrap. Be sure to add a label with the name of the dish and cooking directions. Before serving, thaw overnight in the refrigerator and bake using the above directions. You might have to add on an additional 5-10 minutes.
I like baked spaghetti even more than the traditional kind! Great idea for a freezer meal!
I love baked spaghetti, it’s such a hearty and filling meal. It’s even better to make ahead of time and freeze, because I love saving time on busy weeknights.
I’ll be needing some freezer meals this summer. Thanks for the idea!
This is my kind of meal. I’ve frozen a spaghetti dish before and it tasted so great months later.
This looks delicious! I love all the cheese!
Some days, I don’t have time to cook dinner! A pre-prepared freezer meal would be a great idea!
Ha I knew thought to bake my spaghetti! This is an interesting way to do it thanks for the spin on it!
This looks delicious. What a perfect meal idea for those busy week nights.
This looks like a great recipe to have made up in advance. Some days you just do not have time to cook.
That id interesting. I have never tried to freeze spaghetti.
I love freezer meals! We will have to try this one!
My husband doesn’t like spaghetti, but he LOVES baked spaghetti. Weird, right? 🙂 I like both. 🙂
Great idea! I do this with lasagna, why not with spaghetti???
That looks really good. I will have to make this for my boys. I bet they would love it.
This looks so delicious! I’m going to have to try this.
I used to make this for my boys and they loved it!!
This looks so Yummy, with all the kids, this would be wonderful to do and have ready. AWESOME!
Can’t wait to make this! I’ve always found that anything made with spaghetti sauce always tastes better after it’s been frozen! This will be a big hit in our house!
Spaghetti goes over well in my house, especially with my toddlers (the messier the better lol). On those busy weeknights this would be heaven sent as time always escapes me and if all I have to do is throw it in the oven it would allow me more time to get all those other household chores done around the house while it bakes in the oven!
What size box of pasta do you use for this recipe? I would love to try it.
It’s one 16 ounce box. I hope you enjoy!
WHAT SIZE BOX OF SPAGHETTI???
ok just found it!! thanks
160z
Spaghetti is one my favorite food, I could it all time.
I’m always looking for new freezer meals! Thanks for the idea!
This looks really good! I love making recipes that I can freeze for later. I try to do most of my cooking for the week on my days off. So being able to mske a lot batch then freeze half would be great. Then we could eat the other half in a few weeks and it saved me from cooking a lot on one of my days because I had something prepared already. Thanks for sharing! Pinning!
This is so amazing I have never tried this before but your right the bigger they get the more they eat and my littlest one is a picky eater but loves spaghetti and wow would he flip for this thanks so much I know what I will be making my next day off.
This looks delicious! I have a small family but love that this can be frozen. I’m always looking for meals to freeze so I can have a delicious and easy meal on busy nights!
I dont know why I never fooze meals when I was raising kids. I do now and its so convenient. I’m new at so excuse this question but do I cook it before freezing and recook per instructions or dont bake before freezing?
I would like to make this but I’m confused about adding the cheese. Your instructions say to add the 2 cups of cheese. Then you add the meat sauce and the rest of the cheese? Please clarify for me!
I’m curious how many servings you figure for either the original recipe or for your freezer instructions – – and how you go from one 9 x 13 dish to 5 – 8″ dishes – since normally half a 9 x 13 recipe is a 9″ square
Since the aluminum containers are not very deep, I was only able to fit two layers of lasagna in the freezer containers. I typically do 3 layers in a 9×13 pan, so I was able to do an additional square container with the additional ingredients. Depending on how large you like your servings, you can expect to get 3-4 servings from each freezer meal. I hope that helps.
Do you bake the ‘baked spaghetti’ before freezing? I worry the noodles will absorb all the sauce. Does that happen?
Hi Jessica, thanks for the question. I never do since the noodles and sauce are already cooked. Just be sure that your pasta is cooked no more than al dente. With baked pastas I to to undercook the noodles a bit. I hope you enjoy!
This looks amazing!! Do you happen to have nutritional information for this?
Geez does this look amazing and easy. I will be adding this to my menu.
How much cheese to sprinkle on top? Recipe doesn’t say.
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese is the remaining cheese that you sprinkle on top.
I made this and it was very good! I want to bake the freezer portion tonight but did not take out to thaw last night. Is that a problem?
I’m glad you enjoyed it. While I haven’t baked it from completely frozen, I think it will be allright. You’ll need to adjust the cooking time and keep it in a little longer. Please let me know how it turns out.