The Food Lab's No-Boil Baked Ziti Recipe (2024)

Why It Works

  • Soaking the pasta instead of par-boiling it delivers perfectly al dente baked pasta without the need to use an extra pot or wait for it to boil.
  • A mixture of a basic marinara sauce with heavy cream and ricotta cheese keeps the pasta moist and flavorful.
  • Diced cubes of mozzarella form distinct pockets of melted cheese for more textural contrast.

Baked ziti is the dish I make at the annual ski retreat that my friends and I take each year in New England. There are few pasta bakes that are easier to put together yet produce such ridiculously good results, particularly when it's snowing outside and you've got a whole cabinful of friends to feed.


Soak, Don't Boil

Here's something I've always wondered: When baking pasta, as in, say, lasagna or baked ziti, why do you always cook the pasta first? Aren't you inviting trouble by cooking it once, then proceeding to put it in a casserole and cooking it again? Well, there's the obvious first part of the answer to this question: Pasta needs to absorb water as it cooks—a lot of water, around 80 percent of its own weight when perfectly al dente. So, add raw pasta directly to a baked pasta dish, and it will soften all right—it'll also suck up all of the moisture from the sauce, leaving it dry or broken.

Here's the thing: Dried pasta is made up of flour, water, and, on rare occasions, eggs. Essentially it's composed of starch and protein, and not much else. Starch molecules come aggregated into large granules that resemble little water balloons. As they get heated in a moist environment, they continue to absorb more and more water, swelling up and becoming soft.

Meanwhile, the proteins in the pasta begin to denature, adding structure to the noodles (something that is much more obvious when cooking soft fresh egg-based pastas). When the stars are aligned, you'll manage to pull the pasta from the water just when the proteins have lent enough structure to keep the noodles strong and pliant and the starches have barely softened to the perfect stage—soft but with a bite—known as al dente.

But who's to say that these two phases, water absorption and protein denaturing, have to occur at the same time? H. Alexander Talbot and Aki Kamozawa of the fantastic blogIdeas in Foodasked themselves that very question, and what they found was this: Youdon'thave to complete both processes simultaneously. In fact, if you leave uncooked pasta in lukewarm water for long enough, it'll absorb just as much water as boiled pasta.

Here's what they had to say on the matter:

The drained [soaked] noodles held their shape, and since the starch had not been activated, they did not stick to one another and could be held without the addition of oil. Once we added the noodles to boiling salted water, we had perfectly cooked al dente pasta in just 60 seconds."

Interesting indeed.

The Food Lab's No-Boil Baked Ziti Recipe (1)

To try it out myself, I placed some macaroni in a bowl of warm tap water and allowed it to sit, pulling a piece out every five minutes to weigh how much water it had absorbed. After about 30 minutes, it had taken in just as much water as a piece of cooked boiled macaroni, all while remaining completely raw!

While the ability to cook presoaked pasta in just 60 seconds in itself is not all that exciting for a home cook (all it does is convert an eight-minute cooking process into a 30-minute soak plus one-minute cooking process—hardly a time-saver), it's a very interesting application for restaurant cooks, who can have soaked pasta ready to be cooked in no time.

But what it does mean for a home cook is this: Any time you are planning on baking pasta in a casserole, there is no need to precook it. All you have to do is soak it while you make your sauce, then combine the two and bake. Since the pasta's already hydrated, it won't rob your sauce of liquid, and the heat from the oven is more than enough to cook it while the casserole bakes. If you taste them side by side, you can't tell the difference between precooked pasta and simply soaked pasta. Think of what this means for lasagna! I know of at least six different common dental procedures that I'd rather have performed than to have to par-cook lasagna noodles.

Keep the Sauce Simple

A basic red sauce is one of the five "mother sauces" of Italian cuisine that I identify in my book (the others being garlic and oil, ragú, cream, and pesto). It's an essential staple in any Western cook's pantry. Countless Italian-American restaurants are based on this sauce.

Marcella Hazan's recipe for tomato sauce may deliver the most culinary bang for your buck that you'll ever see. It's so simple it doesn't even need a full recipe—just simmer a 28-ounce can of whole tomatoes with five tablespoons of unsalted butter and an onion split in half, crushing the tomatoes against the sides of the pot with a spoon—but the flavor you end up with is rich, fresh, and perfectly balanced. It's the butter that makes the difference. Unlike olive oil, butter contains natural emulsifiers that help keep the sauce nice and creamy. And the dairy sweetness works in tandem with the sweetness of the onions while rounding out the harsher acidic notes of the tomatoes.

Building from where Marcella leaves off, it's not a far jump to a classic Italian-American marinara sauce—tomato sauce flavored with garlic, oregano, and olive oil. Butter is still essential for smoothing out the rough edges of the acidic tomatoes, but here I like to substitute extra-virgin olive oil for half of it to bring some extra complexity into the mix. I make it in quadruple batches and store it in sealed Ball jars. Bottle while hot in sterile jars, seal them, and allow the sauce to cool to room temperature before refrigerating. It'll keep in the fridge for at least a month, ready to reheat and serve or incorporate into another recipe.

Now that we know how to make a basic marinara sauce and have learned how easy it is to soak, rather than boil, pasta for a baked casserole, it's just a short skip and a jump to classic baked ziti. The noodles get tossed with a pink mixture of tomato sauce, cream, and ricotta cheese, with a couple of eggs thrown in to lend structure to the casserole as it cooks. I also like to toss cubes of mozzarella cheese together with the pasta to form gooey, stretchy pockets. I top the whole thing with some more marinara, more cubes of mozzarella, and a grating of Parmesan.

The Food Lab's No-Boil Baked Ziti Recipe (3)

This recipe is an excerpt from J. Kenji López-Alt's book, "The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science."

October 2015

This recipe was cross-tested in 2023 and updated with more accurate measurements and timing to guarantee best results.

Recipe Details

The Food Lab's No-Boil Baked Ziti Recipe

Prep10 mins

Cook60 mins

Soaking and Resting Time40 mins

Total110 mins

Serves6to 8 servings

Ingredients

  • 1 pound (454g) ziti, penne, or other thick tubular pasta

  • 4 cups(950ml) homemadeor high-quality store-bought red sauce (such as Rao's), divided

  • 12 ounces (340g) whole-milkhomemadeor high-quality ricotta cheese (see notes)

  • 3 ounces (85g) Parmigiano-Reggiano, finely grated and divided (about 1 1/2 cups)

  • 2 large eggs, beaten

  • 1 cup (240ml) heavy cream

  • 3 tablespoons mincedfresh flat-leaf parsley, divided

  • 3 tablespoons mincedfresh basil, divided

  • Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

  • 1 pound (454g) whole-milk mozzarella cheese, cut into rough 1/4-inch cubes and divided

  • Cooking spray

Directions

  1. Adjust an oven rack to the middle position and preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C). Place ziti in a large bowl and cover with hot salted water by 3 or 4 inches. Let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes, stirring after the first 5 minutes to prevent sticking. Drain.

    The Food Lab's No-Boil Baked Ziti Recipe (4)

  2. Pour 3 cups of the red sauce into a large pot; add ricotta, half of the Parmigiano, eggs, cream, and half of the parsley and basil, and stir to combine. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Add the soaked ziti along with half of the mozzarella cheese cubes and stir until well combined. Transfer to an ungreased 9- by 13-inch baking dish and top with the remaining 1 cup red sauce and mozzarella.

    The Food Lab's No-Boil Baked Ziti Recipe (5)

  3. Lightly grease aluminum foil with cooking spray. Cover the baking dish tightly with the sprayed aluminum foil and bake for 45 minutes. Remove foil and bake until the cheese beginsto brown, about 15 minutes longer. Remove from oven and sprinkle with remaining Parmigiano, then let cool for 10 minutes. Sprinkle with remaining parsley and basil and serve.

    The Food Lab's No-Boil Baked Ziti Recipe (6)

Notes

Look for a ricotta cheese that contains nothing but milk, salt, and starter culture or acid. Avoid those with gums and stabilizers. Our favorite national store-bought brand is Calabro.

Special Equipment

9- by 13-inch baking dish; aluminum foil

  • Baked Pasta
  • Italian-American
  • Pastas
  • Tomato Sauces
  • Pasta Mains
The Food Lab's No-Boil Baked Ziti Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Should you bake ziti covered or uncovered? ›

Should I cover Baked Ziti while it's baking? Yes. Cover loosely with foil so it doesn't stick to the cheese, then bake for 20 minutes. Then remove the foil so the cheese can go bubbly and golden!

What is a substitute for ricotta cheese in baked ziti? ›

Cream Cheese: Cream cheese is keto-friendly and can be used as a substitute for ricotta in both sweet and savory dishes. It's rich and creamy, adding a similar texture.

How do you keep baked ziti moist? ›

Why is the top layer of baked ziti super dry with hard cheese crust? Make sure you bake it at 350 degrees, use a deep dish and cover it with foil. I always add a lot of sauce and that helps prevent the dried out top layer. Take out of the oven as soon as cheese is melted and golden.

Why is my baked ziti so watery? ›

Oftentimes, baked ziti can end up watery if the tomato sauce isn't thick enough. Luckily this recipe calls for the tomato sauce to simmer on the stove along with the ground beef and onion. Doing this will help to get rid of some of the extra water in the sauce.

Should you undercook ziti before baking? ›

(You want to undercook the pasta slightly, as it will continue to cook in the oven. A good way to do this is cook it 2 minutes less than you normally would if preparing it al dente.) Reserving 1 cup of the pasta cooking liquid, drain pasta and rinse with cool water; set aside while the tomato sauce finishes cooking.

What do Italians use instead of ricotta? ›

Mascarpone: Another Italian cheese, mascarpone makes a great ricotta substitute. However, since mascarpone is more tart and flavorful, you should only use it in dishes with other strong flavors.

What do Italians use instead of ricotta in lasagna? ›

Most traditional lasagna doesn't use ricotta cheese. Instead, bechamel sauce mixed with parmesan cheese is used.

Can I use Philadelphia instead of ricotta? ›

You can substitute it, but consider these few factors, there is a lot more salt in cream cheese than in ricotta so you will have to adjust the over all salt. Cream cheese is a bit more tart than ricotta.

Is it better to let homemade pasta dry before cooking? ›

Giving the pasta time to dry before cooking works well for long thin shapes, such as fettuccine. Stuffed pasta like ravioli or tortellini needs to be a little harder before we cook them; otherwise, that tasty filling will simply fall out when it's boiled!

Do you turn the stove off when boiling pasta? ›

Yes, it's a good idea to turn down the stove when adding pasta to boiling water. This helps to prevent the water from boiling over and making a mess. Once the pasta is added, you can bring the water back to a gentle boil and adjust the heat as needed to maintain a steady simmer [1].

Does it matter if you use hot or cold water to boil pasta? ›

In fact, starting your pasta in cold water has a myriad of benefits: It takes less energy to heat, it takes less time since the noodles come to a boil with the water, and you end up with concentrated starchy cooking water that gives a silky, creamy finish to pasta sauces.

Why is my baked ziti so dry? ›

Make sure to toss your ziti with plenty of sauce

But we've all likely sunk a fork into a baked ziti that's just too dry, seeming like a conglomeration of noodles instead of a moist sum of its parts. That pitfall, according to The Kitchn, is almost always due to not saucing the ziti adequately.

Does baked ziti contain ricotta cheese? ›

Ricotta cheese – It creates a creamy layer in the center of the baked ziti. For the best texture, make sure to use whole milk ricotta in this recipe.

Can baked ziti be left out overnight? ›

Baked ziti should not sit out longer than 2 hours after baking because that is when bacteria will start to grow. Refrigerate as soon as cooled.

Should you cook pasta covered or uncovered? ›

Cover your pan with a lid to help bring the water up to the boil more quickly, then remove the lid once the water is boiling or reduce the temperature slightly to stop it bubbling over. Add the pasta to the water once it's boiling, never before, and cook without the lid.

Is it best to cook pasta covered or uncovered? ›

Should you cover the pasta when cooking it? It's okay to put a lid on the pot while you are waiting for the water to boil. However, after it starts to boil and you add the pasta to the water, you should remove the lid to prevent the water from bubbling over.

Should pasta be covered while baking? ›

Leaving the pot uncovered is also key because pasta should be stirred frequently to prevent sticking. Plus, because pasta should be cooked until al dente, a lid will make it hard to decipher how far along you are in the process, and might even lead to mushy noodles, which is the last thing you want.

Do you cook baked ziti covered or uncovered reddit? ›

I boil my pasta to just under a minute of “al dente” and then after my layering it typically bake it uncovered because I want the crusty cheese on top.

References

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