Baked Cream Cheese Spaghetti
A baked spaghetti casserole that’s amazingly cheesy and creamy. It’s comfort food at its best, and EASIEST!
I know. It’s the day after Labor Day, we’re just about to start football season, and I post this instead of some sort of post-Labor-Day-juice-cleanse-quinoa-health-kick type recipe.
Sorry guys, but you’ll need your stretchy pants for this.
It’s pure comfort food at its best – so no. It is not diet-friendly. It is not skinny. It is not light. It’s just the best kind of spaghetti.
It’s a spaghetti casserole with layers of pasta noodles, cream cheese and sour cream, and a meaty-marinara sauce, baked to cheesy perfection.
It’s enough to feed a crowd or feed a party of two all week long. You win either way.
Baked Cream Cheese Spaghetti
Ingredients
- 1 pound spaghetti
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 pound ground beef
- 1 small onion, diced
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- ½ teaspoon dried parsley
- ½ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes, optional
- ½ cup whipped cream cheese
- ½ cup sour cream
- ½ cup shredded cheddar cheese
- ½ cup shredded Monterey Jack cheese
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley leaves
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly oil a 9×13 baking dish or coat with nonstick spray.
- In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook pasta according to package instructions; drain well.
- Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. Add ground beef and onion and cook until beef has browned, about 3-5 minutes, making sure to crumble the beef as it cooks; season with salt and pepper, to taste. Drain excess fat.
- Stir in crushed tomatoes, basil, oregano, parsley and red pepper flakes; season with salt and pepper, to taste.
- In a small bowl, whisk together cream cheese and sour cream.
- Add pasta to the prepared baking dish and layer with cream cheese and beef mixture; sprinkle with cheeses.
- Place into oven and bake until bubbly and heated through, about 15-20 minutes.
- Serve immediately, garnished with parsley, if desired.
Did you make this recipe?
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Really awesome mouth watering by seeing the beautiful images.
This is easy, cheap and DELICIOUS! A 10! I ♥️ your recipes. This is the way I’ll make spaghetti from now on!
Very good! I used chive and onion cream cheese in my recipe. Damn delicious
I was expecting more of a casserole. I thought about mixing the cream cheese in with the spaghetti per other comments, but stuck to the recipe and just layered it. It was basically cheesy spaghetti. I would not classify this as a casserole at all. It was good, but probably not something I’ll make again.
Home isolating myself. Decided to make this dish tonight as comfort food. I will have to divide up the remainder in small portions and freeze them because this is SO GOOD! Wonderful recipe.
What a recipe! Getting ready for the game today, this was a life saver, I was drawing a blank on what to make, then I found this. The cream cheese is a superb idea, and not being the typical fried food is truly spot on!
Hello, I’ve made this before and it’s amazing! Just a quick question- I’m making it for a pot luck tomorrow and I’m just wondering if I should still bake it since I have to reheat it tomorrow? Or should I bake it for less time that way the cheese doesn’t turn brown when I reheat it the following day.
I made this yesterday and it is fabulous. I used an Italian blend of cheese and added some garlic to the sauce. It makes a lot. I might try cutting it in half the next time as it is only me in the house.
This was very tasty! Great to have a variation on a regular spaghetti dinner. I doubled the cream cheese and cheeses, mixed the cream cheese and sour cream into the noodles, split everything in half and layered the layers twice (noodles on bottom, then meat sauce, then cheese, repeat.)I also added some fresh garlic to hamburger while browning it with the onion and added garlic powder with the tomatoes. Next time I might increase the red pepper flakes as my family likes some kick.
It made A LOT, so I am freezing leftovers for another dinner later this week. I like finding yummy recipes with Ingredients that I am likely to have around!
Does anyone know for certain if this recipe is freezer friendly? It sounds amazing. Please let me know after what step to freeze, and proper thawing/baking steps to take. Thank you so much 🙂
I made this with some homemade spaghetti sauce I had in the freezer (which included 1/2 lb ground beef and 1/2 lb mild Italian gound sausage) . It was absolutely delicious! I used 1-1/2 times the cream cheese and sour cream. Also, I didn’t have whipped cream cheese, so I heated 3/4 block regular cream cheese in the microwave for a few seconds before mixing with sour cream. I also added a little garlic salt to the creams. I would recommend layering in the same order listed in the recipe as it’s easier to spread the creams evenly across the noodles before putting on the red sauce. I think if you tried spreading the cream over the red sauce, it would end up mixed together.
Laurie,Then you didn’t make this,how can you write a review on a recipe when you change just about everything about it.
SVC.. recipes are a guideline. They are meant to be personalized to a person’s taste and creativity. If you don’t understand that, you do not understand the basics of cooking.
Random question; all your pots and dishes are so lovely Making this dish this week.
Love this idea. Made it with the following changes..made more of the creamy
I also added some jarred Tomato sauce with the tomatoes
I made this earlier this week. It’s very tasty. But…way too much pasta for the recipe. I also had to double the cream cheese/sour cream part. I think if you cut the pasta to 1/2 pound, this would be better.
I’ve made spaghetti quite a few times but, it was always the usual meat sauce spaghetti. Family would eat it but, wouldn’t go for seconds . I tried this recipe a few weeks ago and it was a hit.
Thank you for sharing this!
I SO can’t wait to try this, wish I could eat it off the screen!!! I have loved all your recipes I have tried, and this one tops it all I’m sure!! I’m a huge pasta fan
Love this idea. Made it with the following changes..made more of the creamy mixture with one brick of cream cheese and 3/4 cup if Sour cream. I did end up mixing the creamy mixture with the noodles to ensure I wouldn’t have any noodles unsauced . Added Garlic and instead of the individual seasonings I used Italian Spice blend. To the meat mixture I added cubed zucchini and frozen mixed greens (kale,spinach, chard chopped pieces). I also added some jarred Tomato sauce with the tomatoes. Love love love this! Thanks for sharing your inspiring recipe!!!
The best baked cream cheese spaghetti we have ever eaten.
We love hearing that!
Every one loved this dish even picky eaters. Would not change a thing.
Very easy to make, twice, and damndelicious.
Can you use pasta sauce unstead of crushed tomatoes? My son is not a fan of tomatoes. I’m thinking I would split the layers, half the spaghetti noodles then half the cream cheese & sauce mixes, repeat. NOTE: I always add a wee little cinnamon and a dash of sugar to the pasta sauce. Sounds strange but it’s really quite good. I’m Greek, it’s something we do.
Sounds amazing!
I ended up using Classico Traditional Sweet Basil added my cinnamon and sugar. I mixed a couple spoons full of the sauce on the spaghetti and margarine just to give the spaghetti a little umphf. Then followed the recipe. Turned out great.