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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This is great!! Added 1/3 cup of Ricotta cheese also and some sugar to lower the acid of the tomatoes. This recipe really works.
I’m adding bacon!!! YUM!!!1
mouth watering… very nice photos…
Hi Chungah!
This looks great– planning on making tomorrow evening for my hubby & I. Based on schedules, I was hoping to put the dish together but put in fridge for a few hours until we’re home to bake it. Do you think prepping it all in advance would work?
🙂
Yes, absolutely.
Could this be made one day — for serving the next day ?
Yes, this reheats very well.
I made this recently I have got to say– FIVE STARS! This recipe is delicious! Creamy, cheesey, all that you would want from a baked spaghetti! I was not disappointed and will definitely be making this again!
Have you ever eaten this without the beef? I try to eat meatless meals as often as possible and while I know it’s possible to make it without the meat I question if it would still be delicious without it!
I actually haven’t – sorry!
We made this, and I would say it needs more sauce and seasonings. I would also say to mix the pasta with the cheese mixture and sauce first and then top with the cheese.
I would agree. I just made it and we enjoyed it. I added a bit if sugar because the sauce was just too hard. The tomatoes had too much of a bite. That was the only change I made, but next time I will mix the layers. I think it will better marry the flavors. Also, I saw earlier that I can double the cream cheese, so I’ll probably do that next time.
I was very indifferent with this recipe. My kids hated it. The concept is good, but the sauce recipe is barely palatable. I’ll probably try this again with a different sauce recipe or with jarred sauce (it would be much better).
I’m sorry that this recipe did not turn out the way you had imagined. I only post recipes that have been successfully tested in my own kitchen, and as you can see from the comments here, many of these readers have had great outcomes in the final dish as well.
So I must ask – did you follow the recipe exactly as written without any substitutions? I am honestly a bit confused as to how the sauce was “barely palatable” – it’s homemade tomato sauce using crushed tomatoes with pantry herbs. You just can’t go wrong with those ingredients!
I apologize, I just saw the reply. I followed the recipe to a “T”. The oregano flavor was extremely overpowering. Again, I think the concept is good…but the sauce didn’t go over well in my household. My kids took one bite and asked if they could have a sandwich instead. I ate it, but I couldn’t decide if I actually liked it. I will try it again, but with a different sauce recipe (or even a jarred sauce).
Is the whipped cream cheese important or can it just be regular cream cheese? Planning to make tonight. Can’t wait!
Standard cream cheese will work just fine.
I’ve made this recipe twice. The second time I used the ground Italian sausage in lieu of the ground beef, and it was much better — not that it wasn’t good before! This recipe is definitely part of our dinner rotation now.
Looks delicious! Can I freeze it after it’s been cooked?
Unfortunately, I cannot answer this with certainty as I have never tried freezing this myself – there were no leftovers left to freeze! Please use your best judgment for freezing and reheating.
By chance did you try freezing this? Did it work?
It freezes great! Thaw completely in the refrigerator before reheating.
This looks and sounds fantastic, like everything you make! I will be trying this out for a dinner this week. Thanks for sharing!
Just a quick question–
Add the spaghetti, and then the layer of cream cheese/sour cream mix, then the sauce on top of that and then the cheese on top of that? So it’s all layers? Opposed to mixing it all together? Thank you!
Ps. You’re recipes are always 5 stars!!!
Yes, that’s exactly right! 🙂
This is sooooooo good. I used squash spaghetti and switched the ground beef for mushrooms.
I am vegetarian. Worked for me!!!!!!!
I can’t wait to try this. My daughter is vegan and the whole family is trying to eat more healthful foods. My mother-in-law made this when my kids visited as they were growing up and loved it!
This was delicious!! I’m definitely going to add this to my recipe rotation.
Looks great! So creamy and cheesy and meaty, though I do have one question: my boyfriend does not like tomato sauce (he would love everything else about this). Is there something I substitute in its place?
The tomato sauce really is a key ingredient here so I do not recommend any type of substitutions. That being said, I just don’t think this recipe is for him. But please feel free to browse through the recipe index for more recipe inspiration that may suit his taste preferences.
Maybe substitute alfredo sauce.
Try cream of mushroom soup diluted with low sodium chicken stock/broth if necessary. Could dilute soup with vegetable stock or water as well.
My mouth is watering just reading this and looking at the pics. Now that that the weather is getting cooler, this sounds like perfect comfort food after a long day.
Can you prepare the casserole and bake it the next day?
Unfortunately, without trying this myself, I cannot say with certainty. Please use your best judgment.
Yes you can. I have a similar recipe and it heats up well … just layer it then refrigerate it until the next day. Take it out about a half hour before putting it in the oven.
When you say a pound of spaghetti do you mean cooked spaghetti or dried? If you mean cooked spaghetti what is the dry equivalent?
The 1 pound of spaghetti in the ingredient list is uncooked. The second step of the recipe indicates cooking the spaghetti according to package instructions:
In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook pasta according to package instructions; drain well.
Looks great. I have a ziti recipe that I’ve used for years that is a lot like this. Alternate layers of sour cream, ricotta, mozzarella cheese and cream cheese. etc etc. This looks amazing – I’m omitting the ground beef because I’m vegetarian and using my tomato sauce made in the crockpot (from my garden tomatoes). I boil pasta in my rice cooker because its only me now and I chunked all of my pots and pans except for 2 cast irons. I will freeze leftovers or this. thank you!!
By chance did you try freezing this? Did it work?
Use sauteed mushrooms in place of the beef
I like them way better than meat.