Creamy Beef and Shells
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A quick/easy ground beef recipe, this is a pasta dish that will be on your dinner table all week long! So creamy and so comforting!
Featured Comment
I cannot even begin to tell you how much of this pasta I ate on probably 13 different occasions.
Well, first, I should tell you that no plating of any kind was involved here.
Nope. This is clearly a straight-out-of-the-skillet type dinner. Just grab your fork and dig right in.
All that cream sauce. All that pasta, just collecting that creaminess. And the perfectly crumbled ground beef, again, soaking up every last drop of that creamy, heavenly goodness.
Ugh, I can’t even talk about this anymore because now I need to make this for dinner. Again. For the 14th time.
Tools For This Recipe
Large cast iron skillet
Creamy Beef and Shells: Frequently Asked Questions
Not at all! Ground pork or ground turkey can be used instead of ground beef.
Tomato sauce, in the US, is tomato puree typically cooked down for a thick, smooth consistency with a relatively sweet flavor. Passata is simply uncooked tomato purée. You can use passata in place of tomato sauce, but it is not a completely equal substitute.
Heavy cream (or heavy whipping cream) has one of the highest fat contents with about 36-40% fat. Half and half or whole milk are suitable substitutes, but will yield a lighter result.
Yes! You can freeze the leftovers in individual freezer bags, thaw overnight, and reheat on the stovetop.
Creamy Beef and Shells
Ingredients
- 8 ounces medium pasta shells
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 pound ground beef
- ½ medium sweet onion, diced
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 ½ teaspoons Italian seasoning
- 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 2 cups beef stock
- 1 (15-ounce) can tomato sauce
- ¾ cup heavy cream
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- 6 ounces shredded extra-sharp cheddar cheese, about 1 1/2 cups
Equipment
Instructions
- In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook pasta according to package instructions; drain well.
- Heat olive oil in a large cast iron skillet over medium high heat. Add ground beef and cook until browned, about 3-5 minutes, making sure to crumble the beef as it cooks; drain excess fat. Set aside.
- Add onion to the skillet, and cook, stirring frequently, until translucent, about 2-3 minutes.
- Stir in garlic and Italian seasoning until fragrant, about 1 minute.
- Whisk in flour until lightly browned, about 1 minute.
- Gradually whisk in beef stock and tomato sauce. Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, until reduced and slightly thickened, about 6-8 minutes.
- Stir in pasta, beef and heavy cream until heated through, about 1-2 minutes; season with salt and pepper, to taste. Stir in cheese until melted, about 2 minutes.
- Serve immediately.
Did you make this recipe?
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This was delicious. Comfort food at its best! My family loved it.
I made this for dinner tonight. It was delicious. I followed the recipe as directed. Certainly will make it again.Dolores
Tomato sauce as in ketchup or do you mean pasta sauce / passata.
Tomato sauce is different from ketchup and pasta sauce. You’ll find it at the market next to canned tomatoes. It’s just tomato sauce
LOVED IT. Two things: I found at while it was pretty juicy upon first serving (almost too much), when I refrigerated the leftovers, they absorbed all the extra liquid…
Also, as I cooked it, I thought, this is like a regular bolognese sauce. So next time, being lazy, I will skip those middle steps and add the beef stock, cream (half and half), and cheese to my jarred marinara sauce before folding in the precooked ground beef and shells.
Will post here if it works!
Can you make this with 1 lb pasta & 1 lb ground beef and still keep the same liquid & cheese portions?
I would increase the liquids and spices to make sure it isn’t dry. The sauce is the good part!
This looks so amazing and I know my fam woukd love. But, we have lactose intolerance at our house.
Anyone make this lactose free and have it come out delish? If so, please share. Thanks!!
Often I sub full fat coconut milk for heavy cream or half and half in recipes.
I would sub d/free “cheese’ shreds or eliminate. Hope this is helpful
I have not made as yet this recipe, but will be soon. Sounds SOOOO good!! I am lactose intolerant and use dairy free or lactose free products for many of my recipes, and have never had a complaint yet. Milk, whipping cream, cheese, butter, homemade cream soups the choices are endless. Try plant based products these are great replacements also.
Yes, I make this completely vegan and use a scoop of plant based cream cheese along with some cheddar style shreds. It turns out fantastic and reminds me of the hamburger helper I used to eat as a kid. But better.
I have to say that every single recipe I’ve tried from your email has been a great success.
Thanks for sharing them all with me. My family and friends think I have become a chef.
Thanks again.
Has anyone tried this using the method from the One Pot Ziti recipe of adding the dry pasta into the sauce with extra water and making this as a 1 pot meal? Looks amazing and will be making soon!
What an amazing and delicious dish! Our family loves this, thank you for another amazing recipe!
Family loved it! Made it just as directed except used mozzarella cheese instead of cheddar because that’s what I had! Yum will make again.
Can this be frozen for later?
I make this from time to time and my family loves it.
Remarkably delicious…for the beef stock I used leftover juice from our Italian beef a few nights before so I only used 1tsp. of Italian seasoning. I also added a tsp. of worcestershire sauce. I also subbed the cream for half and half because that’s what I had, and used monterrey jack cheese. It was delicious!
Did you sub the extra sharp for Monterey or did you add? Hubs and I love this recipe but feel like it’s flat like it’s missing some flavor.
I’ve made this before for myself and it was amazing! But my partner is allergic to tomatoes so I was wondering if anyone knew an easy work around?
If he likes roasted red peppers, make roasted red pepper sauce and use that instead. Or maybe use Alfredo sauce instead of the tomato paste and sauce.
YUM-MYYY. Made as directed (kinda) I substituted chicken broth , used an extra 1/2 tsp of Italian seasoning, garlic & onion powder added. Mixed my pasta (I used what I had ) for 8oz or so. lol
Added flour to the ground beef to cook for a minute or two and then proceeded to follow directions .
Hubby and my daughter loved it. Went back for seconds. You can definitely change this up to your liking. Add corn , hot sauce, used ground Turkey, ground chicken, so many options.
Bottom line: it was “Damn Delicious “
Thank you!
Very tasty! I doubled the recipe but otherwise followed it and there’s no need to change a thing! I was afraid it’d be too saucy but love the generous sauce-to-pasta ratio. The flavors were extremely cheesy and beefy (it didn’t even seem like there was tomato sauce in the dish).
This was also very easy and quick to whip up, so I can see this being a weeknight dinner.
Can this be increased and put in a slow cooker
I like to make the recipe as written the first time I try it. This was so good an easy to make! We really enjoyed it just the way it is! Not sure that I would change a thing!! Thank you for sharing!!
This was sooo delicious.
Can you tell me what tomato sauce is? Is it the same as passata?
Tomato Passata is pureed, strained tomatoes usually sold in bottles. It’s 100% tomato, no additives or flavourings, but sometimes contains added salt. It’s uniform and smooth unlike crushed or chopped tomatoes, and makes gorgeously thick tomato-based sauces. It’s known as Tomato Puree in the US. So, not exactly the same as tomato sauce, which is thinner, but you could thin it out with more liquid, like extra broth, to about half as thick.