Savor the simple joy of home cooking!
This easy hamburger casserole recipe combines rotini pasta, lean ground beef, and veggies in a rich tomato sauce, all under a bubbly cheese layer.
Perfect for a family dinner or when you’re craving some cozy homestyle cooking.
Weeknight Wonder: Easy Hamburger Casserole
- It’s a crowd-pleaser – kids and adults both love it!
- Easy to prepare, with simple, common ingredients and perfect to sneak in some nutritious veggies.
- Totally budget friendly and versatile – feel free to mix and match proteins, pastas, and cheeses.
- This ground beef casserole recipe is pure comfort food when you need a hearty, delicious meal.
- Excellent for meal prep and for saving time on busy weekdays.
This recipe has been sponsored by McCormick
Ingredients and Variations
- Pasta: We love rotini because the spirals are perfect for holding onto the savory sauce. If you can’t find rotini, replace it with another medium pasta like fusilli, penne, or egg noodles.
- Lean Ground Beef: Lean ground beef is often referred to hamburger, giving this meaty dish its name. Replace beef with ground turkey, Italian sausage, or ground chicken.
- Frozen Mixed Vegetables: Use any blend you like; I use a blend with carrots, peas, corn, and green beans. Adding them to the pasta water makes for a fast meal!
- Sauce: This sauce is simple but flavorful. Any brand of pasta sauce will work or even try homemade marinara as the base. Diced tomatoes add a tangy freshness, I prefer petite diced tomatoes if you can find them. I season the sauce with McCormick oregano, basil, and garlic powder. You can swap the spices for homemade Italian seasoning.
- Shredded Cheese: A pre-shredded cheddar cheese or mozzarella cheese blend is a great (and easy) option; choose any mixture you like.
How to Make Hamburger Casserole
- Cook pasta per package directions, adding the frozen vegetables in the last few minuts per the recipe below.
- Brown the ground beef in a large skillet, add sauce ingredients and simmer for a few minutes.
- Combine noodles, ground beef mixture, and cheese in a casserole dish. Top with cheese and bake until bubbly.
What to Serve with Hamburger Casserole
Hamburger casserole is a full meal deal in itself, so it only needs a simple green salad and some bread.
Prep Ahead & Leftovers
Keep leftover hamburger casserole covered in plastic wrap or in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days. Reheat on the stovetop or in the microwave.
Freeze portions before or after baking, wrapped tightly in foil. Thaw in the refrigerator overnight and bake as directed in the recipe.
Easy Weeknight Casseroles
Did you make this Hamburger Casserole? Leave us a rating and a comment below!
Hamburger Casserole
Equipment
Ingredients
- 8 ounces rotini or medium pasta
- 1 pound lean ground beef
- 1 small onion diced
- 1 ½ cups frozen mixed vegetables
- 14 ounces pasta sauce
- 14 ounces canned diced tomatoes or petite diced tomatoes, lightly drained, 1 can
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- ½ teaspoon dried basil
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt or to taste
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
- 1 ½ cups shredded cheddar cheese blend
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400°F.
- Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil and cook the rotini al dente according to package directions. Add the frozen mixed vegetables to the boiling water for the last minute of cooking time.
- Heat a 10-inch skillet over medium-high heat. Add the ground beef and diced onion to the skillet, cooking until the beef no pink remains. Drain any grease. Stir in the oregano, basil, garlic powder, salt, and pepper.
- Add the pasta sauce, diced tomatoes, tomato paste, and Worcestershire sauce to the skillet. Simmer for 4 to 5 minutes or until thickened.
- In a large bowl, combine the sauce, pasta, and vegetables. Spread into a 2½ quart baking dish and top with cheese.
- Bake for 15 to 18 minutes or just until heated through and the cheese is melted.
Notes
Nutrition Information
Nutrition information provided is an estimate and will vary based on cooking methods and brands of ingredients used.
Course Casserole, Dinner, Main Course, Pasta
Cuisine American© SpendWithPennies.com. Content and photographs are copyright protected. Sharing of this recipe is both encouraged and appreciated. Copying and/or pasting full recipes to any social media is strictly prohibited. Please view my photo use policy here.
Wonderful recipe! Please create more casseroles’ recipes.
I am so glad you enjoyed this recipe Lilia! You can see all of our casserole recipes here.
Hi, what other noodle or pasta have you tried with this or used that would also be good. It’s a good recipe but I do not always have egg noodles on hand.
Any medium noodle shape should work in this recipe. If you try it I would love to hear how it turns out!
Delicious! Will be going in my potluck rotation!
My husband and I can’t have tomatoes in our diet due to acid reflux. Could this be made with mushrooms and beef gravy instead of the tomatoes and pasta sauce?
I think that sounds delicious. Make it more of a ground beef stroganoff style!
My family and I have really enjoyed this recipe. Instead of the frozen vegetables I put fresh mushrooms, bite size zucchini and squash.
Love this recipe! I cooked lots for a winter outreach (for unhoused). They ate it all and asked to have again.
Can this be made ahead and frozen?
Hi Kathy, the noodles can get a bit soft when frozen and reheated so I would recommend cooking them al dente to help when reheating. You may need to refresh the spices as well depending on how long it is frozen.
This is a great recipe for kids. I have 4 granddaughters and a couple of them are picky eaters but they love everything in this. I would not make it for a group of adults but a great family friendly choice
Casserole was very good. Made a few substitutions: mushrooms and pea pods, and tomato sauce instead of pizza sauce.
What a disappointment and waste of time and money. This is not a good recipe. I even sautéed fresh garlic as something didn’t look correct with recipe. A complete disaster, sorry Holly. Avoid this by all means.
I’m sorry and surprised to hear that you think it was a complete disaster Michael. What went wrong? This recipe is well loved by my family and many readers.
It totally lacked flavor. I had high hopes as most reviews were positive.
Sorry to hear. Thank you for letting me know. And thank you for trying the recipe.
May I suggest, instead of sauteeing garlic cloves, to put the cloves in the dish before baking, so when it bakes, more garlic flavor will be released by its natural oils?
Obviously your result was from “Operator Error”. 4.91 rating from over 150 people means something definately wrong with how you prepared it.
Can you use any other pasta noodles in the recipe other than egg noodles?
Any medium noodle shape should work in this recipe.
Tired of the same things. I need inexpensive recipes. Cooking for one.
Hi Debra, most of our recipes are for multiple servings but so many of them are great as leftovers or even in the freezer. Have fun cooking!
I need some recipes that are not expensive.
This was so good! Definitely making again. My husband and I both loved it! So simple and quick to make. So happy to have leftovers. Surprised that some people didn’t enjoy it but I think it’s really important to use quality, flavourful ingredients to suit individual taste. The only thing I changed was I used a mix of cheddar and mozza cheese because it was what I had. And as I was afraid to add too much salt and pepper this time (a lot easier to add then to take away) I will be increasing slightly next time.
Thank you so much for sharing all your wonderful recipes with us.
I must say, I was a little skeptical about this recipe. Wow, was I wrong!! It’s so easy, so good and so filling. It will be a must have in our household from here on out. Thank you!
This was delicious! I used a can of drained mixed vegetables instead of frozen. I didn’t know what to expect but I was pleasantly surprised. It was super easy to throw together and turned out amazing! I will definitely be making this again. I served it with toasted ciabatta bread with butter and garlic powder sprinkled on it. My family also loved it. I did use the whole jar of spaghetti sauce because I used about 4 cups of egg noodles and a little over a pound of hamburger. Thank you for this wonderful recipe
I just pulled this out of the oven but I made a few changes to suit our taste. In place of the mixed vegetables, I used a large can of sliced mushrooms, I used fresh garlic and mozzarella cheese. We topped it with Parmesan cheese and crushed red peppers. Absolutely delicious in addition to being quick and easy!
Are you able to use canned vegetables instead of frozen?
You can use canned drained veggies. They will be a bit softer than frozen but should still work great.
Wow. Very good. I used Picsweet onion 3 pepper mix, in place of mixed veggies (I didn’t have any). Also I use more seasonings than most recipes call for. I love oregano and basil. Prepared this before work, so I could just pop into oven when I got home. I don’t usually leave comments but this was truly an easy, delicious meal. Served with a salad and crusty bread. Yum. Thank you for the recipe
Thank you so much for coming back and leaving a comment Diane! I’m glad you loved this.
Meh. Should have listened to some other reviewers who commented on lack of flavor. I seasoned the meat well, but really didn’t like this dish. The frozen mixed vegetables were just not a good addition. We had a lot left over but it was just meh. We threw it in the trash.
I’m sorry your family didn’t enjoy this as much as ours did. Thank you for trying the recipe.
I so wanted to like this casserole. I made it exactly as directed. It just tasted so bland and ordinary. I ate it. Husband didn’t care for it. Now I have leftovers neither of us like.
Sorry to hear that you didn’t enjoy this as much as we do Joan. Thank you for trying it!