The most comforting Mac and Cheese recipe
Today we are bringing to you pure comfort. Mac and cheese is a dish to treat ourselves once in a while as well as an amazing plate for any cheese lover. Our recipe uses different cheese and spices to achieve the best flavour and it is topped with the crunchiest, most delicious exterior.
Although it could seem surprising, this recipe originates in Italy a few centuries ago, but it is greatly extended in the US. We love preparing this dish as it is really easy with the best results.
Mac and cheese
You will find our Mac and cheese recipe amazing. Firstly preparing a Mornay sauce (which is a béchamel with some cheese), using mozzarella and cheddar and with a breadcrumbs top that adds some crunch every bite.We hope you enjoy it!
Ingredients
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 3 tablespoons flour
- 500 mL milk
- water for the pasta
- 240 g pasta preferably elbow pasta, riccioli, chifferi…
- 1 teaspoon cayenne powder optional
- 1 tablespoond ground nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon ground mustard
- salt and pepeer to taste
- 1 bay leaf
- 100 g cheddar
- 125 g fresh mozzarella
- 50 g panko or breadcrumbs
- 25 g parmesan cheese
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 tablespoon dry parsley
Instructions
- Firstly, we are going to prepare a béchamel sauce. To do this, we put the butter on a pan at medium heat.In the meantime, we heat the milk in a separate pot (this will make the cooking process easier).When all the butter has melted, we add all the flour into the pan very slowly, ensuring that it is getting incorporated into the mixture in a homogeneous way. You can shift the flour prior to this to facilitate it.
- When we have added all the flour, we add the cayenne and mustard powder as well as some pepper and let it cook for a minute.Now we add the milk very slowly, making sure that the milk has absorbed all the liquid in a uniform way before adding more. To do this, we have to mix it very well with a spatula ensuring we break any bumps.At first we will get a quite thick mixture, but by adding the milk it will become more creamy and liquid. We add all the milk.
- Once we have run out of milk, we add the bay leaf and nutmeg and lower down the heat to low. In the meantime, pre-heat the oven at 160 °C / 325 F.In a big pot we boil water to cook the pasta. We will leave it in the water until it is slightly harder than “al dente”, or around 1 minute less of what is indicated in the packaging cooking instructions. It will finish cooking in the oven.
- Whilst we are cooking the pasta, we can shred both the parmesan and mozzarella and we are now going to prepare a Mornay sauce, which is basically a béchamel sauce with some cheese.Therefore, we incorporate very slowly the cheddar as well as the mozzarella, making sure that it gets mixed into the béchamel very well.It is important that the pan is not too hot to avoid that the older cheeses release their fats.Check the flavour of the Mornay sauce and add salt of needed.
- In a bowl, we mix the panko, parsley, olive oil and grated parmesan very well.
- Add the pasta to the Mornay in the pan and mix very well.
- Now, in a baking dish, firstly add the pasta in the Mornay.Then top it with the panko, parlsey and parmesan mixture.
- Now we put it in the oven until the cheese has melted and the pasta is completely cooked. It should take around 15 minutes.If you have a grill function in your oven, turn the fans off and put this on for five minutes to grate the cheese until the panko has acquired a golden colour.And that’s it! Now we can enjoy this amazing dish.
Notes
Experiment with your favourite cheeses. We use cheddar because of its flavour and mozzarella thanks to its stringy texture when melted.