Ultimate Mac ‘n Cheese
I’m going to tell you right now: Don’t blame me if you gain a few pounds. This is one of my ultimate comfort foods. Whenever I make it, it always turns into an excruciating battle with my (underdeveloped) sense of self control.
I almost always wind up losing.
Go on and make a pan. I defy you not to stuff yourself. You’ll see.
The filling is rich, creamy, and satisfyingly salty. The topping is crisp with just the right amount of crunch for contrast. Seriously, this might just be the perfect feel-better food.
The basic technique for Ultimate Mac ‘n Cheese
This recipe follows the basic tenets of a lot of mac ‘n cheese recipes.
Make a basic bechamel sauce (milk thickened with a combination of flour + butter), toss in loads of cheese and a handful of spices, mix with al dente pasta, top with cheese-y panko breadcrumb topping, and bake until it’s blissfully bubbly.
Here’s how to do that in detail.
Wait, Mouse. Are you trying to kill me with all that cheese?
No. I promise, I’m not. I love you. You should know better.
That said, this recipe does call for about two-and-a-half pounds of cheese.
That’s a lot. I know. Trust me, it’s worth it. (In my defense, it makes a 9 x 13-inch pan, packed to the rim.)
And if I may offer this advice: Don’t skimp. Don’t use low-fat cheese. Don’t try to do tricky things with yogurt or skim milk. It’s mac ‘n cheese. It’s not diet food. It’s guilty pleasure food, so go on and just enjoy.
I used a mixture of taleggio and cheddar (for strong, cheese-y flavor), fontina (for mellow nuttiness), and mozzarella (to make all those gooey strings of cheese).
Taleggio
Fontina
Change up the cheeses however you like. Just aim for 2 1/2 lbs. and be sure to choose cheeses that melt well. Fine Cooking magazine has a really good guide on that here.
Which kind of pasta should I use for mac ‘n cheese?
I used medium shells, but by all means, use whichever noodle you like best.
Choose pasta that’s on the medium to small side (larger noodles tend to break and lose their shape). Pick a shape that has lots of nooks and crannies to trap all that glorious sauce. Elbows, rotini, and radiatore all work great.
Ultimate Mac n’ Cheese
Pasta (a.k.a. vehicle for cheese)
1 lb. medium shells
water
kosher salt
Crust
4 Tbls. butter
2 cups panko breadcrumbs (or cut the crusts off white bread and whiz it all up in the food processor)
1 1/2 cups shredded orange cheddar
1/2 cup Parmesan, grated
Ooey, Gooey Cheese-y Goodness
8 Tbls. butter + butter to grease the pan
8 Tbls. flour
5 cups whole milk
1 tsp. ground white pepper
1 tsp. ground garlic
8 oz. Taleggio, chopped into small pieces
8 oz. young Fontina, chopped into small pieces
2 cups shredded orange cheddar
1 cup shredded mozzarella
Makes 1 (9 x 13-inch) pan
Generously butter a 9 x 13-inch pan. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
Cook the pasta
Cook the pasta in a large pot of boiling, salted water. Aim for al dente. (The pasta will continue to cook in the oven.)
Drain the pasta. Give it a rinse with cold water to keep it from glomming together. Set it aside to drain in the sink while you make the topping and the sauce.
Make the breadcrumb topping
Melt 4 Tbls. of butter (that’s half a stick) and put it in a large bowl. (I usually just zap it in the microwave for about 30 seconds on high.)
Toss in the panko.
Give a stir to mix with the butter. It will be clumpy. Just break up the lumps with a wooden spoon.
Add the Parmesan cheese and the shredded cheddar.
Mix to combine. Set aside while you deal with the sauce.
Make the cheese sauce
Melt the butter in a medium-sized, heavy-bottomed pan over medium heat. Toss in the flour.
Whisk well to combine.
Beat out all the lumps, until you have a smooth paste. (If you want to get technical about it, you’re making a white roux here.) Cook for about 3 minutes, whisking often. You don’t want it to get brown. You just want to cook the rawness out of the flour.
Pour in the milk. Whisk well to combine and incorporate the roux with the milk.
Raise the heat to medium-high. Bring the sauce to a boil, whisking constantly. When it starts to boil, knock the heat down to medium, and simmer the sauce for about 3 more minutes, or until it’s considerably thicker. Whisk constantly. If you don’t, it will stick and burn on the bottom of the pot.
Yank the pot from the heat when it’s nice and thick. You want it to look about like this (thick, but not like grammar school paste):
Grab your taleggio, fontina, and shredded cheddar. Resist the urge to gobble it all down.
Toss it into the pot.
Whisk to combine and get it melting.
Whisk for a few minutes, on and off, to incorporate the cheese as it melts. Again, resist the urge to jump in the pot and swim around with your mouth open.
Toss in the white pepper and garlic powder. Whisk to combine.
Your sauce should be thick and velvety.
Assemble and bake the mac ‘n cheese
Transfer the cooked pasta to a large mixing bowl. (By large, I mean the largest one you have. It has to fit the sauce + the pasta, with enough room to stir it all around.)
Pour the sauce over the pasta.
(Mmm mmm mmm…)
Mix it all up.
Toss in that last cup of mozzarella and mix well. This will give your mac ‘n cheese those wonderful strings of cheese.
Pour the mixture into your buttered pan.
Sprinkle thickly with the prepared topping.
Pop the pan into your pre-heated 400-degree oven. If your pan is really, really full, slide a piece of aluminum foil onto the rack below the pan. It’ll catch any drips and save you a ton of cleanup if your pan bubbles over a little.
Bake for 20-25 minutes until the crust is brown and bubbly. Yank it out of the oven and let it cool a bit on the counter.
It reheats really well, and will keep for about 3 days in the fridge.
Oh, and as good as this is, if you want to make it even better, serve garnished with big, cooked hunks of lobster meat.
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34 Comments
holy crap. cheese heaven! do you think it would freeze well if i wanted to store some for a cheese craving emergency?
Hmmm, I haven’t tried to freeze it. I’m thinking that it might get a little grainy, but if you give it a try, definitely let me know!
+Jessie
Okay, so I’m going to have to expand my vocabulary to keep up with my expanding waistline, but right now all I can say is OMG!!!!
You’ve brought out the mouse in me with all this cheese! I cannot wait to make this. I think we may just have to add mac & cheese to our Thanksgiving menu. I hope you have a wonderfuly holiday!
Hehehe, it’s a secret device of the Mouse Empire! We use this mac n’ cheese to turn people into mice!
+Jessie
Just looking at that makes me feel better – and maybe just a little teensy bit fatter
Yay!
+Jessie
TO DIE FOR!!! Love the idea of adding lobster too…going to make it for work!!! Happy Turkey DAy
Thanks, Cory, honey!
+Jessie
Oh Holy Macaroni! That looks divine! Mac/cheese is one of my all tame favorite comfort foods too. Mmmmmmmmmmmmm.
Me, too, Glenna!
Thanks so much!
+Jessie
Looks wonderful! My ultimate comfort food. Since I’ve gained 10 lbs since I started blogging, I haven’t made mac & cheese for a long while.
Hopefully soon! I’m gonna try your recipe when I break my abstinence. Thanks for sharing.
Ha! Yeah, that is one of the hazards of being a food blogger.
Thanks so much!
+Jessie
How can it be comfort food if it is low fat? OMG this is to die for…and I would gladly!
See, this is why we get along so well!
Thanks, Honey B!
+Jessie
now that is a lot of cheese! I love it though and it sounds so tasty and definitely comforting
Hehe, yeah, it’s a ridiculous amount of cheese, but it’s so good.
Thanks, Jessie!
That macaroni and cheese looks awesome, even my grand children will choose this over KD, although I have never made them mac and cheese with the panko topping. I will have to try it, thanks for the recipe.
Wow! This is pure heaven. I can’t wait to try it.
Thank GOD I can’t afford two and a half pounds of good cheese, because mac ‘n cheese is one of the foods that I have absolutely no self control about. I’ve always had this weird love/hate relationship with cheese in that I love melted cheese but am not so fond of unmelted cheese. This makes me a perfect mac ‘n cheese target. When I moved to Quincy my mom and I ate at The Fat Cat, which has mac ‘n cheese so good that we both almost cried with joy. And now I can never go back there to eat, because I have no cheesy self control.
OMG how can anyone resist this???!!!
those pictures are sensational…mouth watering and love this post
Oh yum I will definitely try this recipe out!
This is going to be one of the dishes I prep for my sister’s dinner party this weekend. I can’t wait to be the one responsible for fattening up her guests.
Holy cheese! It looks so creamy and delicious. Looking forward to testing this one out. Happy holidays!
This is the ultimate mac and cheese! This is the real thing! And I love it! This is going to be the dish that I will focus on this Christmas!
I made this and it looked exactly like the photo and was delicious. Made it in a le creuset flame dutch oven – gorgeous and yummy!!!
Oh yay! So glad you liked it! It’s seriously one of my favs.
Cheers!
+Jessie
Ok, there is no doubt that this Ultimate Mac N Chees is fantastic! I made it last nite and it tasted incredible. My only complaint is that it literally cost me $32 to make as I had to buy most of the ingredients. The Taleggio cheese was $7.79 for 8oz. The fontina cheese was $7 for 9oz., the cheddar cost me $5 (on sale), the mozzarella was $1.25 (on sale) a quart of whole milk was $1.19, the ground white pepper (had no idea such a thing even existed!) was $4.49, the panko was $1.50 (on sale). Then adding in the other ingredients (pasta, flour, butter, parmesan cheese and garlic powder) that I already had on hand… it tallies up to about $32. I can tweak the quantities of the Taleggio and Fontina to help cut back but it won’t make that much of a difference. Even if I cut those 2 cheeses in 1/2 it would only reduce the total price by about $7.40 which still tallies up to $25. So, as m,uch as I thoroughly enjoyed eating this, I can only afford to make it on special occasions. Or if I win the lottery.
I made this last night and as much as I hate to leave a bad review, this was so not worth the cost or the calories. I (and my guests) felt like it was unfortunately quite bland. My left overs went in the trash, if I’m going to eat something that unhealthy, it ought to have flavor.
Oh gosh, really? :/ I’m surprised, what with the taleggio and the cheddar, but to each his own. I’ve made this several times (as have other readers), and have gotten rave reviews. I’m wondering if there was something off with your cheese. At any rate, sorry you didn’t like it.
+Jessie
Hrm in response to the bad review I would say try, try again! The fun thing about cooking is that a recipe isn’t set in stone. Any recipe has the potential to turn out poopy if you don’t adapt it to your own personal tastes. With this dish I would recommend adding a bit more flavor into the crust/topping if you want more of a kick. You can add garlic in some form, any kind of pepper you like, or maybe even maybe go texmex with some taco seasoning mix? If that is not enough flavor why not mix in some of your favie veggies? I like little bits of broccoli in mine sometimes. =)
Anyway, the jest is use this for an awesome foundation and put your own twist on it. It makes cooking so much more enjoyable.
By far the best Mac-n-Cheese I have made!! This had such great texture and taste. I could not find the taleggio cheese, but I was determined to make this tonight. So I substituted Brie.. So absolutely wonderful. Yeah, it is lots of money for cheese, but so worth it.
Thanks for sharing the recipe..
Dear Jessie,
i love to cook, but really have no one to cook for these days and that makes it – well – it’s a downer to say the least.
My son and his friends are always coming and going and now i can give them snacks and things so easily and inexpensively. and they will love all of this stuff!! (and they’re all skinny – jeez – and my skinny son didn’t get it from me, that’s for sure :]
but, with your visual recipes, i feel like i have company. (your instructions and comments make it so easy and give me the little push i need to feel like creating again
thanks so much – you are a very creative person and i think you have the best cooking site ever!
– alexa (new york city)