Good Old Macaroni Cheese

Quick and easy homemade macaroni cheese

Good Old Macaroni Cheese

Feeds 2

Ingredients

• 1 tsp oil (add to boiling water)
• 225g macaroni
• 50g butter
• 50g plain white flour
• 600ml semi-skimmed milk
• 200g strong cheddar; grated
• 1 tsp English mustard
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• Salt and black pepper
• Extra cheese for topping

Recipe

• Boil macaroni hard for 16 mins or till soft. Drain. Preheat oven to 200⁰C
• Melt butter in a saucepan for cheese sauce. Add flour. Stir over low heat with wooden spoon to make a paste ball (roux). Don’t let it burn. Stir for 2 minutes. Remove from heat.
• Beat milk into paste just a bit at a time to ensure sauce is smooth. Use a balloon whisk or wooden spoon. If your sauce goes lumpy – sieve or blitz with a handblender.
• Return pan to low heat, stirring until it boils and thickens. Add a splash more milk if you think it needs it. Reduce heat.
• Simmer sauce gently for 5-10 minutes. Beat in cheese, mustard, juice, seasoning. Taste. Adjust
• Stir into pasta. Tip into buttered ovenproof dish/tin. Top with grated cheese. Bake for 20-30 minutes.

Taken from – Sam Stern’s Student Cookbook - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sam-Sterns-Student-Cookbook-Survive/dp/1406308188/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323618933&sr=8-1

Review

Macaroni cheese, well well well one of the most staple of all the pre-prepared ready meals. Question is, is doing it yourself worth it? Especially when you think that you can get your hands on three macaroni cheeses for a fiver.

This recipe feeds two and so I offered to cook for my flat mate. Now apparently the key to this dish is mastering the cheesy sauce. I cooked the dish and thought to myself I’d done a pretty good job and that my flat mate and I would enjoy.

I sat her down, prepared the table and served up my wonderful cheesy dish. After tucking in I asked ‘How is it?’ to which I got the reply ‘Yea it’s ok’.

In that moment I knew, I had failed.

My expectations were probably a lot lower as I quite enjoyed it, more so than the ordinary ready meals you get from the supermarket.

However I’m not quite sure I’d do it again, if I was a better cook then it would probably be worth it, so all I can say is that if you are good enough to cook it well then this may very well be a good viable alternative to your usual microwave meal.

By Matthew Hancocks