Macaroni and Cheese Casserole

While I love the navy blue box for a quick meal, nothing beats a good homemade macaroni and cheese casserole. There is nothing like the gooey rich cheese sauce and the squishy elbow macaroni. Especially if the recipe is easy enough for a weeknight. I’ve had three different recipes for homemade macaroni and cheese casserole since that first apartment in graduate school, and they are all very good and fairly easy.

My Improvised Attempt

When I moved into my first apartment for graduate school, I held themed dinner parties. The menus are long lost, but the good recipes were incorporated into the family cookbook. I wanted to serve homemade macaroni and cheese casserole at one of the parties, but I didn’t have a recipe. And this was before the Internet made it easy to find recipes, so I had to improvise. I knew how to make Dad’s fettucine alfredo by heart and, since that is basically a cheese sauce, I figured I could adapt it to a macaroni and cheese casserole.

If you’ve never made alfredo sauce before, it starts with melting a few tablespoons of butter or margarine in a medium sized heavy sauce pan. Then whisk in approximately an equal amount of all purpose flour to make a roux. Since parmesan cheese is the cornerstone of the recipe, it is important to use fresh grated parmesan (from the cheese counter or the deli) and not the shelf stable artificial stuff. Whisk in the parmesan cheese until the mixture forms a soft ball. To finish the alfredo sauce, gradually whisk in enough light cream to approximate the consistency of packaged cake batter and season with grated nutmeg and white pepper. I usually start with two tablespoons of butter, two tablespoons of flour, one cup of fresh grated parmesan, one cup of light cream, and seasonings to taste.

What I would need to do to make a homemade macaroni and cheese casserole is switch out the parmesan cheese for cheddar cheese and then somehow thicken the sauce, both of which would be fairly easy to do. Because cheddar sheds more oil than parmesan when it melts, I switched up the order of the recipe steps. It still started with making a roux out of butter and flour, but then I added enough light cream to achieve the consistency of packaged cake batter. I finished the sauce by gradually adding enough shredded cheddar cheese to achieve the consistency of packaged brownie batter. Then I poured it over one pound of cooked elbow macaroni and baked it for twenty minutes.

The recipe worked out well enough for me to keep in the family cookbook for close to fifteen years, until I dropped it in favor of a better recipe in version nine in 2009.

The Endangered Recipes Version

When I updated the family cookbook in 2009, I dropped the adaptation of the fettucine alfredo for a very easy recipe for homemade macaroni and cheese casserole that I found in Endangered Recipes. This is a cookbook about family recipes that were “in danger” of going extinct because of current heath consciousness and food trends. Over the course of time, I simplified it even further. So now the recipe is basically open two cans of evaporated milk into a large pot, bring it to a boil, turn off the heat, stir in one pound of shredded cheese, season with salt and pepper, pour over one pound of cooked macaroni in a 9x17 casserole, and bake for thirty minutes.

This recipe worked out well enough for me to use for about seven years, until we were having a family discussion about macaroni and cheese recipes. It turned out that I was the only one of the siblings who made homemade macaroni and cheese casserole without making a roux.

My Sister’s Recipe

My sister rhapsodized about her homemade macaroni and cheese casserole recipe during our family discussion. She said it was the best recipe ever, and that everyone always asked her to bring the casserole to potlucks because it was so good. My curiosity was piqued, and I wasn’t above asking her for her recipe when I planned to bake a macaroni and cheese casserole for one of my larger buffet dinner parties.

I was a little surprised when my sister replied to my request with a link to an Alton Brown recipe on the Food Network website. However, in typically family fashion, her reply detailed almost a dozen changes to the recipe in order to make it properly, from the simple change of always doubling the recipe to some more complex omissions and substitutions. The recipe starts with making a roux out of equal parts of milk and flour, then whisking in milk and seasoning with paprika and chili powder. The sauce is finished by stirring in approximately eighteen ounces of cheddar cheese and one cup of sour cream, and seasoning with salt and pepper. One pound of cooked macaroni is mixed into the sauce, and then poured into two 8x8 pans and topped with six ounces of cheddar cheese. Of course, my sister wrote that the twenty-four ounces of cheese can also include different ratios of cheese, such as the mac and cheese mix, pepper jack, and habanero jack. There is a panko and parmesan topping that gets put on top of the casserole. It gets baked for thirty minutes, and then rests for five minutes before serving.

When I prepared my sister’s version, the only real changes that I made were that I used a 9x17 casserole pan (everything fit!) and I forgot the bread crumb topping. It was a huge hit at the dinner party; one of my friends even declared that the casserole was restaurant quality. My friends actually seemed to prefer my sister’s recipe to the usual Endangered Recipes version, although some of them said that they honestly couldn’t remember exactly what the other version tasted was like.

The Verdict

While my sister’s recipe was beloved by my friends at the dinner party, it was a little too complex for a quick weeknight meal. For that, my adaptation of the Endangered Recipes recipe is perfect as it takes less than an 45 minutes from start to finish.

My Macaroni and Cheese Casserole

1 1lb box of elbow macaroni
2 12oz cans evaporated milk
1 lb shredded cheddar (white, yellow, or mixed)
Salt and ground black pepper

1. Lightly spray a 9” x 17” glass baking pan with vegetable or olive oil.
2. Cook macaroni according to the directions on the box, using the lowest cooking time indicated. Drain, rinse well and drain thoroughly. Pour into prepared pan.
3. Bring evaporated milk to a simmer over medium-low heat in at least a 6 qt pot. (Milk will boil over a smaller pot.) Simmer for a few minutes to thicken slightly. Stir periodically to prevent burning on the bottom.
4. Whisk cheddar into hot milk in small additions. Ensure each batch is melted before adding more. Add salt and pepper. Taste and adjust seasonings, if necessary.
5. Pour over macaroni as evenly as possible. Mix gently to coat, if necessary.
6. Bake at 350F for 30 minutes, or until light brown and bubbly.


My Sister’s Macaroni and Cheese Casserole Recipe

While on family vacation, I mentioned to my sister that friend had requested that I blog about homemade macaroni and cheese casserole. She surprised me by revealing that she was a loyal reader of my blog. (Woo hoo! I have one!) Of course, she gave me permission to share her awesome recipe, reminding me again that it was an adaptation of the Alton Brown Food Network recipe.

1 1lb box of elbow macaroni
6 tbsp butter
6 tbsp flour
5 cups milk
1 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp chili powder
24 oz shredded sharp cheddar cheese
1 cup sour cream
2 tsp kosher salt
fresh black pepper

Topping
6 tbsp butter
1 cup panko bread crumbs
1 cup parmesan cheese

1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. Cook macaroni in well-salted water according to the directions on the box, using the lowest cooking time indicated. Drain, rinse well and drain thoroughly.
3. While the macaroni is cooking, melt the butter in a separate pot. Whisk in the flour and keep it moving for about five minutes to make sure it is free of lumps.
4. Gradually whisk in the milk, paprika, and chili powder, keeping the mixture smooth. Simmer for ten minutes.
5. Stir in ¾ of the shredded cheese. Stir in the sour cream. Season with salt and pepper.
6. Fold the macaroni into the mix. Pour into two 8x8 pans. Anything that doesn’t fit can be poured into muffin pans. Top with remaining cheese.
7. Melt remaining butter for topping in sauté pan. Toss bread crumbs and parmesan with the butter. Top the macaroni with the bread crumbs
8. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and let rest for five minutes before serving.

- My sister gets the 8-ounce pre-shredded bags of cheese. She says that 3 bags of cheese makes the math right and, depending on her audience, she'll use different ratios of cheddar (or mac'n'cheese mix if they have it), pepper jack, or habanero jack (really spicy), etc.

- My sister also says that this is a great make ahead dish. She usually makes it and puts in the pans the night before and bakes it about 1-2 hours before it is time to serve.