The Quick, Essential Stovetop Mac-and-Cheese is exactly as it sounds, a way better than boxed weeknight savior, and it takes, at most, 3 minutes longer to make (the 3 minutes you grate the cheese.) The mic drop of the macaroni-and-cheese category, the one you make when only the very, very best will do, is MarthaвЂ™s Mac-and-Cheese. Note: There are three macaroni-and-cheese recipes on this site and this is not an accident. вЂњThe moral of the story: When in doubt, add more cheese.вЂќ Finally, she suggests that you resist the temptation to form a crust with unrelated ingredients such as bread crumbs, corn flakes or tortilla chips, with enough cheese, a crisp naturally forms on top. Three: this is no time for whole wheat pasta or artisanal orecchiette, elbow pasta works best. Two, despite suggestions of glorious, rich cheeses, she found nothing better in end results than cheddar or (!) American cheese.

One, a seemingly outrageous 2:1 ration of cheese to pasta is indeed possible, and a good thing. She bestows on us several nuggets of gooey wisdom. вЂњNone of the recipes came close to my fantasy of what the dish should be: nothing more than tender elbows of pasta suspended in pure molten cheddar, with a chewy, golden-brown crust of cheese on top,вЂќ she says, to which I say amen. She finds herself searching, like me, for an un-fussy, classic recipe and finds even more atrocities from white sauces, Worcestershire, smoked gouda and creamed onions instead. A quick search on the New York Times website brought me to this archived article, from the NYTвЂ™s Julia Moskin. Sadly, finding a good recipe was not this simple, and seriously, when did mac-and-cheese get so gussied up? Bacon? Onions? Mushrooms? Blue cheeses? Heavy creams? Bechamel sauces with low proportions of mild cheeses? Curry? Blech! Look, thereвЂ™s a place for fancy, and childhood classics arenвЂ™t it. ThereвЂ™s no comparison, not even a nominal one, to the box mixes, and if I told that the essence of most recipes is to boil milk, stir in cheese, pour it over par-baked pasta and bake it until itвЂ™s crusted, would you then believe me? ItвЂ™s not really my favorite thing, but would that score me points with my eternal-inner-child husband or what? As I searched fruitlessly for a good basic recipe that was neither a pot de crГЁme nor a puddle of ganache, I remembered that I also had a chunk of Cabot extra sharp cheddar to use up and now do you see how these things come to pass? Mac and cheese is one of these sinful beauts that I encourage everyone to make, at least once, from scratch. ItвЂ™s sat unopened in the fridge since, leaving me the quandary of finding a recipe that used a large quantity of it, as my inner Yiddishe Mama would not allow me to let it go bad, and god knows I am not earnest enough to actually make my morning lattes at home. The quart of whole milk had been purchased last Saturday with the intention of using it in aforementioned spinach quiche, which, oops, didnвЂ™t require any. And yes, I know you are snickering, because how on earth can one innocently go about a process than concludes with spooning into a deep casserole dish crusted with cheese and pasta in a two to one ratio? Well, youвЂ™re me, thatвЂ™s how and you needed to use up some milk. You know, this really started out far more innocently than it now may seem.

Easy mac and cheese oven