How to Make the Ultimate Macaroni and Cheese ⎢Martha Stewart

Did your mom make the very best macaroni and cheese you ever tasted ?

I thought mine did until I tasted our macaroni and cheese 101 at the magazine .

We tried maybe 35 or so recipes before we came up with .

What we voted on was the warmest , the richest , the most deliciously cheesy macaroni and cheese .

Any of us had ever tasted macaroni and cheese has been around a very long time legend has it that Thomas Jefferson , a known lover of food , brought a macaroni machine back from a trip to Italy and he would serve macaroni and cheese at dinner parties .

Centuries later in 1937 to be exact , introduced macaroni and cheese dinners in that familiar blue box to the marketplace making it one of America's favorite comfort foods and macaroni and cheese .

101 is one of mine too .

And I'll show you how to make the one that we just think is so good in a little sauce .

Pan melt two tablespoons of unsalted butter .

And here are six slices of white bread that have been just derus and torn into little pieces .

Just drizzle the butter over that bread this is the bread crumb topping for the final dish and just toss the butter with the bread and just set it aside .

Meanwhile , in a heavy bottom sauce pan like this one melt , six tablespoons of butter and in another pot bring to a boil 5.5 cups of whole milk .

And this has already come to a boil .

It's actually forming a little skin on top which is fine .

Just stir that up and in this butter that's melted , stir in a half a cup of all purpose flour .

We want to cook flour and butter and then add the milk that's called in French .

A sauce .

Don't burn the butter and the flour , make sure you just cook the flour .

So adjust your heat if necessary , by the way , also have a big pot of water boiling and put in your macaroni and you're going to cook one whole pound of macaroni in lightly salted water .

And you're gonna cook it for about 3 to 4 minutes less than the box tells you because you want it a little bit al dente , a little hard to the tooth .

So let's just cook that .

And I'm gonna add just a little bit of salt here .

Our base is cooking and now stir in very slowly .

You're boiling milk , you're going to keep stirring .

You do not want a lumpy and I'm going to transfer from a wooden spoon to a whisk nice and thick .

Now you can raise your heat a little bit and start cooking this a lot of milk .

But we're going to make a big macaroni and cheese .

It's already pretty smooth , but we're going to cook and cook until this starts to thicken .

It's going to bubble and then become thick .

All of a sudden , I'm just tasting our macaroni and it tastes done and it better be poured right into a colander in the sink .

One way to avoid a lot of steam .

If you don't want a facial is to run the cold water , not on the pasta , but next to the colander , it keeps down the steam a little bit and shake out all the water and I have to wash my bish .

See how nice and thick it's becoming .

Once it's thick , just remove it from the heat .

And then we're going to add half a teaspoon of salt .

A quarter of a teaspoon of freshly grated nutmeg and it's really nice to grate your own nutmeg .

Smells so good .

And nutmeg is very important .

I think in macaroni and cheese and don't forget Cayenne pepper .

This is something that my mom did add to her macaroni and cheese .

A quarter of a teaspoon of Cayenne pepper .

Mom added at least that much .

None of us really like tremendously spicy food , but we like the taste of Cayenne pepper and we also love the taste of black pepper and add a quarter of a teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper too .

And now into this special melt , add your cheese , three cups of cheddar cheese and 1.5 cups of .

And now you can just add your macaroni .

Make sure you coat all the macaroni with the .

We will pour this into our dish .

You can avoid the topping if you like and just put this into the oven .

But the topping with the wonderful bread crumb crustiness is something that if you haven't tried it , you should try at least once you'll love it .

So now we're going to Sprinkle with the and the cheddar an even layer of both .

Now , you can put this in the freezer and wrap it really well and have it for parties .

It's just a real old fashioned and very homey buffet .

This is the bread crumb topping and make sure your oven is preheated to 375 degrees .

So we're ready to get that right into the oven and we're going to bake it in the oven until it's brown on top for about 45 to 60 minutes .

And here is our really beautiful bubbling macaroni and cheese .

It's really important to let that just sit for five minutes or so .

It's still piping hot , but it's not going to burn you and take as much as you like .

Now you don't have to do this .

But my mother always gave us a little dollop of ice cold sour cream on top of our macaroni and cheese .

So I'm gonna have it that way and I'll let you know how it tastes .

Macaroni and cheese .

101 .

Something that everyone's gonna love pretty good with that sour cream .