The BEST Mac and Cheese to Make on Thanksgiving!

Hey , everyone .

Welcome back to another video .

Ok .

I don't think I've been this excited to share a recipe with you guys and it's because it was my favorite food as a child .

And it still is today growing up , I would eat a box of mac and cheese every single day .

And now as an adult , mac and cheese is still my favorite food , but I've just upgraded to a more bougie version and whether you consider mac and cheese to be a side dish or main , it's absolutely delicious .

So let's start making it for the pasta .

Using elbow macaroni is standard for mac and cheese comes in all shapes and sizes and they're all just as good for the pasta .

We're going to bring a large pot of salted water to a boil and that brings us to another huge tip when making mac and cheese do not overcook your pasta .

You want to keep in mind that we're not only boiling the pasta , we're also gonna throw it in the oven to bake .

That means it's really easy to overcook it .

And you'll end up with really mushy macaroni to prevent this .

Cook your pasta about a minute or two shy of Al Dente , start on our cheese sauce .

So we're basically only going to be using three cheeses .

The first cheese we'll be using is sharp cheddar .

Unless you're making a white cheddar .

Mac and cheese .

Sharp cheddar is super important to give your mac and cheese that beautiful , vibrant yellow color .

The second cheese we'll be using is Monterey Jack .

It has a more neutral flavor and it melts beautifully to give a little stretch to the sauce .

You can also substitute Monterey Jack with Kobe Jack and it'll be just as good .

The third cheese is smoked , go and that , that's my personal favorite .

It has a very strong , unique taste that I think is essential in this recipe .

A good replacement for smoked via would be because it also has that strong bold taste as well .

The first step to making the perfect mac and cheese is starting out with a , if you're not familiar with a roux , it's basically a thickener made of butter and flour and it's very common in soups or white sauces .

Now , here's another very important tip .

You want to stream in your half and half very slowly .

Do not add it in all at once or it's gonna shock the roux and cause it to clump .

Here's another huge tip when you're making mac and cheese with a rough if you've ever had any issues with your cheese sauce , turning out really grey or clumpy , you might wanna try warming up your milk or dairy of choice since your roux is gonna be hot when you add cold milk or half and half , which is what we're gonna be using .

It's gonna cause it to clump up .

What I like to do to avoid that is just pop my half and half in the microwave for about 15 to 30 seconds just to get it warmed up a little bit .

Now , we're going to add a little bit of cream cheese .

It adds a little bit of tanginess and makes the sauce super smooth and creamy .

Now it's time to season our mac and cheese and we definitely don't want to be shy .

Now , don't get me wrong cheese is absolutely delicious .

It adds so much flavor , but sometimes you just need a little bit of a kick .

So for our spices , we're gonna be using s smoked paprika , garlic powder , dry mustard powder , black pepper , nutmeg cayenne and salt .

You wanna stir the sauce until it thickens up really nicely to coat the back of your spoon .

You'll notice the sauce has thickened up a lot .

So we're gonna take it off the heat right now to add our cheese .

Yeah , and that's basically it .

Now , you know how to make the perfect mac and cheese .

It's super creamy on the inside and perfectly crispy on the outside .

If you have any questions about this recipe , let me know down below in the comments and of course , if you enjoyed this video , make sure to give it a thumbs up and don't forget to subscribe .

So you never miss when I upload a new video .

On that note , I'll catch you in the next one .

Bye .