How to Make MACARONI and CHEESE Like an Italian

Ladies and gentlemen , this is the macaroni and cheese done the Italian way .

Originally this was an Italian recipe .

You took it from us and now I'm bringing this recipe back to Italy , macaroni and cheese .

The Italian way .

I can't believe I'm making macaroni and cheese .

I might lose my Italian passport .

But hey , let me tell you , I'm gonna do it the most Italian way as possible .

Mm .

And crunchy .

Mm mm .

Mm .

Mm .

Mm mm mm .

That mm .

Hi and welcome to place the place where you get to learn how to cook delicious Italian recipes .

Well , this is a famous Italian American dish .

We don't have it in Italy .

Macaroni and cheese don't exist in Italy .

We don't eat macaroni in it , but we do like to eat pasta with cheese .

And this is what I made for you today with the macaroni and cheese touch .

Ok .

Now Italians don't eat it but they will eat this if you make it this way .

Now , I never made macaroni and cheese .

It was the first time I made it .

And let me tell you there's male .

It's fantastic .

Now , let's learn together more about this dish .

Now before we make the mac and cheese , we need to learn the history of mac and cheese .

Ok .

Where is it from ?

Italy ?

America , England , Canada .

Where is this Mac and cheese from ?

So we're gonna watch a video from Eco , which I really like this channel .

They um they do interesting videos .

OK .

Let's watch this one and let's learn about the history of mac and cheese .

References to dishes involving cheese and pasta .

Go back more than 500 years as far as 14th and 15th century Italy .

Ok .

So we know that this pasta is from Italy pasta is from Italy and it's been around for a long time .

This is a pasta made with cheese .

Ok .

Simple .

Very easy answer .

Thomas Jefferson .

Yes , that Thomas Jefferson .

The story goes that Jefferson encountered macaroni in France and Northern Italy in the late 17 hundreds .

He was so smitten by the elbow shaped pasta that he had a special macaroni extruder shipped back home to Virginia where he served it to friends and guests even at presidential dinner .

Very interesting .

Wow .

This guy really loved the macaroni shape .

What do you like about it ?

You know , it's interesting that the macaroni pasta is not popular in Italy anymore .

I wonder why ?

Decades later , Mary Randolph , a distant cousin of Jefferson's included a recipe for macaroni and cheese .

Notably , her recipe had only three ingredients , macaroni cheese and butter , well done Mary , well done Mary .

So why don't we keep this recipe .

That was a classic Italian recipe .

Mac and cheese is from Italy .

She put it in a book in Virginia .

Ok .

Put it in a book in Virginia .

But the recipe is from Italy .

What happened after that 1937 when a certain crafty corporation produced a boxed version of the dish that mac and cheese really caught on the country was still in the grips of the Great Depression .

And a single box could feed a family of four for less than 20 cents .

More recently , macaroni and cheese has even gone on to make best friends with bacon truffle and sounds good .

I will have the one with the lobster and truffle together .

They boxed are homemade .

A nice hot plate of velvety cheesy goodness became an American staple .

And the rest as they say is history .

So basically , for all of this , we need to blame the craft company that created that during a good time in history for them .

So basically this mac and cheese .

Ok , that everyone eats it come from a box and now it's world famous worldwide because of a box .

That's not fair .

This is a dish that's been around for 500 years from Italy .

Ok .

And well , it was not popular since the box .

So what , what are we talking about here ?

So we're talking about a population , a world population that prefers the commercial over authentic .

Hm .

All right .

I mean , here we need to learn more about this dish and we need to make it the way an Italian will make it .

I just wanna read more about this craft .

OK .

So historically accurate , it's a channel that talks about history .

OK ?

It doesn't have many views , but I recommend you to watch this video and listen what he says about craft .

Listen , Kraft Foods was founded by James L .

Kraft , a Canadian immigrant to the United States who started his own company as a door to door cheese business .

Kraft had great success with prepackaged mac and cheese as the cheap product appealed to adults who just wanted a quick and easy meal .

See the power of money , the power of money , money talks , money decides what to do .

And in this case decides the history of a dish .

This dish has been around for 500 years in Italy and this craft all of a sudden decided made it up and the mac and cheese is from us .

A popular very quickly with Kraft selling more than 8 million boxes in its first year alone .

While today macaroni and cheese is available pretty much everywhere selling for less than a dollar a serving 200 years ago .

It was one of the heights of luxury .

Wow .

Wow .

I am shocked and surprised .

All right , let's see .

What's this big fuss about this dish ?

I've never made it before .

So I wanna make it the real Italian way .

These are the ingredients to make the macaroni and cheese my way .

The Italian way .

Ok .

So first let's talk about pasta .

OK .

The traditional pasta , it's macaroni in Italy .

Macaroni are not really popular anymore and it's not something that we eat .

I wonder why .

Now what I will do is I will go for , I , I will go for small shells .

You can go for or any short pasta that you like ?

Ok .

Oh macaroni .

Ok .

In , in my case , I've chosen one of the reasons why I'm going for is because it's very hard to find a top quality Italian brand making Macaroni .

OK ?

Very rare .

OK ?

Only commercial brands make it .

So look at the difference between the two .

We have a light color pen which is made by an artisan top quality brand and we have an orange macaroni made by a commercial brand .

OK ?

And if you look at these two , the difference is very important .

Now , this one was made with good semolina and dry at low temperatures .

OK .

This one was made with semolina again but dry at very high temperatures .

Now , is this good for you ?

No , this is not good for you .

This is good for you because it's full of proteins .

OK ?

Now I will go for this .

If you can find top quality macaroni in this color , then go for it otherwise pick a different pasta .

Now how much pasta do we need ?

Basically , this is the casa roll I'm using .

So basically I'm putting the pasta in the casserole to see , you know , you want this casserole to be almost full .

Ok .

So I'm using one packet and a half of penne .

Ok ?

Could be enough for a lot of people .

You know , then I'm using one glass of full cream milk .

OK ?

One glass .

Then I'm using 100 g of butter , you know , is important to use butter for this dish .

So here we have 100 g of which is a beautiful smelly , creamy cheese .

OK ?

Very hard to find .

If you can find it , you can use something else .

OK .

Creamy something creamy name .

What we have here is buffalo mozzarella .

Again , 100 and 20 g of buffalo mozzarella and made , we need 100 and 30 100 and 40 g of provolone and six large tablespoon of pecorino cheese or parmigiano cheese up to you .

Now , let's make this pasta .

All right .

So what we do with the provolone is we want to cut the provolone into cubes .

OK ?

The provolone will be only used at the end .

OK ?

We're using this right at the end .

The beautiful provolone cheese , you just have it on top and just cut into beautiful provolone .

It plays an important role is the queen of this dish because it will go on top of everything .

The first thing to do , we're going to get a large pot and fill it up with water and then we're gonna put one tablespoon of sea salt .

OK ?

Put one tablespoon in there and that will give flavors to the beautiful pasta .

So this top quality pasta takes about 12 minutes to cook in boiling water .

OK ?

So let's put the pasta in .

Now let's cook it for 12 minutes .

Give a quick stir .

OK ?

Because you , you don't want the pasta to get stuck at the bottom , make sure the pasta moves around and the pasta needs to dance .

The pasta needs space when it boils .

All right .

Now , in the meantime , we're going to make the cheese sauce for the macaroni and cheese .

Now , we're gonna be using the same cup of casserole if you can , you know we're using for , for baking .

OK ?

So here I have a beautiful cast iron pan which I'm gonna put the butter .

You know , it's very generous with butter .

Make sure you cook this at low heat .

OK ?

Low , low heat .

You want the butter to melt .

Yummy , yummy , yummy .

Oh , I love the smell of butter , but I do prefer extra virgin oil for cooking .

But in this recipe , we're gonna use butter .

Now , the butter is melted in no time .

We're gonna add the milk and we are going to add the creamy cheese .

Ok ?

Like this is you can use , you can use anything this creamy cheese which I'm breaking with my hand .

I want this to melt .

OK ?

It's in a very , very , very low heat .

Now , what is happening with this beautiful cheese is it , it , it is slowly , slowly melting , OK ?

It doesn't melt super fast .

The milk at the same time is evaporating .

So you got the milk evaporating the cheese melting at the same time .

OK ?

And this is beautiful .

OK ?

And if you use the or Ken bird , it will do the same thing .

How beautiful it is .

Now the pasta needs two more minutes .

What we do this water in the pasta and now it's full of starch .

So we get a mug and we're going to get the pasta water full of starch and this is going to help us to combine the ingredients , guys .

The pasta is almost ready .

The cheese is melting .

We need to now make the cream for the pecorino .

OK ?

Now what's gonna happen is if I put the pecorino in there right now , the pecorino will become stringy and it's not what we want .

We don't want strings of pecorino .

I want the pecorino to be creamy .

So here I have a little bit of pasta water to put in there .

Not much , just a little bit .

And then what we do is we mix until we get a cream .

A nice thick cream .

OK ?

And that's what the pecorino does when you mix it with the water with starch , put a little bit more water and you will see what's gonna happen .

It's like making a OK .

Same , same food is simple guys .

It's basically the water is very important for many things for you .

All natural ingredients put together .

Look at this it is dense , this dense cheese that we have over here .

This is gonna turn into cream when we combine all the ingredients together in the sauce pan .

Look at that look at that this is what we wanna get .

Ok ?

Alright you got this .

Now the cheese here is melted on low temperature now we can put the pasta inside .

Alright guys the beautiful are ready .

They are nice and make them , don't over cook them because we are gonna cook them in the oven for about 25 minutes , ok ?

So let's collect the and we put it straight in the pan with the cheese .

Now we put the pasta straight in the pan and don't worry if you have a little bit of pasta water going it's actually good you have pasta water in there gonna help .

Oh it looks fantastic .

Now what we do is we gently gently mix , we wanna make sure our pasta mix well , stir mix , mix gently and make sure you don't have the temperature too high , ok ?

And this will be on a low heat , ok ?

Now this is what I do because I think it's easier to combine the ingredients .

So I get a salad bowl and I put all the pasta in there , the pasta is nice and warm , ok ?

Very important .

And now what we do is we're gonna put this pecorino cream in there .

So what I do , I spread it everywhere .

It's like when I make a pepe OK ?

Spread it everywhere .

I'm going to break the buffalo mozzarella here .

See the buffalo mozzarella .

I'm gonna break it here .

Oh Beautiful .

The cream is inside the buffalo mozzarella .

This is so important , this moment , so important .

So spread it everywhere .

Beautiful .

OK ?

And now what we do , we're gonna mix everything .

Now we wanna add a little bit of pasta water .

This is gonna help the combine ingredients .

OK ?

Start with a little bit and then we'll see how we go .

OK ?

Now let's mix all the ingredients we mix until we get the cream .

Now what's gonna happen to the mozzarella ?

The mozzarella will melt because the pasta it's very hot and then we're gonna finish this off in the almond .

So the mozzarella will disappear in the pasta .

Look at that .

Look at the , look at the pecorino .

Look what the pecorino is doing over here .

Look what the pecorino is doing to your pasta is making this pasta , super , super creamy and we haven't put the in yet .

Can you just see how creamy it is , please .

You need to do coming over here and do a very close up .

I want you to see how creamy this is .

Do a super close up .

No shrinks .

See , we don't have any shrinks which is important .

The cheese is melting beautifully and that's what you guys want .

This is how you wanna make the mac and cheese .

Look at that .

This is perfect just the way it is .

Now guys , this movement is gonna help to combine the pasta even more .

So you basically wanna shake like this and this is gonna help to get a creamier , OK ?

It's just the way it is by doing this .

You make the pasta a lot , a lot creamier and it's actually easy .

It's not hard .

OK ?

You just need to make the pasta , jump , jump , jump , jump , jump , jump , jump and look at , look at the result that you get , you know when you do that , see just because of the jumping technique , the pasta became creamier .

OK ?

And now it is where the magic begins .

OK ?

We have the pasta here .

She spread it , spread it everywhere .

Oh Wow .

Look at a piece of mozzarella .

We are going to add pecorino cheese now everywhere .

OK ?

A nice amount of pecorino .

The pecorino will make the pasta crunchy .

You know when you put it in the oven , the pecorino will make it crunchy .

You don't wanna miss this you can use if you .

And now is the moment for the provolone .

Provolone will go everywhere guys .

You can be generous with how much pro you wanna use .

OK ?

It's completely up to you macaroni and cheese .

It's all about cheese .

It is a rich dish .

It's gonna make you full in the old days .

This dish used to feed the family .

Ok .

Now it's gonna feed more than the family .

It's gonna feed your street everyone on your street because families are smaller .

They're not as big as they used to be , but you want this to be rich and here it is right now we are ready to bake it for 25 minutes at 100 and 80 °C .

Alright .

See you soon .

Babies have fun in the oven .

Make sure you melt right properly and become crunchy .

Wow .

Wow .

Wow .

Wow .

Wow .

Wow .

Wow .

The smell is sensational .

Thanks to the beautiful cheese .

I used .

Look at the crust .

Look at the provolone , look at the way it melted over there .

Look how fantastic it is guys .

It took me less than 25 minutes to become this brown .

Let me tell you .

So keep an eye on it .

Ok .

180 °C for about 2025 minutes and look what you get .

Look what you get .

This is sensational .

I can't wait to cut it and show you how creamy it is inside .

All right , the most important part has arrived .

Come on , let's cut them and let's see how it is inside .

Oh , Mac and cheese .

Done the Italian way .

Look at the cheese .

Look at the cheese over there .

I love cheesy .

I love cheesy .

Yes , baby .

You want to be eaten ?

Do you ?

Oh , look at this .

Hello , baby .

I love cheesy pasta .

Are you ready to be eaten ?

Hm .

I am ready for you .

I've got a soft and a crunchy piece in here .

Hm .

Super creamy .

Done with the right cheese .

I definitely didn't use orange cheddar and I will never use it .

Ok ?

You use the right cheese .

You get a beautiful , amazing flavor in your mouth .

Yum .

Now let's play this pasta .

I recommend you to use a nice dark plate .

So the cheese will stand out , you know .

And then we put the beautiful crunchy part on top and that's the mac and cheese guys .

That's some mac and cheese for you .

Look that beautiful .

Look at that .

And this is how we take uh pasta with cheese , macaroni and cheese back to Italy .

Oh Let's try it .

I already know it's gonna be sensational but I have to try it .

This is the best time of the video recipe .

Look at that .

Mm mm The the pecorino cream , the pro on top , the buffalo mozzarella guys .

These are the flavors that you want your belly to experience .

Mm There's no milky .

I can't taste the milk .

The milk only helps at the beginning to combine the ingredients .

It's sensational creamy , it's moist and crunchy at the same time .

So this is something I I happy to order at the restaurant .

If it's done the right way , you can call it Italian Mac and cheese .

You can call it authentic real mac and cheese .

But let me tell you , this is the only mac and cheese that you wanna have ?

Hm .

And be creative with Jesus .

Ok .

Hm .

Use any cheese that you want but the only cheese you don't wanna use is the orange cheddar .

Please don't do that guys .

I hope you enjoy it .

Thank you so much for watching this episode .

I'm gonna see you in the next Vincenzo plate video recipe .

Vincenzo plate .

I can't believe I'm eating macaroni and cheese .

Mm .