Mac n Cheese and oh baby

 Hi everyone 

I love cooking a smoky brisket accompanied by a creamy mac n cheese. I do tend to amp my pasta up so will be committing sacrilege for the traditionalists. But here you go:

• 2 cups of uncooked elbow or penne pasta
• 1 red or white onion diced
• 4 rashers of bacon or prosciutto diced
• ▢1/2 cup butter 
• ▢1/2 cup all purpose flour
• ▢1 1/2 cups cream
• ▢2 1/2 cups full fat milk
• ▢4 cups shredded medium sharp cheddar cheese 
• 2 cups shredded Gruyere cheese 
• ▢salt and pepper to taste
• ▢black pepper
• ▢1/4 tsp. smoked paprika
• Preheat oven to 180 degrees C and grease a big baking dish if you want or if lazy like me pull out a high sided oven proof fry pan :)  
• Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.  When boiling, add dried pasta and cook 1 minute less than the package directs for al dente.  Drain and drizzle with a little bit of olive oil to keep from sticking.
• While water is coming up to a boil, 
• - fry onion and bacon/prosciutto in a dash of butter in separate pan and then drain on a paper towel
• - shred cheeses and toss together to mix, then divide into three piles.  Approximately 3 cups for the sauce, 1 1/2 cups for the inner layer, and 1 1/2 cups for the topping.
• Melt butter in a large saucepan over med heat.  Sprinkle in flour and whisk to combine.  Mixture will look like very wet sand. Make sure you give it a good 1 minute at least to let the flour cook out otherwise thats all you will taste in the sauce. It's important to do that and stay and stir it otherwise the roux will burn and you will have to start again ..bc burnt roux will just mean burnt tasting sauce if you use it. 
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• Slowly pour in about 2 cups or so of the milk and cream, while whisking constantly, until smooth.  Slowly pour in the remaining milk and cream, while whisking constantly, until combined and smooth.

• Continue to heat over med heat, whisking often, until thickened to a very thick consistency.  It should almost be the consistency of a semi thinned out condensed soup.

• Remove from the heat and stir in spices, onion and bacon and 1 1/2 cups of the cheeses, stirring to melt and combine.  Taste and season
• In a bowl combine drained pasta with cheese sauce, stirring to combine fully.  
• Pour half of the pasta mixture into the prepared baking dish or back into the high sided frying pan if using.  Top with 1 1/2 cups of shredded cheeses, then top that with the remaining pasta mixture.
• Sprinkle the top with the last 1 1/2 cups of cheese and bake for 15 minutes, until cheesy is bubbly and lightly golden brown. 

                                                                

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