GOURMET MAC AND CHEESE

Macaroni and cheese is the ultimate comfort food. As you might expect, mac and cheese traces its roots to Italy, home of many culinary delights. The Liber de Coquina, or Book of Cooking, an Italian cookbook from the 13th century, includes a recipe called de lasanis that foodie historians believe is the first macaroni and cheese recipe. The recipe calls for sheet pasta cut into 50-millimeter squares, cooked in water and tossed with grated cheese, likely Parmesan. From that time, macaroni and cheese grew in popularity across Europe. In colonial America, casserole dishes similar to today's mac and cheese were served at New England church suppers, where they probably originated from recipes, passed along from English relatives. The dish was primarily reserved for the upper classes until the Industrial Revolution made pasta production easier. Historians have often credited Thomas Jefferson with introducing macaroni and cheese to the United States. That probably isn't true, but he did help make it popular. He dined on the dish during his time in Italy and loved it so much that he brought a pasta maker back with him to the U.S. and served the dish at the White House in 1802.

Serves 6
30 minutes
489 kcal per serving


Ingredients

• 500 g macaroni
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• Olive oil
• 1 smal bunch fresh oregano, leaves picked
• 75 g Parmesan cheese, grated, plus a little extra for grating
• 75 g Emmenthal or Gruyère cheese, roughly chopped
• 75 g mascarpone cheese
• 1/4 nutmeg, grated
• 1 small ball buffalo mozzarella cheese

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 200 °C.
2. Cook the macaroni in a pan of salted boiling water 2 minutes short of the timing on the packet instructions.
3. Drain in a colander and reserve a little of the cooking water.
4. Heat a little bit of olive oil in a frying pan, add the oregano and fry for a minute until it starts to crisp up, then turn off the heat.
5. Add it to your cooked pasta, along with a couple of spoonfuls of the reserved cooking water and the Parmesan, Emmenthal or Gruyère and mascarpone.
6. Toss and stir around until most of the cheese has melted and you have a gooey sauce. You may need to add a little more of the reserved cooking water.
7. Season to taste, then tip it all into an ovenproof dish.
8. Grate over the nutmeg, tear over the mozzarella and sprinkle over the extra Parmesan.
9. Bake the macaroni cheese in the preheated oven for about 10 minutes, until golden brown and crispy on top.