Mac and Cheese

There are few things my husband and I love more in the world than Mac and Cheese. Seriously. You would think we were toddlers with how we just adore the stuff. We used to eat the Kraft boxed kind, which, I won't knock too much because let's face it, it's easy, quick, and not horribly gross. But, I will say, there are few things better then good homemade macaroni and cheese. And now that I have found an easy, delicious recipe, the blue box has been kicked out of our house!

I used to make a recipe that Rob found a few years ago when he lived with roommates. I sort of adapted it overtime and it was always "alright" but not perfect...but it was filling and relatively cheap and easy so it stuck around. Then, I found a new recipe. It was by Rachael Ray, who I usually love, although not always. But this time, she won me over. Now, note that this isn't just mac and cheese, it's a complete meal because she adds broccoli and chicken. But if you want to do it without, you can easily just not add those things in. So first, I will post her original recipe and the link...then we can go on to how to make this your own!

Rachael Ray's "Mac and Cheddar Cheese with Chicken and Broccoli" (Link)

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, 2 turns of the pan
• 1 pound chicken breast tenders, chopped
• Salt and pepper
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 pound macaroni elbows or cavatapi corkscrew shaped pasta twists
• 2 1/2 cups raw broccoli florets, available packaged in produce department
• 3 tablespoons butter
• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 3 cups whole milk
• 1 cup chicken stock
• 3 cups yellow sharp Cheddar
• 1 tablespoon prepared Dijon mustard

Directions

Place a pot of water on to boil for macaroni.

Heat a medium pan over medium to medium high heat. Add extra-virgin olive oil and chicken and season with salt and pepper. Saute a couple of minutes then add onion and cook another 5 to 7 minutes until onions are tender and chicken is cooked through. Turn off heat and reserve.
To boiling pasta water, add pasta and salt to season the cooking water. Cook 5 minutes, then add broccoli and cook 3 minutes more or until pasta is cooked to al dente and florets are just tender.
While pasta cooks, heat a medium sauce pot over medium heat. Add butter and melt, then add flour, cayenne and paprika and whisk together over heat until roux bubbles then cook a minute more. Whisk in milk and stock and raise heat a little to bring sauce to a quick boil. Simmer sauce to thicken about 5 minutes.
Drain macaroni or pasta and broccoli florets. Add back to pot and add chicken to the pasta and broccoli.
Add cheese to milk sauce and stir to melt it in, about a minute or so. Stir in mustard and season sauce with salt and pepper. Pour sauce over chicken and broccoli and cooked pasta and stir to combine. Adjust seasonings, transfer to a large serving platter and serve.

 Notes: I usually use a bit more cheese then her recipe calls for since I like mine extra creamy and cheesy. It also makes the sauce a bit thicker, which I like. We also mix up the cheeses according to what we have on hand, but our favs are the sharp cheddar with some colby jack. Oh and one last note, she says whole milk, but I have used 2% no problem. My only suggestion is to make sure you aren't using low fat cheese since the consistency is a little different and it doesn't melt as smoothly. If I happen to have low fat cheese, I will use mostly regular and then just supplement with a little low fat (like 2 cups regular, 1 cup low fat, or some similar fraction of cheese ratio).

Super easy peasy right? And do you want to know a trick to make it even easier? Either used leftover chicken from a previous night, or buy those precooked chicken pieces from your local grocery and just throw it in. It makes it even faster and easier.

Now...to change this up is super simple. You can use a variety of cheeses. You can basically take the chicken and replace it with a ground meat (or sliced/cubed but you will probably want to stick with white meat if you are going the sliced or diced route since the texture will match better) and any vegetable. Some of the combos I have made are with ground beef and broccoli and ground beef and frozen spinach. Both have been super simple and really yummy. I just browned the beef first and defrosted the spinach then added it in as the directions stated. This is one recipe that is fantastic for using up what's around! Try it out and tell me what your fav combos are! I would love to hear what worked for you!