macaroni and cheese

There's got to be a hundred ways to do this. This is my way.

pasta	sauce

Cheeses used for topping and for assemblage

topping	assemblage

The pasta dough needs to be exceedingly dry and stiff to work well in the extruding machine. Much dryer than if you were rolling it out because that machine really crams it through the little holes. The dough was corrected with additional flour to make it crumbly. You stand there with a knife at the the Bosch mixer on its side and whack off the pastas as they're extruded before they get too long. You have to feed the machine with crumbly dough and judge each whack depending on how fast they're extruding. It's fun. You can turn it up to fast. Reminds me of kindergarden Play Doh Spaghetti Factory except this time I have a knife. The end pasta is not dried so it cannot be al dente, which I'd actually prefer. I did not boil it in advance of baking and it would absorb more liquid so I made the sauce thinner than regular sauce. I was going for a sort of soupy dish, but it stiffened more than I anticipated. Holdovers can be warmed with yet more milk or cream to correct that without sacrificing flavor. I'll give it that -- it's very flavorful. Probably not kid-friendly.

Oatmeal included in the topping was an afterthought. Seemed like a good idea. I like it. Coated the dish with the topping. Now, where do you ever see that, huh? Nowhere, that's where. I got that idea from soufflés. It's purpose in a soufflé is to give the mixture a surface to cling to and crawl up, but it also makes a tasty crust.

You'll notice butter in both the topping and the sauce. Of course not a whole stick in both, but rather, just a nob. I'm showing the word "butter."

Cheese in the topping and the assemblage. That's what gives the topping a nice crunch.

Assemblage: It occurs to me now the photos are not clear. Layered, like a lasagna. The alternative is to mix it all in the pot of sauce and pour it into the dish. Either way seems fine.

That little triangle of cheese is something something something or other soft cheese I nabbed from the imported cheese section at the local grocer. They're trying to class up the place over there, but the store is in a section of town that generally would rather just have their bean burritos. I predict it won't last. I looked for something possibly mild and soft to counter the strong and hard cheeses I would be using. The black package is aged cheddar. The other is imported Parmigiano. Actually, they're all very good. Ricotta added directly to the sauce to lighten it up a bit. I could have added it all to the sauce but chose not too. My pasta is delicate because it was not dry that meant I had to be gentle with it so that it wouldn't all go to mush by excessive stirring.

At assemblage, the whole thing seemed a bit stiff. I doused it with additional cream and trusted it would filter down. Then sprinkled the topping.

As to the sauce; using two spoons, one for dipping and to transfer to a second spoon used for tasting, (as if anybody was around to be offended by double dipping) I sampled the sauce and it seemed to lack oomph. Added scant salt mindful the cheese to be layered later also contains salt, but even with that in mind it was still oomphless. I could taste the cayenne, but it lacked a rounding body that even the cheese would not fill, but still. Then I noticed the bottle of saki. * ding * Splashed some in. It worked magnificently. Now I ask you; who in the world adds saki to their mac and cheese? Nobody, that's who.

I'm kind of proud of myself for not going overboard with spices. I must be maturing or something.

In the end it's much easier to open a box and dump out a flavor packet. But where's the fun in that?