I have been a follower of Chrissy Teigen on social media because of her old blog, the one where she shared a lot of her recipes. This was before she came out with her cookbooks. She still has a blog today but it is under the name of her brand, Cravings by Chrissy Teigen. Last year I decided to try her Mac and Cheese recipe from the cookbook that I found on Brown Eyed Baker.
Here is how I did it (with a few adjustments because of the availability of ingredients):
Breadcrumbs
8 slices white sandwich bread (torn into pieces)
6 cloves garlic (minced)
6 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 teaspoon kosher salt – [I used ordinary sea salt since we do not have kosher]
½ teaspoon black pepper
5 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
Pasta
1 pound pasta shells – [About half a kilo]
1 teaspoon olive oil
½ cup unsalted butter
5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
5 cups whole milk
12 ounces cheddar cheese (shredded (3 cups))
12 ounces Swiss or Gruyere cheese (shredded (3 cups))
12 ounces American cheese (diced small) – [For all three types of cheese, I substituted a three-cheese pack with the same combination that I found in the supermarket.]
2 teaspoons kosher salt – [Again, I used ordinary sea salt]
¼ teaspoon black pepper
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Grease a 9x13-inch baking dish with butter.
For the Breadcrumbs:
The instructions were to process the bread in a food processor until it formed fine crumbs. Our processor is teeny-tiny so we had to attempt to crumble the bread by hand before we could put it on our processor (one of those hand-held ones). It was quite the process to accomplish. The total crumbs should be around 4 cups.
After that, butter is heated in a skillet. Once it foamed, I added the garlic and cooked for a few minutes. Before the garlic could brown, I added the breadcrumbs, cooking by stirring and increasing the heat until the bread is toasty and brown. Add the salt and pepper and transfer to cool and add the Parmesan cheese.
For the Mac and Cheese:
Cook the pasta in salted boiling water until al dente. Drain and rinse then toss with olive oil.
For the cheese, heat butter in a large pan until melted, whisking as you cook. Add the flour until it turns a light brown and toasted color then gradually add the milk. Once the sauce boils, reduce the heat and cook until it thickens then you add the cheese, whisking until the sauce becomes smooth. Stir in the salt, pepper, and cayenne then add the pasta.
In the preheated pan, add the pasta then the breadcrumbs on top. Bake until the topping is crisp, and the cheese is bubbling.
I must admit, making concessions with the ingredients and not having the right equipment at home to make this may have affected the way that the Mac and Cheese tasted. Being Filipino, this is not the typical way that most of us enjoy this type of pasta. The whole breadcrumbs topping thing is new to us, so we were not sure of what to make of it when we were eating it.
It was not bad, considering that I made some changes with the cheese and with the number of ingredients -- I was feeding a family of 8, so I had to double everything to come up with a larger amount of pasta, which may not have been a good idea since I was trying this for the first time.
There are still a couple of recipes from Chrissy Teigen’s cookbook that I have tried that I have not blogged about, but I plan on sharing them here soon. Again, I made some changes to adapt to what I had on hand, but I still believe I did a good job, nevertheless.
Until next time, stay safe everyone!
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