The Cold War years corrupted a lot: faith in democracy, trust in authority, and the prestige of chastity, just to name a few. But nothing in those glory years was so ignominiously backhanded to the waste bin of once-adorable-but-now-inconvenient notions as homemade macaroni and cheese. While we pondered the cosmos and the communists, the powder 'n carbs mix that passes under cloying appellations like "mac 'n cheez!" led the charge of "convenience foods" into grocery stores, supplanting from the American cultural memory the faintest recall of firm pasta accepting escort from crunchy bread crumbs and a fresh-made, well-seasoned cheese sauce. Instead, blue boxes and their electric orange contents carried the day for decades. Well, I, for one, say that's about damn long enough: tonight, we exorcise our Nixon-era ghosts with fresh macaroni and cheese from scratch.
The sauce is the only part of this recipe you even have to really pay attention to--other than eating it. Start with caramelized shallots, then deglaze with white wine and kill the heat after allowing the alcohol to burn off (a few seconds of bubbling). Allow to cool and add in some thick milk--preferably, one or a mix of vitamin D, half/half and/or cream. Turn the heat on med-low and bring the temp up as you add in grated cheeses. Tonight, I'm using a smoked mozzarella and aged Irish cheddar with just a bit of Parm. I find that smoked cheeses go wonderfully in sauces within limits, but that too much smokiness can weary the palate. As such, I'd suggest some more grounded co-cheeses as an accompaniment.
Allow the cheeses to melt into the milk on low- to medium-low heat while seasoning with pepper and lightly with salt (the cheeses already have quite a bit of salt in 'em), as well as a bit 'o balsamic. Stir frequently, if not constantly, so as to avoid burning. When you get small bubbles on top, the sauce has reached its maximum viscosity. For more thickness, add another iteration of cheeses. You'll of course want to taste frequently as the sauce develops. Finish with chopped fresh herbs--tonight we've got Sage--and, should you dare, chopped Serrano chili.
Combine the pasta and sauce while you still have a less than fully-thickened sauce since the whole deal will thicken quite a bit in the oven (more notes on sauciness follow). To distance myself from inheritance, I'm using Farfalle ("bow-tie") pasta tonight. Macaroni is of course great, but other pastas can go well, too, so feel free to experiment. Under cook 'em: they'll get the rest of the way done in the oven.
Combine the par-cooked pasta with the cheese sauce in some sort of oven-able dish. I usually go around the edge of the dish with a little bit of butter, providing the pasta with a well-lubricated exit strategy. Sprinkle panko (or bread crumbs, but keep in mind that store-bought panko is by far superior to store-bought bread crumbs) and finish with Parm so that you get some good browning on the top. Throw it under the broiler until the top is golden brown, or at least blond.
A word about the oven: the thin sauce will thicken up in the oven. When I've let the bread crumbs brown without much cheese on top, the sauce sometimes comes out quite thick, almost like a paste. None of the flavor is lost, of course, and the dish is still delicious, but if you really want lots of creamy sauce, I thought I'd share a few ideas. First, you can sprinkle lots of finely grated parm on top of the bread crumbs. The parm flakes will brown before the crumbs, saving some time in the oven (and therefore saving some creaminess in your sauce, too) while also producing a golden brown topping. Alternatively, you can reserve some of the sauce from the stovetop and either use it as a garnish over the browned crumbs or as a base on the plate atop which to affix the finished product. In either event, the arid effects of the broiler can be mitigated--although a drier macaroni and cheese is no penance.
Garnish with more herbs and serve--perhaps with a side salad.
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