It’s no secret that I love pasta or that I also love cheese. One of the best combinations of these two is macaroni and cheese. There’s a few different types including oven baked, stovetop, homemade, store bought and this post is the beginning of my journey to find out which one I like best – because I do like them all.
Evaluation Criteria
I will be evaluating mainly by taste. Some other factors coming into play will be consistency (can I easily make this the same way over and over again?), scalability (can I make enough to have leftovers if I want them?), convenience (are the ingredients likely to be on hand? is the preparation complex or time consuming? are there many dishes to clean?), mixability (not a word I know, but can I easily mix this with a vegetable or protein and really make it a meal?), leftover appeal (how good is it after a few days in the fridge?).
Todays Contenders:
For this first matchup we have the tried and true blue box Kraft Macaroni and Cheese Original Flavor:
I’ve probably made close to 5000 boxes of this stuff, it was a staple in high school and college and I’ve adjusted the recipe from the box a bit to my liking. I add 2tbsp of butter, 1.5-2 slices of american or cheddar cheese and enough milk to mix it well. Against this staple of my diet, the single meal I’ve probably made the most, I’m pitting seriouseats.com’s http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2017/01/3-ingredient-stovetop-mac-and-cheese-recipe.html), touted as just as convenient as the blue box and more tasty. I’ve never made this version before so it’s already coming in at a big disadvantage, but we have to start somewhere.
Preparation
For Kraft, I boil water in a pot, add the pasta and cook until done.
Then I drain the pasta and return the pot to the stove adding 2tbps of butter and a bit of milk and stir for a few seconds.
Next I add some cheese and the pasta and top with the cheese mix.
I then mix this well and if it’s too thick add more milk.
Again, I’ve made this many many times, and many different ways – according to the directions on the box, experimenting with adding more cheese, different kinds of cheeses, adding different spices (there were a few months in college where I would add Mrs. Dash to it), I’ve made it with just water when I didn’t have milk or butter on hand, I’ve even worn out pots making this – again in college I didn’t realize all those black specs weren’t just Mrs. Dash until I started making it without adding the spices and still got black flecks of what turned out to be part of the pot. So I’ll say this – and it might be the many iterations I’ve made it but – it’s really easy to make Kraft.
The 3-Ingredient seems simple enough, using equal amounts by weight of pasta, evaporated milk and cheese. I used a pound of each (well sort of – more on that later). The first step is to just cover the pasta in cold water and bring to a boil.
This small amount of water is to really get the starch out so the cheese melts well. We don’t actually drain the pasta at all. And you can see the starch coming out of the pasta as the water gets cloudy:
While this is boiling you can grate your cheese:
But don’t forget to stir the pasta pretty frequently to prevent the pasta from sticking to the bottom because the water does get absorbed and evaporate.
When the pasta is just about done you add the evaporated milk.
Evaporated milk near me comes in 12 ounce cans and pasta comes in 16 ounce packages. This recipe calls for equal weights of each and to get an even amount using full packages you can make 3lbs of it or do what I did and use 12 ounces of evaporated milk and 4 ounces of water. Or you could have leftover uncooked pasta or unused evaporated milk – and I guess that’s an option but I only use evaporated milk for macaroni and cheese and really only cook pasta 1-lb at a time. Anyway, after the milk comes to a boil you add the cheese and stir until it melts:
You can also add more water if it is too thick (or like me you only used a 12 ounce can of evaporated milk):
The 3-Ingredient fulfills the promise of easy to make, even for a first timer.
Preparation Conclusions (Consistency, Scalability, Convenience):
Consistency: I think these are even in consistency. Kraft will always be Kraft and 3-Ingredient using a scale will also be the same each time you make it.
Scalability: 3-Ingredient takes the victory here. As long as the 3 ingredients are even by weight you can scale up or down as much as you want, make a pound and have leftovers, make a couple ounces and have one meal, whatever you want. For Kraft you’ll have to make it in increments of box size. And while I’ve found a box is a pretty decent meal for me, to make more if I’m especially hungry I’d have to double it.
Convenience: Kraft is the winner here. While the preparation of both are equally easy, take about the same time, and produce the same amount of dishes – for the 3-Ingredient you have to grate the cheese and monitor the pasta a little more while cooking. These factors alone might have to do a little with how many times I’ve made Kraft, but taking into account the ingredients Kraft becomes the clear winner, as I’ve said earlier I’ve made it with just water and enjoyed it. I don’t always have evaporated milk on hand, or even cheese for that matter, so I’m giving this category to Kraft.
Taste:
Compare those colors. Yikes, the Kraft is pretty orange. Lucky for me orange is probably my favorite color so it doesn’t bother me as much as it might for other people.
The Kraft tastes good, there’s a reason I’ve made it so many times, but with this I’ve also perfected the recipe to my tastes.
The 3-Ingredient is also very good, especially for a first time through.
The Kraft was a little more flavorful than the 3-Ingredient and also more gooey where the 3-Ingredient was creamier and almost too thin (a possible outcome of replacing 4 ounces evaporated milk with water, or not letting it rest a bit more because it did get thicker when resting a bit). The 3-Ingredient was also a little bit grainy/gritty. Not very much, but compared to the Kraft I noticed it and preferred the Kraft.
Second helping (about 10minutes after first) was about the same as the first with the 3-Ingredient becoming thicker and creamier, but I still preferred the Kraft.
Mixability:
I had these with broccoli and the clear winner was the 3-Ingredient. Kraft did not mix well with the broccoli and I’d rather eat them separate. The 3-Ingredient and broccoli complemented each other and I imagine this would be the case with any additions.
Leftover Appeal:
This picture demonstrates the scalability issue pretty well. I wanted left overs and barely had any of the Kraft but plenty of the 3-Ingredient. I’m weird that I like cold leftovers, and not just out of laziness, but I generally prefer leftover things like cold pizza or cold pasta to their warm counter parts so I didn’t bother warming these up.
The winner here is the 3-Ingredient, easily, it was still creamy, none of the grain/grittiness I tasted earlier was there and it still had a great flavor. Kraft on the other hand got dry and wasn’t creamy or gooey at all. Most of the flavor was gone and it was just not good.
Conclusions:
Like most comparisons there isn’t a clear winner, it isn’t black and white but depends on what I want to do with the meal. Do I want to make enough to have leftovers? Do I want to add broccoli? Am I just in it for a quick meal? While Kraft wins on taste and convenience, the 3-Ingredient wins on scalability, mixability, and leftover appeal.
However, for the purposes of crowning a winner, and focusing just on the macaroni cheese meal (not the side dishes to go with it or the leftovers or anything else), I choose Kraft.