Macaroni and Cheese

I'm sitting here sipping my coffee, before both the kids are up and hubby's still snuggled in bed. I honestly cannot remember the last time that this has happened, between sleep deprivation, our daughter teething or our newborn waking up *ahead of schedule* I'm usually taking as much sleep as I can get. But today, my brother, sister and nephew are driving in for our son's dedication, so they should be arriving any minute now. So up I got, made my coffee and sat down for a little peace and quiet.

You may think it's odd that I'm thinking of Mac & Cheese so early in the morning, but since I've found a few noodles here in the couch from my daughters lunch yesterday I figured it's fitting to make this my Weekend Wrap topic for today.

My husband and I love macaroni and cheese. Whether it's Kraft out of the box, Velveeta with shells, or someones family recipe we usually devour as much as we possibly can. Well, I've never actually made my own macaroni and cheese, other than from the box of Kraft, but since my husband was really begging for it I decided to create my own.



I picked up some Velveeta cheese, plus had some feta cheese and cheddar cheese at home I planned to use as well. The secret to having creamy macaroni and cheese, no matter what other cheeses you add, is to use condensed milk in the recipe. It keeps everything from drying out. If you are backing your mac & cheese though and it begins to dry out, (after adding the condensed milk) you can pour a little bit of regular milk in while its in the oven.



The mac and cheese came out delicious and I look forward to experimenting a bit with other cheeses as well as some sort of topping....I'm thinking Ritz crackers...or something mixed with Italian herbs. Yum.

In case you'd like to take a whack at the mac & cheese, I did a huge no-no in my book and didn't write down my recipe (which is pretty much the whole motivation behind why I wrote my cookbook) but anyways. I cooked the noodles as directed. Then put in to a 9x13 inch casserole dish. Cut up a little less than a half a block of Velveeta, about a cup of feta cheese, probably a cup or so cheddar cheese, sprinkled in some Parmesan, added salt, pepper and garlic, and one can of condensed milk. Threw it in the oven at 350 until the cheese melted...about 30-45 minutes.

Next time I'll write down the recipe :)   

What are your guy's secrets to making creamy mac & cheese?