Comfort Food: Macaroni and Cheese

Macaroni and cheese. Blue boxes, skinny little tubes swimming in creamy orange sauce, or thick elbow macaroni in bubbling, yellow goo, steaming from the oven in a casserole dish. Everyone agrees that this classic is pure comfort. Calories don’t even enter the picture--there are just too many.   

In America, most sources credit Thomas Jefferson with bringing the dish to this side of the pond after having been enchanted by it in Europe. He bought a pasta maker and cheese from Italy, and his daughter made the dish at the White House. Jefferson even served it at a State dinner in 1802. The Italians were the first to record a recipe for pasta and Parmesan, though, in the 1300s. The English were writing their own cookbook about the same time which included a dish called “makerouns,” a lasagna-type casserole layering fresh pasta with cheese and butter.

In 1937, as the US reeled from the Great Depression, Kraft Foods introduced the iconic Kraft Cheese and Macaroni when a salesman came up with it as a way to sell more cheese. Eight million boxes at 19 cents each were sold that year, and even today, Kraft sells one million boxes per day. It retained its popularity during World War II when meat was in short supply and became a household staple after that.

Of course there are many, many variations on the mac and cheese theme. Cheddar is the number one cheese used, but combining two or more cheeses is common. Choose cheeses with some bite, like sharp Cheddar, Fontina, or Gruyere to increase the cheesy flavors, so they aren’t lost in the milky sauce.

Some people add bacon, ham, tuna, ground beef, vegetables, mushrooms or any number of spices and herbs to bump it up, as long as it’s gooey and hot and sticks to the ribs.

I’m a purist and like the regular cheesy sauce on macaroni, baked in the oven casserole. For these photos, I used a super easy, basic recipe from the New York Times (click here) that can be added to or adjusted with little or no effort.

Others go for the low-fat versions. Boo on that—this is comfort food for snow-shoveling, snow-shoeing, “feed a cold,” and coming-home-from-a-tough-day days. And if you’ve had a REALLY tough day, this link to an article by The Huffington Post will give you a recipe combining TWO comfort foods: the Mac and Cheese Grilled Cheese Sandwich. There are also recipes for mac and cheese pizza, mac and cheese stuffed peppers and mac and cheese stuffed meatball sandwiches.

Hope you’ve enjoyed the comfort food series. Check out the wine pairing for macaroni and cheese in this week’s “Wine Pick” on the Wine page. For the next two weeks, come back for a tribute to amore, foods and wines of love.  

Comfort Food: Grilled Cheese

It’s another comfort food classic, and I have memories of eating grilled cheese sandwiches (and tomato soup) after sledding on Cherry Hill. I still fix it for a quick dinner, but chefs have updated today’s grilled cheeses with gourmet ingredients, and some are even—dare I say it?—healthy.

As with meatloaf, cheese on bread has been around since at least Roman civilization, where it appeared in early cookbooks. Fast forward more than 1500 years, and the French were eating their classic comfort sandwich, Croque-monsieur, grilled (or baked) ham and cheese by 1910.

Two events in the early years of the 20th century shaped America’s version of bread and cheese. First, James L. Kraft launched his version of processed American cheese, which enabled mass production of a dairy product that stayed fresh longer. Second, Otto Frederick Rohwedder, of Iowa, invented and marketed the commercial bread slicer machine, stepping up production of mass produced white bread.

The Great Depression boosted the popularity of “toasted cheese” sandwiches, which, at the time, used only one slice of bread. Ration-conscious moms in World War II fed their children plenty of these, too. In the 1960s, the top slice of bread was added and became the sandwich familiar to us today. 

Nostalgic as it is, if the Kraft singles/Wonder Bread version isn’t your thing, you can revisit your culinary past without guilt using a couple of variations:

• Start with a whole grain or multi-grain bread for better nutrition and fiber. And butter the bread, not the pan.
• Truth be told, American cheese slices have little flavor. If you want flavor and orange color, use grated sharp Cheddar. Grown-up cheeses like Gruyere and Asiago will give your sandwich a tang, as will goat cheese. Bonus: more flavor means you can use less. In addition, goat cheese is naturally homogenized, has less fat and is often tolerated by the lactose-intolerant.
• Creamy cheeses like brie and soft cheeses like mozzarella or farm cheese melt easily to a gooey consistency. Brie usually has less sodium; part-skim mozzarella has less fat. But don’t use “fat free” cheese. It doesn’t melt, and it isn’t “real” cheese.
• Cover the sandwich while it’s cooking to melt the cheese faster, so the bread doesn’t burn; let the finished sandwich rest for a couple of minutes to cool and bring out the flavors.  
• Aside from cheese, the most popular toppings added to the sandwich in the United States are bacon, ham and tomato. The sky is the limit, though, with recipes listing everything from spinach to chocolate. Click here for a look at Martha Stewart's takes on this classic, but Google “grilled cheese + (a ingredient,) and you’ll probably find something to love. 

Speaking of love, the record for competitive scarfing of grilled cheese, was achieved in 2012 in Texas by a Japanese competitive eater—13 sandwiches in 60 seconds.

The most expensive grilled cheese was purchased on eBay in 2004. A Florida woman claimed she kept her sandwich on her nightstand for 10 years because she believed the face of the Blessed Virgin Mary Mother of God was on the bread. An online casino, GoldenPalace.com bought her sandwich for $28,000. For everyday fare, though, the most expensive grilled cheese is at a NYC restaurant, Serendipity 3. Chefs use the rare Caciocavallo Podolico cheese, bread made with Dom Perignon Champagne, truffle oil with gold flecks, and truffle butter on the grill, for $214.

Searching for the perfect grilled cheese? Here’s a link to help you match your soul with the sandwich.

Check the wine page to find out why a Bordeaux blend would be an excellent partner to grilled cheese. 

May 1--Time for Some Pecorino Romano

Pecorino Romano cheese is one of Italy’s oldest, feeding Roman soldiers 2,000 years ago and appearing in writings by Hippocrates and Pliny the Elder. Most of it is aged for 8 to 12 months and sold with a hard, flaky or grainy texture and a salty, sometimes smoky flavor that is used mainly as an addition to other dishes. But there is also a younger, softer version with a sweeter flavor used as a table cheese.

In other parts of the world, including Italy, May 1 is International Workers Day—like Labor Day in the US. In a celebration of spring, families traditionally take picnics of Pecorino Romano, fresh fava beans and a bottle of wine to the countryside on this day. Towns outside of Rome also host a sagra delle fave e pecorino—a local food festival (sagra) that, on May 1, features fava beans and Pecorino Romano. Pair this with Chianti Classico, Sangiovese or a white Orvieto.

Here are a few more facts about Pecorino Romano. Buon appetito!

• Pecorino cheese is made from 100 percent sheep’s (pecora) milk.
• But authentic Pecorino Romano is not just any sheep’s milk. As in the wine industry, some specialty foods receive Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) status. This Pecorino Romano milk must come from Lazio, Sardinia and Grosseto in southern Tuscany, and the cheese must be produced there as well.
• The aforementioned production of the cheese is the same as it was 2,000 years ago. Farmers drain and press the whey from the curds immediately after they’ve formed. The curds are heated and turned out into molds and pressed. The cheese is turned and rubbed with salt daily for the first few days, then every 3 to 4 days, then once a week for 3 to 5 months. The wheels are then aged on pine boards for 5 more months.
• Italy exports more than 20,000 tons of Pecorino Romano annually, 90 percent of it shipped to North America.
• The cheese is about 25 percent protein, one reason it was part of the soldiers’ rations. It’s also a good source of calcium, phosphorus, magnesium and potassium.
• Cheese products labeled "Romano" on store shelves are not the same as Pecorino Romano and have no connection with the real cheese.