Nathalie - the award-winning author of Mastering the Art of Southern Cooking and teacher who started one of the most prestigious cooking schools in the South in Atlanta in the 1970′s - was reminiscing about macaroni pie. I was talking with my longtime friend Nathalie Dupree of Charleston, SC, recently.
CUSTARD VS BECHAMEL MACARONI AND CHEESE MAC
Hoop cheese is what most Southerners used as they adapted this recipe into their own homes, getting a little bit closer to the mac and cheese of today. Then you added grated cheese and milk, and baked the mixture in a pie pan until browned and bubbly.īecause these recipes called for turning the mixture into a pie pan, they took on the name “macaroni pie.” The choice of cheese is vague, but historians believe Jefferson’s enslaved chef, as well as Mary Randolph, would have used either a hard Italian cheese like Parmesan or a softer, cheddar-like hoop cheese because that is what was available throughout the South. Macaroni was boiled in salted water, drained, and while still warm, stirred with butter and egg. It was a little like an Italian recipe for spaghetti carbonara, minus the carbonara. Rhett, Lettie Gay, Helen Woodward and Elizabeth Hamilton. Something called “macaroni pie” appeared in the 1976 cookbook, Two Hundred Years of Charleston Cooking, by Blanche S. Adding eggs would come later, when it evolved into a light supper dish. And Mary Randolph, who authored the Virginia House-Wife, cooked “macaroni” in milk and water before tossing it with cheese and butter. Thomas Jefferson popularized it because he served it at dinner parties. It is old.īack 200 years or more, the word “macaroni” was a generic term for pasta. It wasn’t first made with the curly, chubby macaroni noodle either. Sorry to disappoint, but mac and cheese did not originate on the back of a box. They were, essentially, broken and cooked spaghetti that was mixed with eggs, milk and cheese, all baked into a custard. Mac and cheese pleases everyone, and that goes way back to the original macaroni pie.Įarly versions of mac and cheese, like the recipe I’m sharing today, bear little resemblance to the side dish we know. It’s at home with fried chicken or barbecue, even on the Thanksgiving table. Mac and cheese just might be the most loved side dish in the South - right up there with mashed potatoes, pinto beans and cornbread.
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