One-Pan Mac 'n' Cheese For The Person Who HATES Washing Up

And also: where the hell have I been?!

Hello hello!

Another week, another recipe where the main focus apart from deliciousness is keeping the washing up to a bare minimum. As I have wanged on endlessly about, I am allergic to recipes that call for a million pots and pans and bowls. Unfortunately it doesn’t stop me from loving the dishes that demand a rake of pots. Lasagne, mac ‘n’ cheese and anything that involves a mashed potato topping are all things that I love more dearly than my children and yet can rarely bring myself to make. However the Magic One-Pot Pasta of a couple of weeks ago inspired me to give a one-pan Mac ‘n’ Cheese a go and my god, it was a sensation.

I’m a fan of a real classic mac ‘n’ cheese, so this is a very basic version but you could take it in a million more jazzed up directions: stir baby spinach, sun-dried tomatoes and crispy pancetta through it. Or how about chicken and broccoli? ‘Nduja and maple-roasted butternut squash… I could go on!

So now on to where the hell was I last week? In a nutshell, I was mildly panicking under a pile of deadlines! Not to mention a pile of children due to the 900-years long Easter Holidays! So last Sunday, I decided to pause payments to give myself a little moment to breathe and get my ducks in a row. April is shaping up to be a very busy month in terms of delivering work to my various long-suffering and wonderful collaborators and so to help me through this deadline quagmire, I’m going to keep payments paused for a little while longer – so paid subscribers won’t be charged and I won’t be keeping to my usual posting schedule. I do still want to share pieces of work through the pause time but as I said I will suspend all payments as it won’t be super organised and regular. I will still be doing the weekly Magic Writing Hour for all paid subscribers because I love us getting together to work and chat and generally feel less alone on this often, let’s face it, very fraught path!

I sincerely hope you’ll bear with me while I’m flailing around with deadlines over here and I will still be appearing in your inbox as and when I can ;)

And so on to the recipe. As you’ll see in the pictures, I used quite a wide steel pan about 25cm across and 5cm deep. This pan of mine isn’t particularly for oven use but I just wrapped the handle (it has a rubber covering) in tinfoil and shoved it in the oven anyway with no disastrous outcomes. A fully cast iron pan is, of course, perfect and if all comes to all, you can do all the steps up until the oven part in one pot and then transfer to an oven-friendly dish – though, if we’re being pedantic this does slightly negate the ‘one-pan wonder’ element.

One-Pan Mac ‘n’ Cheese

Serves 4 (with a side salad to round out the meal)

Ingredients

2 tbsps butter

3 tbsps flour

1 1/2 cups milk (full fat please!)

1 cup water

1/2 tsp salt

125g (dried weight) macaroni

100g cheddar, grated

3 tbsp panko breadcrumbs

20g parmesan, grated

Preheat the oven to 180°FAN. First we’re going to make the roux for the white sauce. Place your pan over a low to medium heat and melt the butter.

Then add in the flour and combine with a wooden spoon.

It’ll look crap, like a kind of sandy paste – fear not, this is normal. Stir over the heat for about one minute then add half the milk and using a whisk incorporate the roux into the milk.

Again this will look slightly shit initially – persevere! Once this is mixed in and thickened slightly, add the rest of the milk continuing to whisk.

Next add the water and the salt and turn the heat up to a medium. Keep whisking for a further two to three minutes until it is steaming and starting to coat the sides of the pan. Make sure as you are whisking that the sauce is not sticking to the bottom of the pan. Add the macaroni (btw I can’t vouch for this recipe using any alternative pasta shell but I imagine a bigger pasta shell like penne or fusilli wouldn’t work as they have a slightly longer cooking time). Stir the pasta in and continue to cook over a medium heat for about another minute, then cover and place the pan in the oven. After about 12 minutes or until the pasta is just cooked (it will continue to cook from the residual heat) pull the pan out and remove the lid (carefully! It will be steaming).

It might still seem a bit too saucy at this point but keep the faith. Add the cheddar cheese and stir through to melt, this will help the sauce to thicken. Lastly sprinkle the parmesan and panko over the top and return to the oven for a few minutes uncovered to brown it. If you can be bothered (I wasn’t!) you can also use the grill for this step. Serve with a salad while wearing stretchy pants.