Mac and cheese: An American comfort food

By Theresa Curry

Correspondent

It was a meal I'll never forget, that mid-'70s potluck supper in Lucy Barlow's backyard. We were in Sugar Hill, a Southside Virginia crossroads named for the white sand glinting in the rows between tobacco plants. I was there to meet my in-laws before bearing their first grandson.

"We'll fix the meat," they said. "You bring the vegetables."

When I showed up with a big bowl of broccoli and a platter of fresh leaf lettuce, I knew I'd woefully undershot the number of vegetables required for a farmhouse meal. What I didn't know was that I'd also misunderstood the definition of "vegetable."

"Where's the macaroni and cheese?" Lucy asked. "Where's the congealed salad?"

There were other standard side dishes, of course, more in line with my idea of vegetables. In the fall, my in-laws boiled cabbage and covered it with homemade relish. From June to October, they served green beans cooked all day with potatoes and fatback. But whatever the season, they had a crusty casserole of macaroni and cheese on the table, made with a generic and very orange cheese hacked from the giant wheel at the Sugar Hill store.

Everyone has a notion of what macaroni and cheese should taste like. Aunt Lucy loved the baked casserole that gets hard and brown in a hot oven, and she added buttered bread crumbs for extra crunch.

Cooks Illustrated recommends cooking macaroni and cheese entirely on the stove top, using one pan for the sauce and one for the pasta for a soft, creamy version that is also the method recommended in today's low-fat recipe provided by the American Society for Cancer Research.

Some cooks add eggs for a more puddinglike texture, and no one can explain why children prefer the lurid orange product that comes from a box. The humble, homey dish has been one of the best-loved American comfort foods since Thomas Jefferson first served it in the White House in 1802, but individual preferences make every version slightly different.

Norfolk cook Carma Basnight is famous for her macaroni and cheese at church suppers. She uses generous portions of three cheeses: sharp cheddar, mild cheddar and mozzarella. Every once in a while, she said, she offers to bring something else to gatherings at New Life Worship Center in Norfolk.

"They don't want to hear about it," she said. "I always end up bringing the macaroni and cheese."

Basnight has a couple of secrets. She cooks the cheese in with the white sauce and adds more before the cheese sauce and pasta mixture goes into the oven. She always adds eggs, and sprinkles in a little dry mustard and paprika for color and taste. Since she transports huge pans to her church, she's solved the dilemma of how to uncover the pan without tearing off the top layer of cheese. She bakes her covered dish in a foil pan large enough so the pasta and cheese stay well below the rim.

"That way, the foil I use to cover the top doesn't stick to the cheese," she said.

Lynnhaven Fish House Executive Chef John Chapman is also a big fan of this homey dish.

"At work, I may be using a silver spoon," he said, "but at home I make things like pot roasts and roast chicken. Macaroni and cheese is a huge favorite."

Like Basnight, Chapman uses three cheeses: Velveeta and either Swiss or smoked Gouda in the sauce; sharp cheddar in the crunchy topping. His casserole starts with a butter-flour roux, is enriched with cream, livened up a bit with a can of green chiles, and finished in the oven with bread crumbs as well as grated cheese on top.

You can still have a comforting portion if you're watching your fat and calorie intake, says Karen Collins, a dieti tian and nutrition advis er for the American Society for Cancer Research. She's reworked the dish, using low-fat milk and cheeses, fat-free sour cream and whole wheat pasta.

It's tricky to alter these comfort food dishes, Collins says, because we all have a different idea of what makes them comforting for us."

Collins decided the appeal of macaroni and cheese is probably the creamy texture, so she kept that in mind when she added the fat-free sour cream.

"You could also use fat-free yogurt," she said.

Collins' recipe also calls for some flavorful chopped vegetables, not only to replace some of the high calorie components, but to add vitamins and plant compounds. The whole wheat pasta does the same, she said, and also provides fiber, which helps stave off hunger.

Theresa Curry, flavor@pilotonline.com