Southern Style Mac n CheeCheese

Mac n Cheese

The weather forecast said that today will be a rainy day and a rainy day it is. I just love rainy days. Back where I come from, it practically rained almost every day. I would sit out on my porch with my cup of hot coffee and watch the rain..Yes just watch the rain and I kinda remember doing this since I was little. Yes and it also means that I am sitting out in the porch with my coffee almost every day. Well I am a coffee lover and I love the rain so..don't think that I can complain much and also please dont be judgemental,  I just spend a couple of minutes out watching the rain otherwise it wouldn't in be a waste of productive time just sitting out there drinking coffee and waiting until the rains stops (and it takes a like 1, 2 , 3 hours for the rain to stop).

Well here where I live now you can count the days where it rained. It is usually a drizzle which they call rain here and it sometimes lasts for 5-10 minutes. But today it was a good downpour in the morning. It wasn't too cold but the boys had to wear the puffer jackets and caps which they didn't like at all. For me there was no complains at all, although my jeans was wet to my knee and my shoes were soaking wet. OK I wasn't wearing any rain boots simply because I didn't get one. Can you blame me when you just get rain like a few days in a year and just 1 or 2 days of heavy rain.

Anyways since I was enjoying the rain and the cool weather I thought that the boys might enjoy some hot lunch today. Something that both of them would like, like mac and cheese but it wasn't going to be something out of a box. So I drove down to Albertsons to get the stuff that I needed for the mac and cheese despite the pouring rain and my drenched jeans and shoes and fix the meal before I went back to volunteer at my youngest's class at 10.30am. The mac and cheese turned out great, I couldn't taste it since I was on a fast so I need to wait for my kids to get back home to tell me how it tasted. I need to shoot off in the next 15 minutes to deliver my other sons lunch. The mac and cheese is still warm in the oven and I think he will like it although this lunch is way of his wrestling diet (he is doing wrestling this semester). I just feel sad that my daughter can't enjoy the food that I cook, especially mac and cheese which is also her favorite. Cant wait for her to come back home for the Christmas holidays and I can cook all her favorite food for her. I miss you a lot baby.

Mac n Cheese before going into the oven

Just out of the hot oven..Mmmm smells really good

Ingredients

1 cup of uncooked elbow macaroni (I used the small sized elbow macaroni)
2 cups of 2% milk
1 large egg
1 tablespoon of all purpose flour
1 tablespoon of butter melted
2 teaspoons + 1/2 teaspoon of kosher salt
1/4 tsp of thyme, crushed
1/4 teaspoon of oregano,crushed
1/4 tsp of paprika
1/2 teaspoon of black pepper powder
1 cup of shredded jack or pepper jack cheese(I used the latter)
1 cup of sharp cheddar cheese
1 cup of mexican shredded four cheeses

Direction

1. Preheat the oven to 350F or 180C.
2. Cook elbow macaroni as per package instructions until al-dente
3. Drain the cooked macaroni and rinse in cold water.
4. While the macaroni is cooking beat the egg and mix it with the milk and strain the mixture.
5. Next add the melted butter, 1/2 teaspoon of salt, paprika, pepper , thyme and oregano and mix well.
6. Add in the drained macaroni into the milk, egg and cheese mixture and mix well.
7. Grease a casserole dish and pour the macaroni mixture in. Mixture will look quite runny.
8. Top up the macaroni with the shredded mexican cheese, sprinkle a little bit of paprika and ground pepper and bake it in the oven for about 40 minutes. Leave to cool for around 10 minutes before serving.