Supper Club: The best mac and cheese recipes to make again and again

Dolly Alderton’s hangover mac and cheese

If you read Everything I Know About Love, then you’ll already be familiar with this recipe – it’s become a mainstay in my own culinary repertoire and can fix anything from a sore head to a fragile heart.

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 350g pasta – macaroni or penne works well
• 35g butter
• 35g plain flour
• 500ml whole milk
• 200g grated Cheddar cheese
• 100g grated Red Leicester cheese
• 100g grated Parmesan cheese
• 1 tbsp English mustard
• Bunch of spring onions, chopped
• Dash of Worcestershire sauce
• 1 small ball of mozzarella cheese, torn into pieces
• Salt and black pepper, to season
• Olive oil, to drizzle

Method

1. In a large pan of boiling water, cook the pasta for eight minutes, so it is slightly undercooked – it will continue to cook when you bake it. Drain and set aside, stirring olive oil through so it doesn’t stick together.
2. In a separate pan, melt the butter. Mix in the flour and keep cooking for a few minutes, stirring all the time until the mixture forms a roux paste. Whisk in the milk little by little, and cook over a low heat for ten to fifteen minutes. Keep stirring all the time and cook until you have a smooth and glossy sauce that gradually thickens.
3. Off the heat, add around three-quarters of the Cheddar, Red Leicester and Parmesan into the sauce, along with the mustard, some salt and pepper, the chopped onions and a dash of Worcestershire sauce, and keep stirring until all is melted.
4. Preheat the grill as high as it will go. Pour the pasta into the sauce and mix everything together in a baking dish, stir in the mozzarella, then sprinkle over the remaining Cheddar, Red Leicester and Parmesan. Grill (or place into a hot oven at 200°C for fifteen minutes), until the mixture is golden and bubbling with a crisp top.

This recipe was extracted from Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton.

Mob’s French Onion mac and cheese

French onion with mac and cheese? Consider me intrigued. According to Mob, this is “The greatest culinary pairing since PB & J” and with a crispy golden breadcrumb, caramelised onion and gruyère topping, they just might be onto something.

Serves 4

Ingredients

Method

1. Finely slice the onions. Get a frying pan over a medium heat. Melt a third of the butter in the pan. Add the onions with a good pinch of salt. Cook, stirring occasionally until completely collapsed, soft and caramelised. This will take around 30 minutes.
2. Once the onions are cooked, pour in the white wine and add the thyme, stripping the leaves from the stalks straight into the pan. Leave to bubble away by half then take the pan off the heat. The onions can be done in advance and kept in the fridge.
3. Cook the macaroni in a large pan of boiling salted water for 2 minutes less than packet instructions. Drain once ready.
4. Meanwhile make the cheese sauce. Melt the remaining butter in a large saucepan over a medium heat. Once melted add the flour, whisk to combine – this is your roux. Whisking constantly, slowly pour the cold milk into the flour mixture, adding a little at a time, in order to get a smooth sauce. Once all the milk has been added, bubble the sauce away for 5 minutes until thickened.
5. Grate in all the cheddar and half the gruyere cheese. Once the cheese has melted take the sauce off the heat, add the Dijon mustard and season with salt and pepper.
6. Add the cooked macaroni and caramelised onions into the cheese sauce, reserving a tablespoon of the onions. Mix well to combine, and then top with the remaining onions, a grating of gruyère and your breadcrumbs. Add a handful more thyme leaves.
7. Place under the grill until bubbling and golden brown. Remove from the oven and tuck in. Enjoy!

Note: Take your time making the white sauce, it will pay off!

This recipe appears on Mob.co.uk. Their subscriber platform is designed to give you more of what you love and costs just under €6 a month (I subscribed months ago and it’s SO worth it)