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Creamed Macaroni and Cheese

A baked macaroni dish with a butter‑flour‑milk cheese sauce and breadcrumb topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Creamed Macaroni and Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Cook the macaroni

  1. Cook the macaroni in salted water until tender, then drain and rinse with cold water.

  2. Place the macaroni in a shallow dish.

Make the cheese sauce

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter, then stir in the flour to make a roux.

  2. Gradually add the hot milk, stirring until thickened.

  3. Remove from heat and stir in the grated cheese until melted.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the cheese sauce over the macaroni and sprinkle with breadcrumbs.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until the top is brown.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Milk + cheesetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,426 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Macaroni
Forms the bulk and body of the dish, holding the sauce in place.
Butter
Adds richness and flavour, and forms the base of the roux.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce when cooked in the butter.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, giving it a creamy texture.
Grated cheese
Adds flavour and richness and helps the sauce turn smooth and creamy.

The step that matters

Gradually add the hot milk, stirring until thickened. Adding the milk slowly while stirring lets the starch in the flour swell evenly. Adding it all at once can leave lumps that are hard to smooth out.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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