Skip to main content
Main

Baked Macaroni

A baked macaroni dish with cheese sauce and crushed cracker topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Baked Macaroni

Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Baked Macaroni

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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the sauce

  1. Cook the macaroni according to package instructions until al dente.

  2. In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat.

  3. Stir in the flour and cook for 1 minute.

  4. Gradually add the milk, stirring constantly until thickened.

  5. Mix in the cheese and season with salt and pepper.

Bake and serve

  1. Combine the cooked macaroni with the cheese sauce.

  2. Transfer to a baking dish and top with crushed rolled crackers.

  3. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 20-25 minutes until golden 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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Milk + buttertop 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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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
Provides the bulk and starchy body that the sauce coats and holds together.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and forms the base of the roux with the flour.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce when cooked with the melted butter.
Milk
Forms the liquid of the sauce, which thickens as the starch in the flour swells.
Grated cheese
Adds savory flavor and creaminess to the sauce.

The step that matters

Gradually add the milk, stirring constantly until thickened. Adding milk slowly while stirring keeps the flour evenly dispersed, preventing lumps. Starch thickens the sauce as it heats, so stopping once it coats a spoon avoids a gluey or grainy result.

“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.

You might also like

Macaroni and CheeseMacaroni and Cheese102 recipesCheese MakingCheese Making50 recipesCheese FrittersCheese Fritters34 recipesCheese OmeletteCheese Omelette31 recipes