Skip to main content
Main

Macaroni, Boiled

Boiled macaroni cooked with milk, salt, butter, and topped with grated cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Macaroni, Boiled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Break up and wash the macaroni, then place it in a shallow basin and cover with cold water.

  2. Set the basin into another basin of warm water and place on the fire.

Cook

  1. After 15 minutes, add the milk and salt.

  2. Let it cook for 10 more minutes.

  3. Add the butter and cook for an additional 5 minutes.

Assemble and serve

  1. Carefully dish the macaroni without breaking it.

  2. Butter a shallow dish.

  3. Add the macaroni.

  4. Grate old cheese over it and 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. 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).

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

What each ingredient does

Macaroni
Forms the starchy body of the dish, softening and absorbing liquid as it cooks.
Milk
Cooks the pasta and forms a creamy, tender sauce around it.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, fatty mouthfeel.
Old cheese
Melts and browns on top, adding savoury flavour and a golden crust.

The step that matters

Adding the milk and keeping the heat gentle. Milk scorches and sticks when it is overheated, and the macaroni can turn gluey if the liquid boils hard. The warm water bath keeps the heat mild and even.

“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