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Maccaroni Cheese

A baked macaroni dish layered with Parmesan cheese and gravy, finished with melted butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Parmesan cheese and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,163 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Maccaroni 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.

Prepare the dish

  1. Boil the macaroni in salted water until tender.

  2. In a deep dish, layer the boiled macaroni and grated Parmesan cheese alternately.

  3. Moisten the layers with gravy.

Finish and serve

  1. Once the dish is full, pour melted butter over the top.

  2. Warm in the oven at 350°F (175°C) until heated through, then serve.

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. Parmesan cheese + buttertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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 structure of the dish, holding the layers together.
Grated parmesan cheese
Adds savory, salty flavor and melts into the layers to bind them.
Melted butter
Adds richness and fat, giving a smooth, savory finish on top.
Gravy
Adds moisture to the layers so the pasta does not dry out in the oven.

The step that matters

Warming in the oven until heated through. Heating too long can dry out the pasta and cause the butter and cheese to separate. Heating gently until just hot keeps the layers moist and creamy.

“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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