- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 4 tablespoons flour
- 1 ½ cups milk
- 3 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese
- ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- Salt to taste
- 1 pound elbow macaroni
Last year I surveyed parents to uncover their biggest challenges when it came to feeding their children. The usual suspects were on the list like time, money, skill and picky eaters in the house, but the questions that allowed parents to elaborate more put a spotlight around not having enough time and energy in today’s busy schedules to make a healthy meal at the end of the day.
That’s exactly why so many of us turn to convenience foods. In fact, that’s why convenience foods were developed over 50 years ago, when moms joined the work force and needed a quick and easy way to feed her family.
Around that same time, food manufacturers found new ways to add flavor and color to our food to make it more appealing (I guess real food wasn’t exciting), and discovered that high fructose corn syrup was not only a cheaper sweetener than real sugar, but it also extends the shelf life of convenience foods. How wonderful (for them).
Fast forward to today and we still need convenience, but we’ve also learned about the perils of these cheap food ingredients. The blue box of orange macaroni and cheese “dinner” is mighty tempting (cheap, quick and easy), and we know kids will love it, right?
Well, we did an experiment to see how convenient the processed macaroni and cheese “dinner” really is, compared to homemade macaroni and cheese.
Mac and Cheese Comparison
You might be surprised by the results.
First, let’s look at how long each took to prepare from turning on the water, to serving up, and how many portions each made. We’ll get to the recipe in a bit.
|
Time to Cook |
Servings |
|
| Homemade Mac & Cheese |
20 mins |
8 or more |
| Blue Box |
18 mins |
2 to 3 |
Then we did the taste test.
What a Decision To Make!
My four year old’s very favorite food is macaroni and cheese. It always has been and likely will be for the rest of her childhood.
Mac and Cheese Taste Test
She tasted both versions and loved the scratch-made macaroni and cheese. In fact, she kept gobbling it up and we actually had to cut her off eventually.
We Have a Winner!
HOMEADE MACARONI and CHEESE
Ready For The Recipe?
Ingredients
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
3 tablespoons butter
4 tablespoons flour
1 ½ cups milk
3 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
Salt to taste
1 pound elbow macaroni
Cook macaroni according to the package. You’ll want to bring it to an al dente place (definitely not mushy). Make your cheese sauce while the macaroni cooks.
Heat a good sized pot over medium heat. Add oil and butter. When butter melts into the oil, add flour and mix well. Gently whisk flour and butter together, until smooth and flour has had a chance to slightly brown, about 3 minutes.
Slowly add milk while continuing to whisk, making sure to get any lumps that form. Bring milk to a low boil while stirring frequently. Allow the milk to thicken slightly, then stir in 2 cups of shredded cheddar cheese, one handful at a time. Season sauce with nutmeg. Add salt to taste.
Add cooked pasta to sauce and coat completely by gently mixing both together. Serve and enjoy.
A couple options:
- Transfer the mix to a baking dish and top with extra cheese, or bread crumbs. Place under a broiler for a few minutes to lighly brown the top.
- Mix in veggies like peas or broccoli – your kids might be more likely to eat them mixed into their favorite dish, and the cheese sauce will make them tasty.
- If your child insists that macaroni and cheese must be orange, make this dish orange by boiling the macaroni with carrots, add saffron or turmeric to the cheese sauce, or use natural food dyes from your local Whole Foods or natural foods market.
Wondering about the price difference? The blue box cost $1.20 to make (the package, butter and milk) for 2 to 3 servings, while the homemade macaroni and cheese cost $5 to make over 8 large servings. Not that big of a difference when you consider the benefits of eating real food.
What’s missing? Yellow 5, Yellow 6, and a lot of sodium. Like anyone is going to miss that!
While there is an increasing amount of convenience foods that don’t use high fructose corn syrup, artificial flavors and food dyes, the least processed foods are better choices.
Give the homemade macaroni and cheese a try with your kids. Stick with it and they’ll forget about the bright orange stuff sooner than you think.
Note: Our recipe for Macaroni and Cheese is a hybrid of a few that we’ve used from mulitple sources. I wish I could share the sources with you, but it’s morphed so many times over the years (as I find a new recipe), that I really can’t. I’m grateful to all of those who’s inspired it, though.
Our kids need to eat, whether we're prepared to feed them or not. Some days it would be great if meals just created themselves, but let's get real. At Feed Our Families we'll share new ideas, recipes and inspiration to help make meals happen in your home. 
AWESOME! I just tried this (a different version) last week to see if I could infuse the food they like in a more nutricious way.
I’ll try this recipe!
Love it! It’s amazing how much more food you can make when you don’t have a tiny box to limit the number of servings
Same amount of effort – bigger benefit! Plus YOU are in the driver’s seat in terms of ingredients.
Thanks for the recipe! A variation we use at home is to sub non-fat sour cream for the milk and cut down on the oil or butter. It has to be easy on the sour, though.
Guess what I was already planning to make for Atticus tonight? I like to add slivers of black forest ham and chopped plum tomatoes (canned works).
For those that try our recipe, please let us know how your child likes it. Thanks everyone!
So many people don’t realize that it can be just as easy to make homemade dinners as the prepackaged kind. Thanks for this recipe!
I know, Maryea! It’s an easy assumption that packaged foods trumps homemade for convenience and that’s simply not always the case! That’s exactly why we did the experiment.
I am always on the hunt for a great mac and cheese! Thanks Gina, going to give this one a try this weekend!!
I did the taste test last night, and the homemade won hands down! The tasters were three generations, my son (5), husband, and FIL. Thanks for the recipe and the idea!
I’m thrilled to hear it, Beth. Great job!
Hi from The Lunch Tray! I’m going to share a link to this on the TLT Facebook page. It looks delicious and I love that you’ve also compared time and cost to show that there is no reason to resort to the blue box. – Bettina
Hi Bettina. Thanks for sharing the link. We often hear “I don’t have time to make mac and cheese from scratch” so we wanted to prove otherwise. And we did!
thankyou for the recipe!! I’ve always wanted to make homemade mac and cheese and this recipe was super easy!! At first, I burnt the flower.. but then I relized you have to cook everything on low!! It turned out delicious!! Thanks again!
I love your blog! Keep it real
I thought maybe mine didn’t turn out bc I used whole wheat flour & pasta and coconut milk. But maybe I just burnt it like Nina. I’ll try it again, next time on lower heat.