I’m calling for a mac and cheese revolution. For those sweltering Summer days when cranking up the oven means turning our kitchen into a sauna, or for those times when I don’t want to be a dishwasher, but still want to have a satisfying home cooked meal, I need a meal that can be cooked fairly quickly and efficiently. I know Todd and I aren’t the only ones who come home from a hectic work day and ask that one universal question “What are we going to cook for dinner?”
Enter the solution and what I call, my mac and cheese revolution: the One Pot, Stove Top, Creamy Macaroni and Cheese recipe.
It’s simple, clear, and considerate of everything we need in order to still eat well and prepare quickly, without compromising on quality and taste.
- One Pot - Yes, you read it correctly. All the raw macaroni is cooked in one pot, without a pre-boil step that most other stove top recipes require. There is no extra pot to pre-boil or wash. One pot means less dishes!
- Stove Stop- Stove top means NO oven! During our hot summer days, that last thing that I want is to turn on my oven and sweat even more just for a bowl of mac and cheese. The stove top method is a wonderful way of cooking the macaroni pasta, quickly and to your desired texture. I can control exactly how soft or al dente I want my macaroni to be. Sometimes, I find myself over baking my mac and cheese in the oven, which ultimately turn out like FLAT, MUSHY mac pasta. Does this happen to anyone?
- Creamy - This mac and cheese recipe is slowly cooked in milk and a little butter. The cheese is added in the end and it’s so creamy and amazing.
- Low (er) fat? Healthy? – Gosh darn it, if I mentioned those words with a mac and cheese recipe, it could be contradicting and ludicrous. But clearly, I take all things into consideration, fat and flavor included. How to cook “better” and still not compromise the flavor? This recipe works wonderfully with low fat milk and I find that using less cheese still makes this recipe delicious. Now I’m not saying that this recipe is the poster child of a heart healthy, low carb nor fat free lifestyle. I’m just sayin’ that this recipe can be made with less fat and calories and still taste great. I’m just sayin’.
- Flavor blasts with creative cheeses- Now that I’ve figured out how to cook it easily and still maintain great texture, now comes the best part—-great flavor! Have fun with this recipe and experiment with flavorful, cheeses that melt well. My favorite is using parmesan and asiago cheese because I can use less cheese and still have bold flavor. Every single bite is delicious.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m still a huge fan of oven baked mac and cheese because the warm, comforting, casserole bake can’t be compromised. The cheesy crusts are a show stopper too. But when I’m starving and the weather is scorching hot, the last thing I want to do is to blast that oven to 350 degrees. And No, we don’t have central air conditioning!
A generous serving of cheesy, starchy, creamy goodness is that bowl of comfort to satisfy the most challenging of days. Macaroni and cheese is medicine, one of those forms of food therapy that make me feel better. If I can figure out ways to feed my starch loving soul with a cooking friendly version of my beloved mac and cheese, then I’ve solved another of life’s dilemna’s. This stove top, one pot recipe is the answer.
Now it’s time for me to go and experiment with another batch using….. blue cheese?
happy mac and cheese times to you,
-diane
Print This RecipeOn Pot, Stove Top Macaroni & Cheese Recipe
The key to keeping this recipe creamy is to make sure the flame is low and to consistently stir the pot. The mac elbows need to be cooked slowly in the milk and any high heat will cause the milk to curl. Don’t leave the pot unattended.
Make sure you have both wet and dry measuring cups! Using the dry measuring cup to measure out the raw macaroni and wet cup for measuring out the liquid milk is crucial. There are volume differences between both dry and wet measuring cups. Read Here for more information.
Obviously with the stove top, there won’t be that cheesy crust that forms on top. But toppings of toasted bread crumbs or bacon should be a nice exchange.
2 cups large elbow Macaroni, uncooked (about 1/2 lb)
2 cups low fat Milk (about 16 oz)
if needed, additional 1/4 cup milk or water for final cooking
1 tablespoon Butter, for flavor ( I tried this recipe once without the butter and I didn’t notice any difference with the recipe. More heart healthy!)
1/2 teaspoon Mustard powder
1 teaspoon Salt, plus additional for final season later
generous dash of Nutmeg
1 cup Grated Cheese, any one or combination of ( jack, cheddar, swiss, mozzarella, gouda, parmesan*, asiago*, pecorino*) *Hard cheeses are best combined with a secondary, softer, better melting cheese.
additional toppings: bacon bits, bread crumbs, chopped parsley, diced tomatoes (optional)
black pepper to taste (optional)
1. Place raw elbow macaroni in colander and quickly rinse under water. Let drain.
2. In medium sauce pan (about 3.5 qt), add milk, raw elbow macaroni, salt, butter, mustard powder and nutmeg.
3. On medium heat, slowly bring milk/macaroni mixture to a simmer, stirring the macaroni frequently as it comes up to a simmer. This will separate macaroni and keep them from sticking together. DO NOT LEAVE THE STOVE! The milk mixture will come to a boil very quickly and leaving it unattended will leave a big mess on your stove stop.
4. Once mixture comes to a simmer, immediately turn down heat to LOW. Macaroni will slowly cook in the milk. Having your heat too high will evaporate the milk too quickly!
5. Continue to stir the mixture frequently so that macaroni will cook evenly and absorb milk evenly. If you don’t stir your mixture frequently, you will get a big clump of macaroni in the end! Stir, stir stir!
6. Cook for about 15-20 minutes or until milk has been fully absorbed. If macaroni is not cooked fully, add a little more milk or water to mixture ( in small amounts) until macaroni is fully cooked. This will take about another 5 minutes.
7. When milk has evaporated, stir in grated cheese of your choice. Stir the cheese evenly into the macaroni.
8. Turn off heat. Place lid on top of pan and cover for about 5 minutes. This rest period will allow macaroni to plump up and absorb any excess milk.
9. Take a final taste and add additional salt to taste. Before serving, stir one final time to mix everything together.
Serve immediately. Feeds about 3-4 people.
Toasted bread crumbs: I love toasted bread crumbs and it’s so easy to make. Just break up some old bread, heat it up on a skillet. Continue stirring until crumbs start to brown and become fragrant. Remove from heat and top off your macaroni and cheese!
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{ 40 comments… read them below or add one }
I definitively know what you mean about oven + summer = sauna. Because it was Sunday and I had time for myself, I finally made my first bread. I forgot that bread needs to bake in a VERY HOT oven! I’m just dying… lol
You were much more clever with the mac & cheese. I never made this dish, I actually thought it was cooked on the stove… See, it totally makes sense…
Hi Melanie- Yes, it does get too hot to bake mac and cheese in the summer! BTW- this dish IS cooked on the stove.
beautiful photo and very good recipe!
This is pure comfort food and joy in a plate. Bringing this recipe on my camping trip. We are going to camp in Washington State & Siuslaw Nat’l Forest in Oregon. This will be perfect after a day hiking or at the beach
Wow, no draining, that’s pretty awesome
I have a feeling the mustard and toasted bread crumbs (yum) make this extra-awesome. Do you think that by using a nonstick pot and leaving the bottom to scorch for a bit after cooking then flipping it over to the serving platter will kind of recreate the brown-y-bit? Hmm, I think a little experimentation on my part is in order (though I don’t wanna wreck my pot!).
Wow! Been reading for a while but this is my first comment – want to thank you for suddenly making my favorite food a summer time possibility! I pride myself on my baked mac and cheese (I use shredded jalapeno jack cheese with cheddar to give mine an extra kick!). I will definitely give this a try this week!
That looks fabulous! I’m all for any recipe that doesn’t require me to turn on the oven! Actually, my mom makes her mac and cheese kind of like this. We call it “risotto-style” pasta. She does it with rice too, and uses Parmesan, Romano and Asiago cheeses. Molto delicioso!
Oooh I am so excited to try this! I am still searching for that perfect stove-top mac and cheese recipe but this could be the end of that search!
Perfect!! After weeks of rain here in the UK, the weather has finally perked up – though I suspect it won’t last…I’m kinda hoping it won’t actually so that I can make this while my macaroni cheese hating other half is out playing football, and I can curl up on the sofa with a big bowl
Cheers!
This is great!! ONE pot!!! I will give this a try! Great pics!!!
Oh geez, here i was trying to loose those extra honeymoon pounds and you have to go and throw this gorgeous little number at us!
Oh, how fantastic! I also love the picture of the swirl in the breadcrumbs!
I love summer recipes like these. I made a grilled 3-eggplant caponata the other afternoon so that I wouldn’t have to heat up the kitchen. Can’t wait to try this one.
I think my stomach just made the biggest and loudest growl ever…This is going to be on tonight’s dinner plans! Yeah for no oven time….we are melting over here too!
Gosh I am hungry now…
This looks amazing; bookmarking it for sure! Would also be perfect for those days when just one more pot or pan would put me over the edge…
Great post! I love Mac & Cheese, and this looks absolutely AH-MAZING! Thanks for sharing!!!
tremendous. outstanding. if the torrent of drool cascading down my face is any indication, you have a winning dish on your hands here.
May I suggest an improvement for the crumbs? If you can get a package of panko (Japanese breadcrumbs), melt a tablespoon or so of butter in a frying pan. Spread a thin layer of crumbs in the melted butter, and stir and toast till lightly browned. Might work with regular breadcrumbs too, but I’ve never tried it. Yes, you have another pan to wash. But you also have buttered crumbs! I always do my crumbs like this even for oven-baked mac and cheese or (oh yum) tuna casserole. I’m gonna consider giving your cooking method a try.
Your recipe looks wonderful! I like the toasted breadcrumbs on top.
Hi! I’m the laziest cook on weekdays but I cooked this last night and it was so easy! It was perfectly creamy and I used a combination of parmesan and scamorza and man…thats a whole lotta flavor!
Oh wow, macaroni cooked in milk. I can only imagine how deliciously creamy that is (until next week, when I stop imagining and try it for myself).
Wonderful idea! Gosh you have saved me…my kitchen is already an oven, even without the oven on!
This is exactly the mac & cheese recipe I’ve been looking for! Believe it or not, I don’t like baked mac & cheese. I’m weird like that. I think it’s much more creamy if done on the stove-top and I like to see the actual separation of pasta instead of one large mass. Perfect, perfect, thank you!
This is Exactly the type of recipe I’ve been looking for this week – a real stove-top mac and cheese, not all those oven baked recipes. I never would have thought to boil the noodles in milk!
I am so going to make this!
WOW. I made this last night (with a combo of colby jack, goat cheese, and parm…low-fat milk, whole-wheat pasta) and it was incredible. SO CREAMY! I never knew low-fat milk and just a cup or so of cheese would result in such decadence. A true M&C revolution, just like you said. We ate it with steamed salmon and broccoli, and I made sure to save leftovers.
I’ll be posting some blog love for this, check out http://www.sustainablediet.blogspot.com for the post in the next day or two!
oh yum! this looks delish and love the one pot idea weather its summer or not! Definitely going to try this with gluten free macaroni pity its not even 10am I want it NOW!
Keep Cooking. The Gluten Free Scallywag.
well, the toasted bread crumbs are a must-add and those needs another pot… but i’m still very excited by this recipe
“high heat will cause the milk to curl.”
I think you mean “curdle.” As in, it makes curds, like cottage cheese.
Just made this last night. Super easy (no whisking and truly one pot!) and super cool bechamel/roux trick – instead of separately adding flour to a portion of milk, the starch that comes out of the pasta (that is normally drained away) thickens the milk. Another plus – no lumps! b/c no clumpy bits of flour were used. Super creamy cheesy dish w/ almost zero effort!
Also, skim milk works fine (all I had). Just used 2-3 Tbs butter, instead of just the 1 Tbs.
Looks like a great recipe, removes the extra step that Cook’s Illustrated’s stovetop M&C requires.
I found the secret to the creamiest possible Mac and Cheese. Aside from cheddar, Parmesano Reggiano & whatever other good cheese I have, I always add at least 8 oz of Kraft (or the store brand) Deli Deluxe American. It has to be the deluxe version that’s marked processed cheese food. There’s something in that cheese that gives the dish a super-smooth mouth feel. Also it melts easily and keeps the other cheeses from curdling, which is caused by overheating.
Thanks for the great recipes. Now to add Fish Sauce and see
FYI, works great with gluten free rice pasta, too. Didn’t even add the butter. Incredibly rich with just 2% milk and some good organic medium cheddar. Definitely a new weeknight staple!! Thanks!
Wow…now i am now starving! I love mac and cheese and have been craving it for weeks. Im going to try whole wheat pasta and ff 1/2 and 1/2 with no butter as a healthier twist….i’ll let you know how it comes out! Thanks for the great recipe!
Correction on the Amercian Cheese. It has to be marked Pasteurized Process American Cheese. Sorry for the incorrect post earlier.
I made this last night for a Pot Luck. It was really simple. I took my time bring it to a boil (about 20 min) and stired it ever 30 seconds but I still ended up with a decent amount of burned milk/pasta on the bottom. Maybe its because we have an electric strove top and the pot is like 20 years old? Ha.The pot is soaking right now. Either way it was sooo good. I did add butter but I added Truffle butter and it was hinting itsself in the background. So good!!! I will make again and again!
This was a brilliant method — just like making risotto, using the macaroni’s starch to thicken the liquid. Thanks for coming up with it! Mine turned out fabulous using fat free milk, just 1 T of light butter, and 2% cheese. I did wait too long before adding the cheese, I think, as it was too thick until I added a bit more milk to loosen it up. Next time I will check the pasta before the milk has completely evaporated. Thanks again!
Have to comment before the food coma sets in – made this for dinner tonight and am absolutely thrilled how it turned out. This may be the mac and cheese I’ve been waiting my whole life for.
Oh thank you, thank you! I have been searching for an easy creamy stop-top mac and cheese recipe that doesn’t have flour in it. This was awesome! I made it today.
If you care about the texture of your pasta(macaroni) boil your noodles first and make a cheese sauce using a rue or evaporated milk separately. But you will need TWO POTS. This gives you much more control over the firmness of your pasta. If you like a doughy texture go for this. I found it to be gloppy and mushy. The sauce ingredients are great on their own. Add boiled pasta to it.
I stumbled across your site while searching for a stovetop mac and cheese recipe, and I’m glad I did! You’re now added to my Reader.
As for the recipe, I was amazed to watch the noodles thicken up on the stove with just the milk. I added in some seasoned salt, pepper, nutmeg, paprika, and a dash of red pepper flakes, and stirred, stirred, stirred. No butter, because I ran out (how does that happen?!) 1c of cheddar, sprinkles of parm. Waited while it thickened, and ate. And was kind of disappointed, actually. Could be that it was mild cheddar (all I had on hand) and the parm was a bit much. Funky texture and not much flavor.
However, there’s a happy ending. This kind of defeats the purpose, but I decided to give it another chance by reheating it in the oven, topped with breadcrumbs, and… YUM. I’ve found my new mac and cheese recipe. Thank you!