Adventures in Mac & Cheese

FYI to NYC runners! Registration for the NYRR races through June is now open and the homepage says the Brooklyn Half is nearing capacity and they expect it to close today. So if you're planning to run it, go sign up HERE!

Alright, so I did it. Sunday I tried my hand at making Mark Bittman's mac & cheese recipe that's in the March issue of Runner's World. I've loved mac & cheese ever since I was mixing the Kraft stuff with my green peas at my parents kitchen table when I was like 5 years old. Now that I'm more conscious of what I eat and I understand how bad the stuff is for me, I have hardly had a bite of it in more years than I can count. So when I saw Mark Bittman's healthier version in Runner's World, I knew I had to try it out.

A few things were working against me, so my optimism levels were pretty low as it baked:

1. I've never made mac & cheese from scratch
2. We have a 3 cup food processor
3. It turns out I'm bad at reading recipes (especially when written in paragraph form)
4. Apparently when the oven light is turned on, the temperature decreases by 25'

The recipe isn't on the website yet, but it should be once the next issue of RW is out on newstands. But, I bet a lot of you already have this recipe sitting on your desk or night stand anyway!

I will tell you a few things:

• I didn't use bay leaves in the veggie stock
• It seemed like there was a lot of sauce, so I didn't use all of it (and I'm glad I made that decision)
• Since I'm still not super experienced as a cook, I was a little confused by the "8oz whole wheat elbow pasta". I started by measuring out a cup of pasta and realized it could not be enough. So I measured out another cup, which was about half the bag, so that made a little more sense.

A few pictures from this adventure.

the base of the sauce is cauliflower

Our little food processor couldn't do the job,
so it was up to the blender

With homemade bread crumbs and grated Parmesan on top,
it's (finally) ready for the oven

Hot out of the oven!

Yes, I look exhausted, but it's done!

The mac & cheese set, was cooked through and was piping hot. You have to understand going into this, that this is not a super cheesy mac & cheese. The base of the sauce is cauliflower, so if you only love mac & cheese if it's made with a lb of cheese, this won't be for you. I did think that the pasta/sauce ratio was a little off, but overall it turned out really well and I'm proud of my first attempt at making this dish. Next time I'll be more sure about the amount of pasta, maybe add a little more and probably use a little less cauliflower. Oh, and I might add the bay leaves in too. But, I know it was a success because Woody asked if he could take some of the leftovers to work tomorrow for lunch! That reminds me. The recipe says it makes four servings, but we had this for dinner and now we're both on our second (and last) day of taking leftovers to work for lunch. So somehow I ended up with quite a bit more, or it makes really big servings.

If you don't know Mark Bittman, check out his website HERE and his RW blog HERE.

• Are you a mac & cheese lover?
• Does it remind you of childhood memories?
• Do recipes written in paragraph form throw you off too?

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Today's workout -
45min elliptical
100 crunches
2x40sec plank
3x10 leg press
3x10 upright row
3x10 hammer curl/squat combo
stretching
Tonight's workout -
heading back to Zumba!