For anyone near NYC
There's a Belgian restaurant in my old neighborhood, on the Northeast corner of 20th and 1st Avenue called "La Petite Abeille"(the little honeycomb) that serves, among other goodies, the best damn macaroni and cheese I've ever eaten in a restaurant. All I can say is they used monster rigatoni, pieces of country ham, and a creamy cheese sauce flecked with nutmeg. Uncommonly good!!! That they serve the stuff in a big "cafe au lait" bowl just puts lustre on the lily. Great place.
For home cooking, I've found that using real cheese is great for taste but not for texture, unfortunately nothing beats Velveeta for that, heresy though it may be. My Mother-surrogate, Ola Mae Gravett used to make the best mac and cheese; her's was oven baked and had eggs in the mix so it came out a little like a cheesy custard.
I've been researching mac and cheese for a long time and it appears that this most American of dishes was probably brought over here by Thomas Jefferson who loved Italian food and served it to guests at Monticello. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if our Mac 'n' Cheese wasn't a decendant of my other favorite pasta dish, Spaghetti Carbonara(an incredibly simple dish that is incredibly difficult to prepare correctly; I've had it badly prepared even in Rome{where I've also had stellar versions of it}).
Ken's Carbonara:
(Serves One)
1 lb. Plain Old Spaghetti(don't mess with this)
Big pot of salted water for boiling
4 of the freshest eggs you can procure
8 rashers of the best bacon you can afford(or guanciale,if you're a fancy-pants)
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper(I'm not kidding)
1 medium sized yellow onion, minced(optional)
4 ounces Pecorino Romano cheese, grated
Small bunch fresh parsley, chopped fine(optional)
1. Cook the bacon until slightly crisp. Remove from pan with slotted spoon leaving most of the fat in pan. Reserve bacon.
2. Cook onion in pan over slow heat until translucent and soft, about 10 minutes. Start pasta water NOW and lower heat on onion to allow them to "melt" into fat.
3. Have all ingredients prepared and ready while water heats. Crack eggs and beat them slightly.
4. When water boils, add spaghetti and stir to make sure strands don't stick together. Expect pasta to be done in 9 minutes.
5. While pasta cooks, "temper" eggs with hot onion and/or fat : beat eggs lightly while slowly pouring onions and/or fat into them. Add pepper; set aside.
6. When pasta is done, drain quickly and immediately throw back into pot so a little of the cooking water goes with it. Stir pasta for about 30 seconds so egg/onion mixture doesn't "seize" as soon as it hits the hot pasta. Add eggs/onion mixture and stir like crazy for a couple of seconds so pasta is coated evenly and egg mixture just barely "par" cooks to create a loose custard sauce around the strands (in my opinion it's better to err on the undercooked side than overcooked--if you're eating Carbonara you are not concerned with salmonella).
7.Throw in bacon, parsley and 1/2 of the cheese and toss.
8.Serve IMMEDIATELY in heated pasta dishes with the rest of the cheese.If you're a hedonist like me, you can use 1/2 Pecornio and 1/2 Parmiggiano or Grana Padano.
