For Father’s Day the kids got me Bobby Deen’s newest cookbook, From Mama’s Table to Mine. Little man was very excited when I opened it, and immediately asked what were were going to cook. Flipping though the pages a recipe for “healthy” mac and cheese caught my eye, and we decided it to make it as a side dish for dinner.
Ingredients:
4 cups whole grain elbow macaroni
2 tbs unsalted butter
2 tbs all purpose flour
2 cups skim milk
1 cup heated low fat cheddar cheese
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
2 oz low-fat cream cheese (Neufchâtel)
1/2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1/2 tsp dry mustard
Freshly ground pepper to taste
1. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook the elbow macaroni al dente. Drain well.
2. Put the empty pasta pot back on the stove over medium-high heat. Melt the butter then add the flour and whisk. Slowly add the milk and simmer until bubbling and slightly thick. Whisk in the remaining ingredients.
3. Measure out 4 cups of cooked pasta, add to the mixture.Cook until heated through and serve.
I made a few changes to Bobby Deen’s recipe. First, upped the amount of Worcestershire sauce to 1 tsp and the dried mustard to 3/4 tsp. I also placed the finished mac and cheese in a casserole dish and baked it in 350 a degree oven for 25 minutes until it was lightly browned on top. Once it cooled slightly at the request of Mason I added “the green things” (chopped parsley). If you follow the directions exactly the mac and cheese recipe yields a creamy version of the classic Southern side dish. If you bake it, it becomes the a tasty casserole that our family prefers. Whichever way you serve it, the mac and cheese had a lot of good cheese flavor with less of the guilt!
For those that care, Bobby’s mama’s version of mac and cheese had 584 calories and 30 grams of fat per serving. Bobby’s came in at 293 calories and 7 grams of fat per serving.
***One quick last note, this is the first cooking post on Sweet Tea & Bourbon. If this is something y’all would like to see more of, let me know! Alternatively, if you think I should just stick to writing about restaurants, tell me that too! Thank you!***
Sweet Tea & Bourbon 
Some cooking ideas, along with the restaurant recommendations, would be fine.
Thank you for the comment! I think this may become a weekly post topic.
Would love to read both, Mike. Thanks!
Great! Thank you for the feed back. The comments and tweets I’ve received have been pro-recipes.
Yes, both please! 🙂 This looks good.
Thank you for the feedback! I was skeptical it would be a worthy mac and cheese, but it turned out very well.
Looks tasty! My Mac n’ cheese recipe is amazing, but probably about a gajillion calories! I like both your restaurant reviews and the recipe post, so write whatever you like, I’m sure I’ll enjoy it! 🙂
Thanks Renee! The regular one we use is packed with whole milk, cheddar cheese, eggs and more cheese. It’s amazing, but I’m trying to slim down a tad.
I appreciate the feed back! I think the recipes tie in with what I write about, so I think I will make them a weekly post. 😀
Yes, I like the new cooking post. Keep ’em coming.
Thank you for the feedback Marty! I think I will post one new recipe a week, probably on Monday or Tuesday.
Good idea about the once a week post, especially on a different day from the restaurant reviews.
Love it. Saw the pic of you and Mason reading book on Facebook. I was curious if I would see something in here about it.
Absolutely! I was unsure if I’d put them here on on my other blog, but this one makes more sense since its already foodcentric. 🙂
I will have to try since there is Worcestershire sauce in it. I’m curious to see how that tastes. I’ve been trying to find a good mac and cheese recipe for awhile now.
Give it a try! Next time I make it I think I’ll serve it creamy to change things up a bit.
Good stuff. Variety in the posts won’t hurt you a bit. Keep it up!
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