Mac and cheese is a top-tier comfort food in my household. I’ll eat it just about any which way, including on its own, straight from the pot I made it in. I only have two requirements for my mac and cheese: one, it needs to taste distinctly of sharp cheddar; two, it has to be super creamy. No lumps, no chunks, and plenty of sauce.
I’ve tried all kinds of recipes for mac and cheese, each promising perfection. I’ve mixed and matched cheeses: gouda, gruyère, parmesan, and pepper Jack. I’ve used a roux and made recipes without one. I’ve made baked mac and cheese with breadcrumbs and other weird ingredients.
While almost all of the variations I’ve tried have been worth eating (mac and cheese is like pizza in that even bad versions are at least edible), my favorite mac and cheese recipes use evaporated milk instead of regular milk or even cream.
More Fat Isn’t the Answer
I once thought that the more fat you add to mac and cheese the better, and I deployed heavy cream or half-and-half instead of milk in my mac. But even though fat is a flavorful component in and of itself, it also coats the tongue, dulling other flavors in the process. Yes, fat is an important part of mac and cheese, but you get plenty of that from the cheese itself, and ultimately you have to balance fat with flavor for the best-tasting results.
What Is Evaporated Milk?
Why not just use whole milk instead? What makes evaporated milk superior? Evaporated milk is exactly what it sounds like: milk that has been reduced into a more concentrated liquid. In the process of making evaporated milk, about 60 percent of the water content of the milk is removed, making it a highly concentrated form of milk. When the water is removed from milk, you’re left with a liquid that contains more fat and more protein.
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Why Evaporated Milk Makes Better Mac
That higher concentration of milk proteins means evaporated milk is more stable, so it’s less likely to “break” or curdle. Evaporated milk also usually contains stabilizers, such as carrageenan, which help keep your mac’s sauce super smooth and silky. You could achieve a similar result by tossing a chunk of Velveeta or American cheese into the sauce (these cheeses are rich in stabilizers), but then you have to buy a whole package you might not use, whereas it’s easy to use a whole can of evaporated milk in one pot of mac and cheese.
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Using evaporated milk also means you don’t have to make a roux. Many mac and cheese recipes require a roux for thickening and to stabilize the sauce. While this approach certainly works, it can leave the sauce thick and gloppy, and the flour dulls the flavor of the cheese. Evaporated milk doesn’t have that drawback, and pouring a can of the stuff into a pot is a lot less work than making a roux.
How To Make Mac and Cheese With Evaporated Milk
To make an easy mac and cheese with evaporated milk, cook eight ounces of pasta a minute shy of al dente in well-salted water, then drain. Return the drained pasta to the pot, and add a 12-ounce can of evaporated milk and all your cheese (you’ll want 12 ounces of cheese for this amount of pasta) and seasonings. Stir it constantly over low heat until the sauce thickens.
Just make sure you’re working with evaporated milk and not condensed milk. While both of these canned, shelf-stable milks are made by the same process, condensed milk — also called sweetened condensed milk — has added sugar, which has absolutely no place in a pot of mac and cheese.
