Recently, members of our medical student food-savvy interest group known as the “Taste Buddies” met at our house for a cooking competition. Since it was late in the Vermont winter season, we decided to go head to head on comfort food, more specifically “Mac N Cheese”. Macaroni and cheese dishes have been around a long time. 14th century Italian and English cookbooks describe macaroni and cheese casseroles. By the 18th century, most cookbooks included a recipe or two. Interestingly, the late 18th century recipes do not differ much from those used by 21st century cooks. Of course, many associate macaroni and cheese with the iconic Kraft product introduced in the 1930s. The distinctive color, taste, and texture of the ready to serve meal have been a hit with children (and some adults) since that time. While it would seem dangerous to tamper with such a famous brand, Kraft Heinz recently announced that they had secretly changed the formula-and nobody had noticed. As reported by Fox News, late in 2015 the company quietly replaced the original recipe with one that had more natural ingredients. Yellow dye numbers 5 and 6 have been replaced by paprika, annatto and turmeric. There are no artificial preservatives- although there is still plenty of salt.
Over 50 million boxes of the newly formulated product had been sold (and presumably eaten) before the company revealed that the change had been made. Nobody had yet complained. To see if there was a noticeable difference between the old and new recipes, samples of each were recently offered to adults in the streets of New York City. Most could not tell the difference although there seemed a slight preference for the old recipe-despite the artificial ingredients. Taste Buddies and I, however, had firm rules.
Our competition was about real homemade macaroni and cheese. We had some absolutely delicious entrees. One cook used a heavy dose of freshly grated parmesan cheese. Another incorporated braised pork and homemade barbecue sauce. A third used bacon and crab. One even made a delicious dairy free “macaroni and cheese” dish. Needless to say, huge volumes were consumed. So while I have often made macaroni and cheese from a box for my children, there is nothing quite like making it from scratch and tampering with a classic recipe to make it even better.
