Mac N Cheese w/ boneless pork ribs

Growing up I loved to eat Macaroni and Cheese, but I never made it from scratch. I always made it out of the box. I've been watching a lot of the food network and they were showing some southern cooking and they had macaroni and cheese from scratch and it looked amazing. I decided to make it, along with some boneless pork ribs that I kind of just made up.

Ingredients:
1 lb elbow macaroni
4 cups of grated sharp Cheddar cheese, or whatever
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup flour
1/4 tsp dried thyme
1/4 tsp cayenne
1/8 tsp white pepper
1/4 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp salt
pinch of nutmeg
1 tsp Dijon mustard
3 cups milk
1/2 cup Panko breadcrumbs plus 1 tbsp butter


Put 1/4 cup of butter in sauce pan on medium heat until melted. Add 1/4 cup of flour mix together and let simmer for about 3 minutes. Add thyme, cayenne and white pepper, let cook for about 1 minutes. Mix in 1 cup of cold milk (I used whole milk so that the sauce would be even creamier). Add the rest of the milk. Then add salt, nutmeg, Worcestershire sauce and Dijon mustard.  Let all simmer for about 10 minutes. ( While you are cooking up the sauce, boil the pasta). After the sauce thickens up a little turn off the heat and add one cup of cheese at a time, be sure to leave 3/4 of a cup of cheese for the top. When the cheese is all mixed in (except for the 3/4 cup for the top) add a it to the noodles in a 13x9 pan. Make sure it is all mixed in well. Melt 1 Tbsp of butter and add it to Panko crumbs and spread over the macaroni, put the remaining cheese over the top also. Cook at 400 degrees for 20 minutes.  Depending how creamy you want the mac n cheese add more or less noodles. In my case I added about 12 oz, which is 3/4 of a pound. It came out very creamy and delicious. 

I had to come up with something to have with the macaroni and cheese. I decided something BBQ would be good, I like pork ribs but I don't have a grill so I decided to experiment with boneless pork ribs in the crock pot. 

Ingredients:

3 large tart apples, peeled, cored, chopped or thinly sliced

1 white onion, halved and thinly sliced

1/2 tablespoon cinnimon

1/4 cup water

1 Teaspoon salt

1/4 cup apple juice

2 1/2 pound of bonless pork ribs

Trim the fat off of the pork, take the pieces and brown them in a frying pan with a little olive oil. To do this put burner on high and cook every side long enough to brown and seal the meat. (This will help prevent the meat from drying out and also help seal in the flavor from the other ingredients).  Add all the ingredients to the crock pot and cook on LOW for 8 hours. After  8 hours, drain liquid and add your favorite BBQ sauce, and cook on low for another hour and a half.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nate is from Tennessee and said that the Mac N Cheese was the best he has ever had.  ( That is his second helping)