Mac n Cheese Cups (Sidedish)

Ingredients:

• macaroni 1 lb
• prosciutto
• white American cheese 1/2lb
• mild cheddar cheese 1/4lb
• Campbell’s cheese sauce 1can
• cream or half/half (as desired)
• green onion
• Ritz crackers

Now that the ingredients are out of the way and the smart folks in the room have left to go do things on their own, the rest of us can go over the how and why of this dish.

We have a BBQ contest coming up that has a side dish entry. So we have been racking our brains about what to make that is easy to get right, tastes great, and doesn’t require an elaborate setup.

Brian found the idea floating around other BBQ sites and I (Joseph) am tasked with making the side. I also got plenty of help from my wife to regularly makes home made mac n cheese. She has really honed her craft into something that is very simple and delicious. The Campbell’s cheese sauce is the secret ingredient. Just about every other recipe calls for making a roux and adding cream and cheese until you finally get a cheese sauce from scratch. The problem is that if you aren’t a master chef it’s very hard to start with a roux and get a finished product that is smooth and doesn’t have that grainy texture. Enter: Campbell’s cheese sauce. It’s cheddar, and it’s already smooth.

Here’s the video if you want to follow along. Or just keep reading.

You can do all this on the grill as long as you can boil water and cook the noodles. That’s probably the only part that will give you any trouble specifically with the average grilling setup.

While the noodles are cooking we need to prep the rest of the ingredients. Grate the cheeses first. I used a half pound of the white American and a quarter pound of the cheddar. You can’t melt a brick of cheese.

Next you will want to place the prosciutto in the pan. I didn’t and it cost me some heat while my mac was sitting and cooling off waiting on me. The prosciutto I have is in the rounded rectangles about the size of my hand held out flat.

Prosciutto instructions: take half of the prosciutto and cut it long ways and the other half cut the other way. You should have the first half as long strips and the other half as kind of squares. The strips will make the sides of the cup and they go around the muffin tin sides. The squares will make the bottom of the cup. Make sure you place the strips along the sides before you put the bottom in. Hopefully the sides will hold the bottom a little stronger that way. Don’t forget to spray the pan first.

You can put the prosciutto muffin tin by itself on the grill before you put anything in it. You want this to crisp up about half way or more before you put the cheese into it. Just keep track of it so that you don’t burn it while you are doing the next steps.

Once the noodles are finished and strained you can melt the cheese. Start by putting the Campbell’s sauce in the pot. You can use extra cream if you want, it’s totally up to you. Then put the grated cheese into the pot and stir. It shouldn’t take too long to melt. Put the noodles back into the pot once the cheese is nearly melted. The heat from the noodles will help it finish melting. Just stir that all together.

Hopefully your prosciutto cups didn’t burn yet and we can spoon the mac n cheese into them and put them right back into the grill.

While you wait for that to cook you can dice up the green onions and crush the Ritz crackers.

Take the cups out of the grill and sprinkle the green onions and cracker crumbs on top. Carefully remove them from the tin without burning yourself or crushing the cups. I use a spoon and gently scoop all the way under the cup and lift it out. Have a tray handy to place them once they are out of the muffin tin.

I hope you like these. If you have any comments please post them on the youtube video. And thanks for coming to Code Up BBQ.