Why You’ll Love This Mac and Cheese Recipe

In case you’ve by no means tried it, you could be questioning, “Is Panera Mac and Cheese good?” And I’m right here to reply that for you! Sure, it’s REALLY good. It’s tremendous creamy, tacky, and flavorful. It’s one of many stand-out, evergreen gadgets on their menu that I can’t think about they ever discontinue!

• Straightforward To Make! Making this dish at house is straightforward and fast. You management the components, lower your expenses, and skip the journey to the restaurant.
• Executed In About 20 Minutes! The whole lot is completed proper on the range high very simply. It is a nice recipe for starting cooks.
• Scrumptious Taste! This recipe will simply change into a household favourite.

What You Will Want

The Panera Bread Mac and Cheese ingredient record is tremendous easy. You may even have every little thing in your kitchen proper now! Be sure that to scroll right down to the recipe card on the backside for the total record of components and directions!

• Pasta. Panera makes use of Pipette Rigate, which you’ll simply discover, however I all the time have shells on-hand, so I exploit these too. Any brief, minimize pasta will work! Simply prepare dinner it al dente so it holds just a little chew because it sits within the cheese sauce and continues to prepare dinner a bit.
• Butter. I specify utilizing salted butter on this recipe as a result of it’s what I favor. You should utilize unsalted butter as nicely. The one added salt on this recipe is what you utilize to salt the pasta water in addition to the salt that exists within the cheese.
• Flour. Common all goal flour is what you want for this recipe.
• Pepper. Floor black pepper is the one further seasoning within the ac and cheese recipe. I like lots of black pepper, however be at liberty to make use of as a lot or as little as you like.
• Milk. You should utilize both 2% milk or entire milk on this recipe. I don’t  advocate 1% milk, skim milk, or almond milk for the creamiest outcomes.
• Cheddar Cheese. To make this an actual copycat Panera recipe I exploit a light white cheddar cheese. You may actually use yellow cheddar if that’s what you’ve got! The consequence would be the identical, simply the flavour will differ barely.
• Parmesan Cheese. The addition of parmesan cheese enhances the cheddar with out making the sauce too “sharp”. Panera mac and cheese has a light taste, so that you don’t need an excessive amount of Parmesan.
• American Cheese. That is the “secret ingredient” to actually getting the creamiest cheese sauce. Don’t skip the addition of the deli-sliced white American cheese!

Suggestions On How To Make Panera Mac and Cheese

• Prep all of the components earlier than beginning. This recipe comes collectively in a short time, so that you wish to have every little thing on-hand and prepared whenever you want it!
• Use high-quality white cheddar: This offers the mac and cheese its signature style. You don’t want to make use of an aged cheddar or something tremendous sharp, however a pleasant, creamy white cheddar will make the sauce further scrumptious.
• Cooking the pasta: I like to start out the water boiling for my pasta on the identical time I soften the butter for the sauce, that means every little thing is completed about the identical time. However you’ll be able to simply make the pasta earlier than hand and simply drain and hold it lined and heat so as to add on the finish. The pasta may stick collectively a bit, however it is going to be okay as soon as it’s blended into the cheese sauce.

What Makes Panera Mac and Cheese Particular

The beauty of this recipe is that it’s executed in minutes, it has nice taste, will be loved as a fast predominant dish dinner or lunch, or perhaps a good dish dish at your prepare dinner out or BBQ.

Can You Use One other Kind Of Cheese?

There’s only a creaminess and texture that may’t be defined, due in-part to the three cheeses I used. I labored laborious to create this copycat recipe that’s each simple and scrumptious, with a creamy mix of cheeses. Is it precise? I can’t say for positive, however it’s fairly darn shut!

You may actually sub in yellow cheddar and yellow American for the white cheddar and it’ll work completely. You can too use a unique mix of cheese in the event you favor and use this recipe as a base to actually make your individual!

Concepts To Add-In To Mac and Cheese

In fact Panera Mac and Cheese is ideal as-is, there are tons of issues you’ll be able to add to make it a full meal or amp of the flavour!

• Scorching sauce. My husband ALWAYS provides scorching sauce to his mac and cheese. Doesn’t matter if it’s selfmade or from a field. He loves the warmth and tang that scorching sauce offers.
• Hen. Actually any form of protein would work nicely in mac and cheese, however cooked rooster blended in is an easy technique to make this a full meal. And in the event you actually wish to take it there, attempt rooster nuggets blended in…SO GOOD!
• Chili. You probably have some leftover chili, including a scoop on high of this mac and cheese creates essentially the most scrumptious Chili Mac!

How To Retailer Panera Mac and Cheese

I’ll be sincere, this recipe is finest the identical day you make it, loved heat. Macaroni and cheese tends to lose its creaminess the longer it sits. That’s simply the way in which it really works when you’re utilizing actual cheese. Whereas it should lose a little bit of the creamy texture you’ll be able to completely retailer this and revel in it the day as leftovers. Merely cowl it in hermetic container and whenever you reheat it add a splash or 2 of milk as you prepare dinner it!