- [Cliff] Today, we're tackling something
that most everybody loves: mac and cheese.
Now I know you're gonna be like,
"don't beep with mac and cheese, Cliff!"
"Why you gotta do that?"
But I may be on your side.
'Cause what we're gonna do is
test a very modern version of mac and cheese.
And I wanna see how it tastes against traditional.
So what we're gonna try to do is
we're gonna use our friend here, sodium citrate,
to make the absolute cheesiest mac and cheese.
Usually what you do is you make a roux with flour and butter
and you add a bunch of milk.
This is how much milk they use for regular.
We're gonna reduce that by a third.
What I'm thinking is the more milk,
the less cheesy it tastes.
Simple conclusion, right?
So if we reduce the milk and we find a way around that,
we can actually get the cheesiest mac and cheese.
Let's jump right in.
Noodles are all going in.
We're gonna cook 'em all together,
cuz we don't want any variances in texture.
Butter is melting.
Flour goes in.
Just so you know, I took one of the most popular
recipes I could find to do the traditional way
because I wanted one that was tried-and-true.
We're doing this one first because it takes longer.
Work this on and off the heat,
let's get it nice and blonde.
We don't want any of that uncooked flour taste.
I'm gonna drain this pasta,
do not rinse it, you want the starches on the outside
Oh, that's steamy!
Now add three cups of milk to this.
So I'm gonna add it in.
And I'm gonna whisk after each one.
Not getting any lost clumps.
We have our cheese here,
you can use any type of cheese you want.
See everyone has, "Oh I use a little bit of cream cheese,
use pepper jack, use half this, half that."
What I wanna do is I wanna create a dead even race here.
So we're using the same amount of butter in each one.
We're using the exact same amount of pasta each one.
We're using the same four cups of cheese on each one.
All we're doing is reducing the milk content.
So were gonna start adding in the cheese.
We're just using cheddar so we can get that
orange, beautiful mac and cheese color.
That is cheesy! That's very blonde.
But we're using this on the same amount of pasta.
And I will say this: three cups versus one cups
of dairy, this cheese sauce could be liquidy.
These are all theories,
I'm very excited about this experiment.
(funky drumbeat)
Now we got the second one.
Bang! Sodium citrate.
Remember the American cheese from the burger that we did?
Remember that?
Alright so this is just a deeper dive
into what sodium citrate does.
Now it makes the fat soluble.
Sodium citrate is actually easier to get than you think.
You can order it off websites
that want to fly drones.
Gonna allow us to get a creamy cheese sauce
that is still velvety while still reducing the liquid.
You just dump it in there.
I have a blender here, a hand blender.
This does require a little bit more work than a whisk.
I'm the Gray Bambino.
(baseball hitting bat)
This is how we break stuff!
Our milk is just coming to simmer,
so I'm gonna start dumping the cheese in.
Just like the other sauce we're incorporating
a little at a time, and I'm gonna blend it,
So we're at like half the cheese right now,
and it's already looking like the other one.
Woo-hoo! Cheesy!
(hand blender whirring)
So we're fully incorporated.
(funky drumbeat)
We have the same amount of noodles on each one, right?
We're gonna use all of the sauce, so that's one.
It's really liquidy.
And heres our second batch.
Little thicker.
Dang, that almost looks like melted Velveeta.
Now we're gonna mix each one of these up.
Oh my God, look at the consistency already on this one.
So this guy's a little bit more liquidy.
(funky drumbeat and guitar)
Time for the taste test.
Regular.
That tastes like mac and cheese.
Let's see what happens when I drain some out.
I just wanna be a little more true
to the texture that we'd be getting.
But it's a little bit cheesy,
you can definitely taste the kinda milky creaminess of it.
It's not too overwhelming.
Sodium citrate.
This is the same amount of cheese.
Coverage is good.
That tastes like you're biting into a block of cheddar.
Like you're not getting a cheese pull out of it.
You're getting an actual cheese sauce.
Which are two things which are fundamentally different.
This is the creamiest mac and cheese from a cheese sauce
you will ever have in your entire life.
But it is a lot to handle.
In terms of texture, knockdown drag out winner
is the sodium citrate mac and cheese.
In terms of flavor, the cheesiest mac and cheese
is a little too much cheese.
So we gotta come back to this one.
If you can sit down and eat a block of cheese,
maybe this is the one for you.
But I honestly don't think I could last more than
a few spoonfuls on that one.
I'm telling you the truth.
This, texturally, much more loose,
but the milk in it.
It's a little bit cheesy, and the fix on this
is just don't use all of the sauce.
The cheesiest mac and cheese actually
is not the best mac and cheese.
Quote, The Sandlot:
"There are heroes, and there are legends."
"Heroes get remembered, but legends never die."
That's the one.
To check out some videos from our buddies
over at The Verge, click here.
(pleasant bells and drums outro)