(upbeat music)
- Hi, I'm jerry James Stone.
In today's video, I'm super excited
'cause I'm gonna make something
that I think is just delicious
and I think you're gonna love it too.
We're gonna make macaroni and cheese
stuffed bell peppers.
Yeah, you heard me right.
Lets get to it.
(upbeat music)
Okay so the first thing we wanna do
is make our cheese sauce.
You want that ready for once the pasta
is done cooking so you can mix that all together
and then stuff the bell peppers.
So lets get to making the cheese sauce.
So that starts out with making a roux.
The first thing we're gonna do
is we're gonna melt some butter
in a nice deep saute pan.
And then we're gonna take flour,
equal parts butter, equal parts flour,
and sift that flour into the butter.
The advantage of doing this,
of creating the roux to thicken the sauce
is by putting that flour into a fat
and sort of getting that all combined
before you add the liquid,
which is the milk,
is that you get a nice even thickened sauce
with no lumps.
Okay so we have our roux ready.
The next thing to do is to add in the milk.
Just go ahead and add in,
I prefer using whole milk,
you can use whatever you want.
I feel like if you're gonna eat mac n cheese
you might as well go balls to the wall
and just go out and do it.
So you wanna add the milk slowly
to the roux and whisk that while you're doing it,
just to make sure that you get a nice even consistency
with the liquid.
Once the milk is worked in,
we wanna bring that mixture to a boil.
Just like a low simmer actually.
The reason you're doing that is you wanna cook it
for a couple minutes in order to get that flour cooked.
If you don't do that the sauce isn't gonna thicken,
but also it's gonna taste kind of doughy
from the flour being uncooked.
So this is really important.
Just to bring it to a low simmer,
but while you're doing that you wanna keep whisking it
'cause you don't wanna burn the mixture at all.
Once it cooks for a couple minutes,
then we're gonna start adding in our cheese.
I'm adding in cheddar cheese here,
you can use whatever mixture that you want,
but I just find this to be a really classic flavor.
So I'm using shredded cheddar.
This is really important though,
before you do that first step
of adding in the cheese,
you wanna turn off the heat
and actually remove the milk mixture in that pan,
remove it from the heat.
The reason that you're doing that
is if you actually have heat,
high heat, any heat really,
with the mixture,
then as you add in the cheese
you risk that chance of that cheese breaking.
And the last thing you wanna do is have your sauce break.
When that happens you're gonna have a mix
of cheese fats, cheese solids,
fat, liquid,
it's just gonna be a whole mess,
and there's really no way to really save it once it breaks.
So you wanna take it off of the heat
and slowly work that cheese into the sauce,
so that way it incorporates,
but it doesn't get overwhelmed.
Okay so our cheese sauce is ready.
Now we're actually gonna make the pasta.
So I'm gonna bring that pasta to a boil,
and hey by the way, I have a video
on how to cook the perfect pasta,
so be sure to check that out.
But I'll tell you right now
just a few of the key points.
One, you wanna make sure that you salt that water.
So bring the water to a boil
and salt it a lot.
It should be like sea water.
And you wanna salt it after it's boiling
because if you don't,
if you are using like a stainless steel pain like I am,
if you salt it before the water boils,
you risk actually damaging the pan.
Once it comes to a boil,
salt the water, throw the past in,
cook it per the instructions,
but don't rinse it once it's ready.
Actually take that pasta
and scoop it out with like a strainer,
and transfer it directly into the cheese sauce.
The reason you do that is the starches
from that liquid that are actually around the pasta
helps just make the sauce a lot creamier.
We're already working with a creamy sauce anyway
'cause it's cheese and milk,
but this will actually add to it.
So we have our cheese sauce,
we have our pasta, it's all mixed together.
Now it's time to actually stuff those bell peppers.
Okay so we're just gonna prep the peppers.
Super simple, cut off the tops,
scoop out the seeds.
Also, by the way, I have videos
on how to prep, store, buy bell peppers,
so be sure to check those out too.
Okay so we cut off the tops,
now we're gonna scoop out the seeds.
(upbeat music)
And now we're gonna prep the peppers
with the mac n cheese.
And try not to get eat it all while I'm doing this.
Now I used a larger pasta, a big, nice,
like kind of large macaroni.
The reason I do that,
I just, I love how it sort
of scoops up all that cheese.
The one thing about that is
you're gonna get a lot less inside of the pepper
because it's a bigger pasta shape.
So if you use like a traditional macaroni
you probably won't go as high up with it,
but you'll fill it with a lot more pasta.
Okay so we stuffed the peppers with the mac n cheese.
Now we're just gonna top it off
with more cheese because why not right?
So just go ahead and add in a bit more on the top,
that way it gets nice, crispy melted cheese toping.
And then we're gonna bake these
for about 12 to 15 minutes at 400 degrees,
just until the cheese on top
gets a nice little gooey topping
and then starts to caramelize a little bit,
get that lovely brown cheese flavor.
All right, just gonna put these in the oven.
Okay so we baked the stuffed bell peppers
for about 15 minutes at 400 degrees
and they just smell delicious.
There's the roasted bell pepper,
the macaroni and cheese.
It's so good.
I'm just gonna top off with a little chopped parsley
and then they're ready to serve.
How great does that look?
Okay definitely give this recipe a try
and let me know what you think.
If you like to cook like I do,
I release new videos every single week
so please subscribe.
If you have something that you wanna see,
drop a comment below.
And hey, if you like this video,
give me a thumbs up.
I'll see you guys next time.
(upbeat music)