(no subject)

[cblj_backup]

So, Chicago used to have a law against food trucks, I have no idea why. Recently, the law has been relaxed to allow food trucks as long as they don't cook the food in the truck or park it within 100 feet of a restaurant. Which basically means we still have no food trucks, because you can't throw a rock in this town without hitting somewhere to eat.

We do have a few, though. There's a cupcake truck. There's a soup and salad truck called The Lunch Machine. And there's the Southern Mac And Cheese Truck.

I have been dying to try this food truck, but it always shows up early and leaves right before I get my lunch break, so I haven't been able to. TODAY, I GOT ME SOME MACARONI AND CHEESE.

...and it's not really very good.

You guys have no idea how sad I am that the Macaroni and Cheese truck makes mac and cheese that is less delicious than the stuff I make myself at home. The pasta is fine -- I mean, it's macaroni, that's hard to mess up -- and for $9 you get a ton of mac and cheese, but they don't seem to have conceptualised "cheese sauce" properly. Maybe it's what I ordered, I don't know. I got the blue-cheese-and-bacon mac and cheese, but I was expecting some kind of white sauce base, like the add-milk-and-cheese-to-a-roux sauce I make when I make it myself. Instead it was literally macaroni stirred up with crumbled blue cheese. I like blue cheese, but it's not a mild flavour, and that's an awful lot to take in at once.

Seriously, my sadness at the mediocrity of the mac and cheese truck is epic. The problem with having a vivid imagination is that reality so rarely lives up to it.

Comments

[ysabet.livejournal.com]

As a lifelong avoider of mac n' cheese (I ate it once when I was sick as a child and have disliked it ever since) but also as a total blue cheese fan, the idea of blue cheese mac n' cheese sounds intriguing. Gonna try to work up your own sauce? I'd love to try that one out myself; maybe a base of a milder white cheese cheese with blue cheese as a spice?

[thalia]

You might find this recipe interesting. I've tried it; it's pretty good, but I imagine it could be improved.

[ysabet.livejournal.com]

Oooh; thanks! Think I'll modify it a bit, but it really looks good.

[copperbadge.livejournal.com]

I think doing one's own blue cheese sauce should be reasonably easy -- I don't think you'd even need to cut it, because you're adding it to milk and roux which would tone down the flavour. But yeah, if you did need to, a really mild white would probably work. Mozzarella or mild white cheddar -- I'd go with mozz, it's a bit moister.

I've totally spoiled myself for mac and cheese by learning how to cook it myself. I can't make it from the box anymore. It's just so much better home-made!

[ysabet.livejournal.com]

See, that's the thing-- what I remember is getting horribly sick from boxed Kraft mac n' cheese. My brother did too (we both had the mumps) and he wouldn't touch it afterwards, so naturally neither would I (and the memory of seeing him toss his cookies-- err, pasta-- didn't help a lot.) This, though, sounds decent. And I'd go with Mozzarella too. Just as a side, have you ever made your own ricotta? It's unbelievably easy and a good thing to do if you accidentally let milk get a little too elderly.

[copperbadge.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the boxed stuff is edible but home-made is on a totally different level. :D

I've seen recipes for making ricotta, but it costs more to buy the milk to make it than it does to buy it in the store, so I've never bothered...

[ysabet.livejournal.com]

**nods** I only do it when I have milk that's going off; the general rule-of-thumb is that you heat it to just below boiling, then add two full tablespoons of lemon-juice per quarter-gallon, stir it in and then strain the curds out once they've formed. Then you rinse them and salt them. I wouldn't buy the milk to make it, but it's fun if, for instance, you forgot to put it back and you get up in the morning and there's the milk, looking at you accusingly. (Guess why I learned to make it? >_<)