WHY IS THIS HAPPENING?!
It has come to my attention that there has been some rather ~controversial~ mac 'n' cheese recipes making the rounds on Facebook over the past few months...
^ I'm not the only one who has noticed.
Given that mac 'n' cheese is SACRED, I decided to investigate.
E!
Everything seems to have started with a video clip of chefs taking turns making their own unique (???) versions of mac 'n' cheese.
This one kicked things off by making a standard roux-based sauce — everything seemed fine until things took a turn...
Food Network / Via Facebook: FoodNetwork
EXHIBIT A: Mac 'n' cheese with an entire sheet pan of roasted veggies dumped in.
Geoffrey Zakarian's anxious nodding basically spoke for the entire world.^
Food Network / Via Facebook: FoodNetwork
The internet fired back:
EXHIBIT B: This dry AF no-boil sheet tray mac 'n' cheese.
This one started out with a mixture of uncooked pasta, cheeses, and some other stuff dumped onto a sheet tray — then was seemingly baked into a shag carpet.
Food Network / Via Facebook: FoodNetwork
People began to see a pattern:
EXHIBIT C: A recipe for mac 'n' cheese pancakes literally made with pancake batter and leftover mac 'n' cheese.
Why was this happening? Why are we turning mac 'n' cheese into pancakes?? I have so many questions r/n.
Food Network / Via Facebook: FoodNetwork
The internet tried to make sense of it all:
EXHIBIT D: This mac 'n' cheese baked on top of stuffing.
This time, (otherwise pure) mac 'n' cheese was baked directly on top of a disc of andouille stuffing. I MEAN...???
Food Network / Via Facebook: FoodNetwork
The internet was (once again) not here for it:
THE FINAL STRAW: A video for baked spaghetti and crawfish that was pawned off as mac 'n' cheese.
This video did look delicious, but the problem was in the delivery. The recipe shows spaghetti noodles being mixed with cheese sauce and crawfish — then baked in a skillet. The issue here was context, not content. This is NOT mac 'n' cheese, and calling it that is a damn crime.
Food Network / Via Facebook: FoodNetwork
Although the crime was less offensive (and more confusing that unsettling), the internet called for an end to the madness:
So please, let this be a lesson — LEAVE MAC 'N' CHEESE ALONE.
via BuzzFeed/Food
