A recipe for mac and cheese that will woo the most fickle paramour

I'm still thinking about Anthony Bourdain. I can't count the number of people who have said to me in the past week that they have never been as affected by a celebrity's death, and I feel the same. Sometimes writing makes it better; this time, what I've tried to get out has just felt dumb. But fittingly, cooking and eating hasn't which makes what follows seem appropriate, given that it too involves a vibrant and complicated man who captivated me. It's not risky the way either of them were, but it is honest and comforting. So if you cook this and it makes you feel better, I'll take that as success.

People who like to feed other people often have a go-to dish. My first one is a baked mac and cheese that has impressed every individual I've ever fed it to, otherwise they immediately became dead to me.

That it's been a hit isn't surprising, given that it's pasta covered in cheese. Though this mac and cheese was the only one I was familiar with for about two decades of my life, I later learned that it is referred to as "baked" mac and cheese because some mac and cheese is made exclusively on the stove. You know, like the kind you make from a box, which I also didn't have for the first two decades of my life, and was relatively snobby about. Now that I have learned to enjoy the simple pleasures of a gussied up box of Annie's, my deeper knowledge of the genre has demonstrated to me why the mac and cheese recipe I was brought up with is so special: it actually takes some time.

Not that it takes much time to make this dish. As you'll see, the ingredient list is basic, the steps quite simple. It requires more than 10 minutes to put together, so for comfort food, it seems fancy. Though there are dozens of baked mac and cheese recipes out there, the best, according to my mother and me, is the one from The New Basics Cookbook, one of THE cookbooks of the '80s. Sheila Lukins and Julee Rosso's has paprika in it, though it will not surprise you to hear that I--of a palate that struggles with hot foods--left that spice out.

I tend to make it in the winter, as it's relatively hearty, and also when I have a lot of people to feed, though making it for just a few also works well because I'm of the opinion that it tastes better as a leftover (it's also a great dish to take to a potluck because it fits in one pan, travels well, is easily reheated, and, as I'll explain, impresses easily). I've made it for dates, for friends, and once, notably, for a prospective roommate I was trying to win over (it worked!). I'll credit the positive responses I get to the fact that it basically tastes like nostalgia. Whatever the actual reason, I'll take it all the same.

I made it recently because the weather window for it being appropriate was narrowing, and also because I hadn't made it in awhile. There were people touring my apartment as I cooked it, which was a first in terms of timing, so I may have ever-so-slightly overcooked the noodles when I was aiming to get them very al dente, but honestly, it's hard to mess this one up even a little. When I cooked it the first time, back in 2008, I had to email my mother to get the correct proportions because my recipe just said milk, flour and noodles. Well, it said 1 lb of pasta, but of course I was 19 and dumb and I didn't know that a box of pasta was a pound. I'm sure her response left me slightly chastised.

Use like, even more cheese than this.

What the recipe above doesn't include is one key ingredient: chunks of Canadian bacon or thick ham or ham of any kind mixed into the pasta and sprinkled on top. I've done thinly sliced, which is what I used this time, because that's another thing that prompted the meal in the first place: I realized I had an excess of cheddar cheese and ham, leftover sandwich supplies from my beach trip. I tend to mess around with this recipe each time, tweaking it depending on what I have on hand or what I feel like eating. Sometimes I'll use whole milk, sometimes I'll use 1 percent. Sometimes I'll even use fancy Italian salami if the bodega has that, instead of thicker cut ham. I don't often use parm or gruyere and just coat the whole top in cheddar then put it in the oven, but again, I'm lazy. One thing I realized this time was that I almost never add enough cheese. I have this thing with waste. I'll save fancy soap and never use it or lotions until they expire and can't be. Me in watercolor class was a nightmare; imagine lots of water and not a ton of color. But when you use more cheese on top it creates a cheese blanket of sorts for the pasta/roux combo below. So, though it seems weird that I would need to make this note to self, I'll do it here publicly: always use more cheese than you think you need.

At left, the start of the roux; at right, when it's lightly bubbling it means it has thickened and is ready to be poured over the pasta mixture.

This recipe also really benefits from a broiler, but a lot of people don't have one (or aren't sure if their broiler works at all). If you don't have one it means that the top layer doesn't get as a crispy as it could, but it's really nbd. It also says you need to cook it for 40-60--I've never cooked it for that long, it's usually just 20-30.

Anyway, here's my go-to mac and cheese that's actually penne and cheese that never fails to disappoint. I have served it to so many fans, probably far more than anything else I've ever made. Pair it with an acidic salad to cut the fat content, and watch your loved ones fall even further under your spell.

KATE

P.S. Some interesting and kind feedback from last edition's seafood bonanza: Dee mentioned that she used to eat a lot of Dungeness crab up in Washington, which sounds amazing; my grandmother said she also loves "seafood with an emphasis on shell fish" and pointed out that it must be in the genes; and my sister wanted a correction, claiming that she ate pizza the night the rest of us had lobster tails in Key Largo, not pasta.

"Also, rude," she wrote. That's an opinion, not a fact, but noted.