5-Ingredient Mac and Cheese : Food Jar Recipe

5-Ingredient Mac and Cheese (The One That Never Comes Home)

Some lunches are a gamble. Mac and cheese is not one of them. This is the five-ingredient, one-pot version I make when the week has gotten away from me, and it's every bit as creamy as the fancy baked kind without the washing up. It's also an absolute legend in a food jar, because warm, cheesy pasta at lunchtime is basically a guaranteed empty jar at pickup.

You'll need:

• 2 cups (200g) dried macaroni
• 150g cheddar cheese, grated (grate it yourself if you can, the pre-grated stuff doesn't melt as silky)
• ¼ tsp Dijon mustard (don't skip it, it doesn't taste mustardy, it just makes the cheese taste cheesier)
• 2 pinches smoked paprika
• ¾ cup (180ml) thickened cream

Here's how:

1. Cook the macaroni in salted boiling water according to the packet, then drain and pop it back in the pan.
2. Turn the heat right down low, add the cream, mustard and paprika, and stir until every piece of pasta is coated.
3. Add the cheese and keep stirring until it's just melted through into a glossy sauce.
4. Take it off the heat straight away and it's done. That's it. Genuinely.

A few little notes from me:

• Leftovers keep happily in the fridge or freezer. When you reheat, add a little splash of extra cream or milk to bring back the sauciness. The pasta drinks it up as it sits.
• No cream in the fridge? Swap it for 6 tablespoons of cream cheese and 1 cup of full cream milk. Works a treat.
• Want to sneak in some goodness? A handful of frozen peas thrown in with the pasta for the last 2 minutes of cooking, or some finely grated zucchini stirred through the sauce, disappears without complaint in all that cheese.

Jodie's food jar tips:

• Golden rule as always: boiling water in the empty jar for 5 minutes, tip it out, then fill with piping hot mac and cheese.
• Make it a touch saucier than you think you need before it goes in the jar. It thickens as it sits, and saucy at 7am means perfect at midday.
• Fill the jar as close to the top as you can. Less air means better heat, and mac and cheese held at a nice warm temperature until lunch is the stuff of playground legend.