Macaroni cheese a la Pat

14 Nov, 2025

Most families likely have a family recipe. Something that everyone has eaten so many times, that appears front-of-mind whenever someone asks, "what did you eat as kids?", that immediately transports you back home to the dinner table whenever you cook it again by yourself years later as a hopefully fully-functioning adult (but it still just doesn't have that "prepared-by-a-parent" magic).

In 2015, I must've felt the need for our Gilbert family specialty. Macaroni cheese, baked in a big old dish, lots of cheese, big slices of tomatoes and bacon bits throughout, all served with some basic-bitch tomato sauce on the side. Don't ask, just accept that your family recipe likely also has some curve-ball thrown in that to everyone else, still doesn't sound that appealing. But lordy is it good. Especially those pieces of the penne pasta that are crispy on the edge. Hnnnnnggggg.

I wrote my mum on facebook and here's the excerpt from our chat.

• Marc: yo momma, can you please flick me your macaroni recipe?
• Mum: Oooh. Yes. Tomorrow ok after golf? Or is it an emergency
• Marc: tomorrow is fine
• Mum: Great. It's an ancient family concoction that I have to make up. But you need a bag macaroni, butter, cheddar cheese, milk, one brown onion, bacon, 2 big red tomatoes, English mustard and plain flour.
• Marc: Hah cheers

Mum then sent me a wonderful Word doc that contained all I needed to know to make my childhood return.

For those wondering, Pat was my grandmother, mum's mum. I don't remember her that much, mostly from pictures and what feels like false memories spurred on from photos, but what I do remember was she smoked a helluva lot. I also remember her raspy laugh, which I was fairly sure she did a lot. RIP granny. I'm not 100% sure what she had to do with this recipe, but maybe mum can clarify and I'll update here.

Ingredients

• Packet macaroni – I use about 2 1/2 cups of the dry curly ones.
• About a cup of grated cheddar
• Butter
• Big brown onion
• Few strips of bacon
• Couple of tablespoons plain flour
• 1 ½ cups full cream milk
• 2 fat red tomatoes
• 2 teaspoons hot English mustard

Method

1. Oven on 180c
2. 1 BIG pot of boiling water with lots of salt and splash of olive oil.
3. Add the macaroni, cook and drain off the water.
4. Add a blob of butter, stir and leave in the big pot.
5. 1 medium saucepan for the sauce.
6. Chop and fry the bacon and onions. Give a bit to Rastas at your feet.
7. Set aside in a bowl but use same pot for the sauce.
8. Add a hefty blob of butter and whisk in 2 to 3 tablespoons of flour.
9. Have the milk handy and whisk it in to make the white sauce – you need lots.
10. Add the mustard, some salt and the cheese.
11. Give another bit of bacon to Ras.
12. Get out the big casserole dish.
13. Make 2 layers of the macaroni, bacie and onion treats, white sauce and thick sliced fresh tomatoes.
14. Cheese on top. In the oven for 40.
15. Outside Rastas!¹

Love you, mum.

#2025 #food #life