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Macaroni with Cream Sauce
1/2 cup macaroni 1 quart water 1 1/2 teaspoons salt Cook the macaroni in boiling salted water according to the general directions given. Prepare the cream sauce as follows: 2 cups milk, or part cream 4 tablespoons flour 3/4 teaspoon salt 1/2 clove garlic, cut fine, if desired Put the flour in a small bowl, and with a batter whip stir it smooth with three tablespoons of milk. Heat the remainder of the milk, to which the garlic has been added, to boiling, in a double boiler, then stir the flour mixture into it. Allow it to cook ten minutes, add the salt, then stir the cooked macaroni into the sauce. Let it remain on the stove long enough to reheat the macaroni.
A plain flour-and-milk sauce with no butter or cheese, thickened in a double boiler. Two details govern the result: cooking the flour long enough to lose its raw taste, and not overcooking the macaroni before it goes into the sauce.
- Cook the flour outBecause there is no roux, the starch is only cooked once it is in the milk. Ten minutes in a double boiler is the minimum; fifteen to twenty gives a cleaner flavour, and the sauce should be stirred often at the start so the slurry does not sit in ropes.
- Sauce consistencyFour tablespoons flour to two cups milk is a medium sauce, thicker than a pouring sauce. If it tightens more than you want while the macaroni reheats, loosen it with a little hot milk.
- Batter whipA wire whisk; any modern whisk will do the job. The point of the three tablespoons of unheated milk is simply to make a lump-free slurry before it meets hot liquid.
- Macaroni timingGeneral directions in books of this period often ran to twenty minutes or more, which turns modern dried pasta to paste. Boil to just short of al dente, 7 to 9 minutes for most dried elbows, since it will finish in the hot sauce.
- Pasta waterOne quart of water for half a cup of macaroni is ample. The 1 1/2 teaspoons salt is for that water, and is separate from the 3/4 teaspoon that seasons the sauce.
- The garlicHalf a clove cut fine and boiled in the milk gives a faint background note rather than a garlic flavour. Fish the pieces out before serving, or strain the milk, if you would rather not bite into softened garlic.
- YieldHalf a cup of dry macaroni is about 2 ounces, so this makes two modest servings or one main dish. The sauce quantity is generous for that amount of pasta; double the macaroni if you want it more coated than soupy.
- If you want it brownedThe recipe as written is a stovetop dish, served soft. Turning it into a baked macaroni means adding cheese and crumbs, which is a different recipe from this book's plain sauce.