I was feeling supremely lazy, so this is not a tale of mornay sauce or hunting down cheap Emmenthaler (one major reason I have yet to make Bouchon's mac n' cheese). It is a tale of Easy Mac for yuppies:
At least the box is much cuter than Kraft's. There's probably something wrong with me describing my pasta purchase to Jon as "Annie's- the lady with the bunnies and shit". But I jest. I heart Annie's and her cute little bunny. Annie's Vermont white cheddar and shells is the pinnacle of pre-packaged cheesy goodness. However, the shells take forever to cook, so I decided to try their microwaveable version instead.
It's really good. By good, I mean that it tastes exactly like Kraft, minus the chalky, viscous tang of scary thickeners and colorants. All the ingredients were recognizable, if not entirely good for you- flour, cheese, whey, corn starch... I'm excited, because I occasionally have vicious mac n' cheese cravings, only to eat a bowl or two of Kraft and then get grossed out by all the weird things it contains. Annie's means I can enjoy my cheesy, starchy goodness again.
I was still just a little embarrassed by my craving for simple carbs. So I got some baby bok choy to pretend my meal was healthy. I ate it raw, because I was feeling lazy. It was strangely good with the mac n' cheese- the leaves taste a little like broccoli without being overpowering (I kind of hate raw broccoli), and the stems had a great crunchy, watery texture.
It also gave me a chance to test out my cheapskate salad spinner ($2.99 at Target). I just tried to find it online, and apparently it's too crappy to merit space on their website. The lid usually flies off mid-spin, and the crappy plastic is not dishwasher-safe, but it's cheap and mostly effective. Especially considering their next-cheapest is something like $20. My rice washer was a perfectly fine substitute (and it gets my vote for most versatile obscure cooking implement- I LOVE that thing), but I couldn't pass it up for under $3.
The wine was decent- it's from Lafite's vineyard in Chile, bottled specifically for Whole Foods. It was about $10, but I really wanted a decent Cab Sauv, so I splurged. It smells amazing- really full-bodied, lots of raspberry, very fruity- but it disappoints a bit on taste. The alcohol content (14%), while not high, comes through way more than it should. It's nowhere near as bad as heavily alcoholic California wines, but it really lacks body and substance compared with the way it smells. I'd drink it again, but there are better things out there- a nice Malbec or Tempranillo would be more substantial.
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