Smokey Bacon N Beer Mac and Cheese!

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My husband, AJ, has a passion for a few things; music, anything nerdy, growing his beard, food, and beer (among other things). Food and beer are very high up on his list. Now that doesn’t mean he’s the guy that goes through a 12 pack a day or whatever. Nope, he’s all about the taste. I’d say he’s maybe even a little bit of a beer snob with his imported beers (German and Belgium beers being his current favorites).

He’s also a huge foodie, as am I. We both have no control when it comes to food and we’re always dreaming up what our next big meal will be.

On Valentine’s Day I told him I would make anything he wanted for dinner. He told me to surprise him. Oh boy, that means I had to do something extra spectacular, right? I was on a time crunch too, so on to Pinterest! I found a pin from a while back that linked back to The Beeroness. She has the most wonderful blog all about recipes to make with beer. Not your normal Miller Light, but real genuine good beer and every single one of her recipes had me wiping drool off my keyboard. I knew I had to make something from her blog for AJ’s Valentine’s dinner.

That’s when I stumbled upon her recipe for Stovetop Bacon and Beer Macaroni and Cheese. I did tweak it a little, I used smoked cheddar cheese to give it a smokey flavor to compliment the beer. I also added extra bacon, because you can never have enough bacon. The recipe with my substitutions is below. This is definitely a must try if you love Mac and Cheese, bacon, and/or beer!

Ingredients

• 1 box elbow macaroni
• 6 strips of thick cut bacon
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1 egg
• 1 cup beer (I used Franziskaner Hefe-Weiss and I think next time we’ll go for a bolder tasting IPA, the Franziskaner gave it a very light taste)
• 2 cups fresh grated smoked cheddar cheese (this gave it an amazing flavor, but if you don’t have smoked cheddar a regular cheddar should work just as well)
• 2 tbs butter
• 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 1/8 tsp smoked paprika
• pinch cayenne pepper
• salt to taste

Directions

• ·         Boil pasta until Al Dente, don't overcook or it will end up mushy.
• ·         Drain the pasta, and set aside.
• ·         Slice up raw bacon into small chunks (doing this before cooking is always much easier!) Use the same pot to cook the bacon until crispy, drain bacon grease and set bacon aside.
• ·         Return pasta to the pot.
• ·         In a separate bowl, add the beer, egg and sour cream, beat until well combined.
• ·         Add the butter and the beer mixture to the noodles and return to medium heat. Stir until the butter has melted.
• ·         About 1/4 a cup at a time, add the cheese. Stir until cheese has melted before adding more.
• ·         Add the spices and chopped bacon. Stir and enjoy (preferably with a beer!) 

I hope you enjoy this meal as much as we did! (We served it with bbq chicken, and then had lots of mac and cheese leftovers which were almost just as yummy as eating it the first time.