The ultimate comfort food! Elbow macaroni or cavatappi cradled in a creamy sauce with bites of sharp cheddar and subtle spices to tantalize the tongue. This easy and delicious recipe has been a family favorite since 1995. Plus, a glimpse of memorable restaurant mac 'n cheese creations. 
First a bit of context, I love macaroni and cheese so much that I was once kicked out of an "all-you-can-eat" buffet restaurant called Sir George's Smorgasbord House. I was 5 years old, shorter than the counter top as I had to stretch up over my head to get the small plate with the tiny scoop of mac and cheese. They said I went back too many times and asked us to leave, even though none of us ate any seafood, prime rib or other expensive items. My dad was so mad that we never went back.
Shortcut to the printable Love2Chow recipe.
I've enjoyed my share of the Kraft variety with the powdered cheeses and the thin, mildly curved noodles. While several men that I know all seemed to share a penchant for making a meal of boxed mac and cheese with cut up hot dogs, I was much more likely to add spinach and mushrooms to ramen noodles. I also didn't really care for the Velveeta version, with its shiny, gluey processed texture. Even the addition of burnt ends from smoked brisket doesn't fix the apparently cheese food-dominant sauce served by one area restaurant. But I found myself liking the Boston Chicken/Boston Market rotini mac and cheese side despite its slightly gluey texture -- it must have been the addition of blue cheese into the Cheddar and American cheese mix.

Over the years, a handful of transcendental mac and cheese experiences at restaurants across the country have made their impression.

Urban Solace: Duckaroni

Skillet of Duckaroni - Urban Solace, San Diego, CA by Chef Matt Gordon. This is a divine rendition of Mac 'n Cheese featuring duck confit, Maytag blue cheese, arugula, scallions and roasted garlic. It is cooked and served in a small cast iron skillet with the cheese bubbling and the protruding edges of duck and biscuit crumb topping browned to crispy perfection. Some peppery arugula and the subtle bite of green onions add refreshing contrasts in color and flavor. I had the good fortune of sampling this amazing appetizer during two separate visits to San Diego. Unfortunately, while writing this post, I discovered that Urban Solace closed this past March, after 12 years of deliciousness. Fortunately, the recipe for Matt's cheese & chive biscuits, which form the crumbly topping, can be found online. I guess I'll have to get a cast iron skillet and figure out how to recreate duckaroni!

Urban Solace: Cheddar-Chive biscuits with Orange-Honey Butter & Smoked Tomato Jam

Brisket Mac & Cheese - Proper Brick Oven & Tap Room, 139 7th St., Pittsburgh, PA. 412-281-5700. Open 7 days a week for lunch, dinner and late night snacking. No reservations. Although I adore the creative, wood-fired pizzas, the salads, and the house-cured bacon candy, it is the brisket mac & cheese that I end up thinking about. This comes in a hearty ceramic bowl featuring fresh cavatappi spirals in a white cheddar sauce, punctuated by wood-smoked beef brisket, caramelized onions, and a perfectly balanced deep red, tart-sweet barbecue sauce. This is an ideal dish, paired with one of the half salads for a winter evening watching a show in the Cultural District.

The owners Mandi and Jeff Horn, have also run a CSA from their 270 acre organic farm, since 2007. They recently opened a deli for take-out service, and the restaurant is dog friendly. Whether visiting Bedford or passing through central PA, Horn O Plenty is the perfect place to stop for a refreshing, healthy meal — whether your preference is wood fired pizza or salad, vegan or thick cut bacon!

"This is new on our menu, and it is soooo good!  Try the meat-bread," gushed our server Lana. Having grown up enjoying her cousin Tahmina's fantastic Uzbekistan cooking using fresh ingredients bought and prepared daily, she was eager to share the delightful mixes of flavors and textures at Pittsburgh's only Uzbek Halal restaurant.

A few minutes later, a glorious wreath of fragrant dough arrived at our table. Cutting its crispy crust revealed fluffy layers of bread cradling thin slices of tender beef. I suggested that they should give that scrumptious bread another name, or simply use the Uzbek words for meat-bread. Although food is a universal language, that delightful wreath deserves something more poetic. For example, the name Kavsar refers to a crystal clear, paradise river. According to their website, "Everyone who plunges into this river, will never thirst and will always be healthy."
Interestingly, the inside of the non or bread reminded me of steamed Chinese flower rolls, or Huā Juǎn 花卷, which are traditionally layered with sesame oil and scallions. Perhaps this should not be surprising given that the Silk Roads funneled right through Uzbekistan and neighboring Turkmenistan, linking northern China with Europe. Several types of dumplings also grace the menu -- chuchvara stuffed with ground beef and onion dipped in sour cream, manti stuffed with beef, pumpkin or spinach, vareniki with  sweet cottage cheese or potato-onion fillings -- as well as golden samsas reminiscent of Indian samosas and Greek tiropitas (at least from the outside) and baked piroshkis. Given the time required to prepare manti, we opted for the chuchvara on this trip.

Chuchvara dumplings

Kavsar's spicy cucumber salad ranks as one of the best salads I have had, taking Asian influences of cucumber marinated in soy sauce and garlic to a whole new height with the burst of bright, grassy anise from the abundant dill (a feature of almost every dish). We quickly devoured the julienned cucumbers, onions, red pepper and fried beef, ladling the leftover dressing onto rice. It was not at all spicy "hot", but rather had a rich blend of contrasting flavors reflecting what I have decided to call the original East-West fusion cuisine dating back up to two thousand years before Pacific Rim or California fusion.

Spicy cucumber salad and Beef borsch soup

Beef stroganoff over mashed potatoes

Lagman - pulled noodles, beef (or chicken) and vegetables

Kavsar special chicken

Tips: 
🐾 Kavsar, on the corner of Southern Ave and Shiloh St, has its own parking lot one block down on Southern across from Natchez St. 
🐾 Although not in the heart of the new Shiloh St shopping area off of Grandview Ave, it is definitely worth walking just one block farther down the street.



DID YOU TRY EATING AT KAVSAR?    Tag @love2chowblog and hashtag it #love2chow

Summer corn - slathered, stir-fried or roasted; A glimpse of two great cookbooks: The Breath of a Wok (2004) and Double Awesome Chinese Food (2019); A potluck worthy riff on an Asian noodle salad with roasted summer vegetables and roast chicken.
Who doesn't love the hot crisp, sweet bite of corn on the cob? There are so many ways to cook it, boiled, grilled and, my personal favorite for ease, speed and guaranteed tenderness -- microwaved in wax paper with salt, pepper and butter.
Shortcut to the recipe for Love2Chow Summery Soy-ginger Noodle Salad
Some years ago, Mexican street corn, or elote, started appearing on upscale taco restaurants. The smoky blend of ancho chiles, salty cotija cheese and mayonnaise pops with the fresh greenness from the lime and cilantro, all in counterpoint to sweet, crisp corn kernels. A friend introduced me to Kenji Lopez-Alt's Serious Eats recipe for elote; she prepared the topping in advance and served it with freshly cooked corn cobs at one of our annual gourmet canoe/kayak camping weekends. The topping is so easy and delicious! We made it as a dip to go with corn, veggies and chips at a family event, and it was finger-licking good.

Elote dip from Serious Eats

While I love the browned, caramelized edges that grilled corn attains, it is too easy to cross the line into drying out the kernels. A recipe in Grace Young's The Breath of a Wok (2004), showcased with a two-page photo spread by Alan Richardson, opened my eyes to a whole new world of possibilities. Liang Nian Xiu's Moon Hill Corn and Beans involves cutting the raw kernels off the corn and stir-frying them with green beans and a tomato, fragrant with the triumvirate of minced garlic, ginger and mild fresh chilies. Absolutely delicious and fresh and simple! The heat of the wok lends perfectly to caramelizing the edges of the corn kernels without risk of drying out the little golden nuggets.

Liang Nian Xiu's Moon Hill Corn and Beans

Among the great things about Grace's recipes is that they almost always work out perfectly the first time you try them, they come with free troubleshooting and advice from the entire Wok Wednesdays Facebook community including the author herself, and they serve as great starting points for variation. What I like to call "clean-out-the-fridge" cooking. Today, I was caught without garlic or tomato, but with two cobs of corn that had been sitting in the fridge all week. The husks were all dried out, but the kernels were still plump. There were also two handfuls of past-their-prime green beans (it had been a busy week), a carrot stump, and a half of a jalapeño pepper. So I adapted Liang Nian's recipe to what I had on hand, sprinkling with brown sugar and omitting the water at the end to augment that rich, browned Maillard flavor.

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Corn cut off the cob also served as the starting point for my riff on a delicious Chinese-American noodle salad from the Li siblings' Double Awesome Chinese Food (2019). I was lucky enough to win this wonderful cookbook through an Eat Your Books giveaway. This is a fun, inventive cookbook less concerned about tradition than with showcasing new combinations that elevate Asian-inspired flavors to a new level. When I tried the Summer Noodle Salad with Ginger Garlic Dressing, I knew this recipe had to be the starting point for our contribution to this year's river camping trip.

I substituted roasted zucchini for spiralized and added roast chicken

There were three of us responsible for feeding 18 hungry people. To accommodate extra prep time for the chosen dessert, Lemon Lust Bars from Joanne Chang's Flour (2010)-the subject of a future post, we decided we needed to adapt this delicious summer recipe into a one-dish meal. Thus, we needed to add sufficient protein to satisfy a group of hungry kayakers.  We quadrupled the dressing recipe, oven-roasting 6-8 pounds of chicken thighs, seasoned generously with Penzey's Galena Street Rib & Chicken Rub, while we were at it roasting the tomatoes and corn. For the vegetarians in the group, we provided Trader Joe's Organic Baked Tofu (teriyaki and sriracha flavors). We cooked the noodles in advance, tossed in olive oil to prevent sticking, and mixed everything on site, cutting up the avocados fresh. While the spaghetti held up perfectly cooked al dente, I recommend soaking the gluten-free rice noodles on site for improved texture -- the flavors were fantastic!

Sheet pans of roasted tomatoes and corn cut off the cob

Oven roasted chicken thighs with Penzey's Galena Street Rub

Summery Soy-Ginger Noodle Salad with Roast Chicken & Vegetables

While canned and frozen corn often work out just fine, I have taken to adding fresh corn cut off the cob to all sorts of dishes, from salads and pizzas to quiches and stews. I've even started tossing cut cobs into the freezer along with frozen bones, onion ends and mushroom stalks. I hear that the cobs add another level of flavor to homemade stocks and soups...


Love2Chow Summery Soy-Ginger Noodle Salad with Roast Chicken & Vegetables