Who didn’t love a heaping bowl of Kraft Mac & Cheese when they were a kid?
I certainly know I loved that stuff.
But now that I’m an adult, I can’t help but think twice about the package of cheese that you sprinkle onto the noodles and wonder if there’s a better and healthier way.
Not to mention that box of Mac & Cheese contains three servings (and I ate the WHOLE box).
ONE SERVING of the traditional box:
- 350 calories
- 13g of Fat
- 720g sodium
- 47g of carbs!
Multiple that three times over and you can see where we might have a problem!
So I was asking myself, “how can I recreate one of my favorite foods- make it low-calorie, have better macros, still be tasty AND convenient like the box.
A little bit of R&D in the kitchen combined with my favorite appliance, my air fryer, I struck gold.
And what I came up with shook out to be:
360 Cals, 50g Carbs, 8g Fat, 22g Protein for an entire skillet!
Bet you want in on the secret, am I right?
No worries, I’ll share 😉
| Servings |
Whole Skillet
|
- 56 grams Macaroni
- 100 grams water
- 60 grams Almond Milk or Skim Milk
- 42 grams Light Shredded cheese of your choice
- 10 grams All Purpose Flour
- 15 grams Yellow Mustard
Ingredients
|
|
- Add all your ingredients (Save 14g of your cheese) into a bowl and mix together till all combined. Next, take a 6.5in cast iron skillet and spray with non stick cooking spray. Add all your ingredients to your cast iron skillet and add to air fryer on 360 degrees F for 18 minutes.
- Periodically as it is cooking, you will want to mix it around to avoid any burning. So for reference, after 5 minutes cooking, at the half way point and then at the 14 minutes mark another mix. Then mix in the rest of your shredded cheese and enjoy!
- The All Purpose Flour is super important to the consistency of mac & cheese. It’s going to bring everything together. Not necessary per se, but if you make it with and without, you will notice a big difference. Worth the extra 7-8g carbs in my eyes.
- I just used regular elbow macaroni. You could sub in whatever pasta you use and I’m sure it will go well! Could be Gluten Free or even the higher protein pasta that’s on the market now.
- If you wanted to make this non dairy, I really do think a non dairy cheese would work fine in this recipe. Full disclaimer, I have yet to try this but I have a hunch it would work!
And if you want to make sure you absolutely crush this recipe- I got you covered with a video tutorial on the Tubes as well!
