Lobster & cheddar mac and cheese
A proper mornay — flour, brown butter, milk, two cheeses — baked over elbow macaroni in a thick sauce and a browned top, with the lobster added at the end so it stays sweet and uncooked-looking. The whole plate is the same dish as every other mac & cheese on a menu; the difference is that the sauce was built at the pass, not mixed from a packet.
Inspired by
The lobster mac and cheese plate on the upscale American-diner and seafood-menu: a baked casserole with a glossy, deep-orange sauce, a browned crust, and a tail or a claw or both on top. (No single house is claimed for it — it's a kind of plate, and the archetype is strong enough to write to.)
Technique notes
The whole page is a white sauce turned into a mornay: the brown butter is the fat in the roux, and the sauce logic (season at the end, cheese off the heat) is the same logic as the miso in the Japanese section, just with more cheese on it.
Why the restaurant does it this way
The mornay is built at the start of the service, held, and finished with the lobster at the pass — the sauce doesn't need the heat at the moment the plate goes out, and the lobster doesn't. The brown butter is the upgrade over a plain white-sauce mac: the hazelnut note carries the cheddar further, and the top is baked brown, not melted yellow, because the dish is supposed to land with a crust, not a film. The pasta is al dente, not soft, because it's going to sit in the sauce for the 15–20 minutes of the bake, and the top of the scale is what the oven is for.
Equipment
- A 26-cm (10-inch) saucepan with a tight lid, for the mornay
- A 20 × 26 cm (8 × 10-inch) baking dish, generous depth — the sauce is meant to coat, not pool
- A fine whisk, and a wooden spoon for the stirring
- Grater for the cheese — it melts faster, and it coats the noodles more evenly
Ingredients
- 250 g (about 9 oz) elbow macaroni (or a medium-cut shell), cooked 2 minutes short of the packet time, drained, and coated in 5 ml (1 tsp) of oil so it doesn't stick in the dish
- 50 g (⅓ cup) butter, browned to a hazelnut color, for the roux — see the brown-butter article for the move and the window
- 25 g (2 tbsp) plain flour (all-purpose), for the roux
- 250 ml (1 cup, plus) whole milk, for the mornay
- 150 ml (⅔ cup) heavy cream, for the richness on top of the mornay
- 100 g (about 3 ½ cups, lightly packed) cheddar, finely grated, plus 50 g of a sharp cheddar or a gruyère, for the top
- 180 g (about 6 oz) cooked lobster meat, in chunks, for the top — the claw is the classic, the tail is the easier, and both are fine
- 30 g (2 tbsp, packed) dry bread crumbs, for the crust — the browned top is the last move of the dish, and it's what separates the plate from a bowl
- 2 g (2 pinches) salt, 1 g white pepper, and 1 g nutmeg, for the mornay
Method
- Cook the macaroni to 2 minutes short of the packet time, so the center of the piece is still a little dense, and drain it. (The pasta is going to sit in the sauce for the 15–20 minutes of the bake, and al dente at the start is the only way to end with a piece that still has a bite at the end of the dish.)
- Brown the butter to a hazelnut color over medium-low, and take it off the heat. (See the brown butter article for the move; the foam dies, the solids toast, and you stop at hazelnut.)
- Stir the flour into the brown butter and cook the roux for 1–2 minutes, so the raw flour is cooked out and the color is a pale, toasty gold — the same color as the finished sauce.
- Add the milk in three parts, beating each in until smooth before the next goes in, then the cream, and cook the mornay for 5 minutes over a gentle heat until it coats the back of a spoon. The target is a thick, slightly glossy, pourable sauce — not a paste, and not a thin, runny liquid.
- Take the pot off the heat, let it cool for 30–60 seconds, and stir in the two cheeses, the salt, the pepper, and the nutmeg, until the sauce is smooth and the cheese has melted into it. (The same rule as the miso in the Japanese section: cheese that's been in a rolling boil will break, string, and separate, and the sauce will go from creamy to oily in a sentence. Off the heat, the cheese melts cleanly.)
- Butter the baking dish, spread the drained macaroni out in an even layer, and pour the mornay over it, pressing the sauce into the pieces so every noodle is coated. (The sauce is the dish, not the pasta, and a piece of noodle that isn't coated in the finished plate is the sign the sauce didn't reach it.)
- Lay the lobster chunks over the top, scatter the bread crumbs evenly over the whole surface, and bake at 200 °C / 400 °F for 12–15 minutes, until the top is a deep, even brown and the sauce is bubbling at the edges. (The brown top is the last move of the dish, and it's what separates the plate from a bowl; the bubbling at the edges is the signal the center is heated through.)
- Serve straight from the dish, with a wedge of lemon and a spoon. The lobster went in at the pass, so it lands sweet and uncooked-looking — that's the good part of the dish.
Common failures
- The pasta is soft and the plate is a thick, paste-y mass. The macaroni was cooked to full at the start, and it went soft in the 15-minute bake. Cook it 2 minutes short, and the final piece should still have a bite at the end of the dish.
- The sauce is oily and stringy, not cream. The cheese went in while the sauce was still at a rolling boil, and the protein and the fat separated. The fix is the one in step 5: off the heat, cool for 30–60 seconds, then stir the cheese in. The sauce is meant to be glossy, not stringy.
- The top is pale and the edges are dark. The heat was on the bottom of the pan, and the top of the dish didn't get the oven's direct heat. A higher oven shelf, and a darker, more even bake, is the fix: the oven is for the top, not the bottom.
- The plate tastes one-note, like cheese on pasta. The brown butter wasn't brown enough, or the nutmeg was left out. The hazelnut note in the roux is what carries the cheddar further, and the nutmeg is the quiet something that a restaurant puts on top of the cream. If the plate tastes flat, push the brown butter a little further next time, and the nutmeg goes in at the end, not at the start.
Variations & substitutions
- No lobster. The dish is still the dish without it — a proper mornay mac and cheese, and the brown-cheddar and the crust are what separate it from the packet version. A claw is the classic, a tail is the easier, and a mix of the two is the plate the restaurant does when it has both.
- A sharper cheese on top. Swap the 50 g gruyère for a blue cheese, a 50 g of blue, or a 30 g of a sharp cheddar, for a more bitter, more intense top — the same mornay, the same bake, and a darker, more bitter edge to the finished plate.
- Half the butter, half the richness. If the plate is too heavy for the table, halve the cream and the butter, and the mornay is lighter, the bake is the same, and the top still browns. The brown butter is the flavor, and a lighter mornay is the plate you want for a meal that has other parts on it.
What to serve with it
A simple, clean green — a little frisée or a plain lettuce, with a light lemon-oil dressing — that cuts the richness of the mornay and the lobster. A cold beer, or a crisp, dry white (a sauvignon blanc or a pinot gris), or a light red (a pinot noir), and a plate of the club sandwich for the person who wants two courses from the same diner menu.
More
Back to Restaurant · Techniques (bechamel, brown butter, sauces 101)