Easy Baked Mac

One of the first pasta recipes I learned in my early years of cooking was this EASY BAKED MACARONI which I would like to share. The original recipe was more complicated and difficult to follow. Through experimentation and a lot of hit or miss, I finally simplified the original recipe, adjusted it to my taste and added beer. I thought of adding beer to replace cooking wine which I often see in meat sauce recipes.

I discovered that cooking with beer helps tenderize the meat faster. It was only much later that I found out that beer does have a tenderizing effect on meat. I also found the malty mild distinctive flavor of beer rather pleasant, hence this recipe of mine was born. You may add canned sliced mushrooms on top if you wish.

Likewise, I also use this meat sauce and white sauce recipe for a QUICK AND EASY LASAGNA. All you have to do is use lasagna noodles and voila, you have a superb tasting lasagna already. You may add dried rosemary to the meat sauce just for that added punch, not too much though as rosemary tends to dominate and overpower the flavors of other spices.

Here are the ingredients for the meat sauce...

1 kilo ground beef
3 Tbsp olive oil
2 medium sized red onions, finely chopped
2 Tbsp sugar
2 beef bouillon cubes
1 Tbsp fine salt
1 tsp Italian seasoning
1 tsp ground pepper
1 cup beer
½ cup water
1 cup tomato sauce

And here are the ingredients for the White Sauce:

1 can evaporated milk
1-70g pack cream of mushroom soup
1 ¾ cup water

Just cook 450g macaroni noodles according to package directions and then top with
grated cheese

Follow this steps...

Dissolve the cream of mushroom soup in a little evaporated milk, then add the rest and the water. Mix well until there are no more lumps then set aside.
In a sauce pan, sauté the onions in olive oil, when onions turn soft, add the ground beef, stir until meat is no longer pink, remove any excess liquid.
Add the sugar, bouillon cubes, salt, Italian seasoning and ground pepper. Allow beef to cook some more, about 10 minutes.
Add the beer and water, cook until almost dry. Add the tomato sauce. Cook for another 30 minutes or until oil comes out on the sides of the sauce pan.
Place the dissolved cream of mushroom soup in another sauce pan, bring to a boil while stirring constantly. When this thickens turn off heat and let cool.
Arrange this on a 3 quarts baking dish, put the meat sauce first, top with macaroni noodles next then add meat sauce again, and then the white sauce, repeat layering until the dish is full.
Top with grated cheese. Bake at 350F for 25 minutes