Smoked Chipotle Mac and Cheese
Southern BBQ's best friend is corn bread. BBQ's second best friend is mac and cheese. Toss in some chipotle and let it sit in the smoker with its meat buddies and you're in for one hell of a feast.
Equipment
- Smoker
Ingredients
- 1 lb favorite macaroni-type pasta (elbows, swirls, wagon wheels, etc)
- 1 cup buttermilk (cream works too)
- 2 cup grated cheddar cheese
- 1 cup cream cheese
- ½ cup butter
- 1 tsp chipotle powder
- 1½ tsp kosher salt
- 1 tbsp finely chopped onion white, red or sweet
- ½ cup diced tomato and/or bell pepper (optional)
- ¼ cup bacon bits (optional)
- ½ cup baguette crumbs, panko or cracker crumbs
- crushed red chilis (to taste/look)
- black pepper (to taste)
- chives, cilantro, parsley, diced jalapeno for garnish (optional, to taste)
Instructions
Pasta
- Bring water to boil and lightly salt water. Add pasta of choice and cook to package specifications 8-12 minutes until well cooked.
- Remove from heat, drain and set aside.
Cheese Sauce
- In a medium sized sauce pan, starting with buttermilk, slowly add in butter, cheddar and cream cheese together, keeping a smooth consistency throughout.
- At any time, add salt, finely chopped onions, black pepper and chipotle powder and stir thoroughly. At this time, add any other optional ingredients you wish to have in the sauce (tomato, peppers, bacon bits)
- Once sufficiently melted, remove from heat to avoid burning the sauce.
Smoker
- Preheat smoker to 225°F. Any hotter, you risk drying out your now-perfect mac. If you already have meat in at a different temperature, adjust smoking time accordingly. The idea will be to have maximum smoke-penetration without drying out the pasta.
- In a cast-iron or oven-ready, open-top pan/skillet, mix pasta and cheese sauces together. Ensure all pasta is covered in the sauce.
- Layer-in cheddar cheese and sprinkle/cover with panko/baguette/cracker crumbs across the top of the pasta mixture.
- Smoke for approximately 90 minutes. If possible, keep furthest away from element in order to minimize extra pasta cooking and maximize smoke exposure. I put mine on the top shelf of a 4-rack system.
- Once smoking is done, remove and let stand for 5 minutes before serving.
- Enjoy!
Notes
I've done this on the stove-top-only or in the oven before as well. Similar deliciousness, but smoking really does take it to the next level.
In this photo session, I used wagon wheel pasta. Great success! With the extra surface area on each pasta piece, the smoke flavour really came through and I actually needed less sauce (for equal overall coverage).
My sauce is still a work in progress. I'd love to try with more cream cheese next time for some more richness, but one thing I never skimp on is buttermilk. This adds an extra dimension from heavy cream or regular milk but those are easy substitutions either way.