Questions about Emma Laperruque's recipe for stovetop mac & cheese

I cooked Emma's recipe, here, https://food52.com/recipes..., for dinner and decided to increase the cream to 3/4 cup and the grated cheese to 8 oz. (I don't remember why, I just did.) I heated the cream and added all of the grated cheese in one big dump, stirring until the cheese was melted and smooth (or so I thought). I added the cooked pasta, and as I mixed the cheese sauce with the pasta I noticed that some of the cheese began to clump together. I removed the cheese clumps, and proceeded ahead -- and what remained turned out fine, although the sauce was a little thinner than what I was originally hoping for.

My questions are these:

(1) Did I make a mistake in putting in all the cheese at once and stirring it into the heated cream; or should I have added a little at a time, then stirring until it was melted, before I added more cheese?

(2) Was there a problem with slightly increasing the amount of cream and also increasing the amount of cheese?

(3) Does anyone have any additional thoughts as to why the cheese clumped together after I added the pasta and stirred to mix the sauce with the pasta?

Thanks in advance for all your comments/assistance.

gandalf
  • Posted by: gandalf
  • April 1, 2020
  • 1402 views
  • 2 Comments

2 Comments

Emma L. April 1, 2020
Hi Gandalf! With those quantities, you have a higher cheese-to-cream ratio, which might have caused some clumping. Another thing that might have gone awry is too-high heat when the cheese is whisked in. (Mixing it in all at once shouldn't cause any issues.) Hope that helps!
 
gandalf April 1, 2020
Thanks! Next time, I'll go back to the original quantities that you listed in your recipe, and take care that the heated cream is not too hot when I add the cheese.
 
Recommended by Food52