Mac & Cheese with Hidden Veg
The reliable kid winner — a scratch cheese sauce with carrot and a little zucchini melted invisibly into it. One pot plus the steam oven, about 25 minutes.
One pot + steam oven · ~25 min · serves 4. No onion/garlic.
Ingredients
- 300 g macaroni
- 40 g butter
- 30 g plain flour
- 600 ml milk
- 120 g cheddar, grated
- 30 g parmesan, grated
- 1 carrot, grated (hidden)
- ½ medium zucchini, grated (hidden, just a little)
- pinch nutmeg
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 head broccoli
Method
The broccoli steams while you make everything in the one pot — boil, then build the sauce in the same pot.
🔥 In the steam oven (runs alone)
Steam oven — no preheat needed; set it going from cold.
- Put the broccoli in to steam.
🍳 On the hob — one pot
Boil (~8 min)
- Boil the macaroni until just tender; drain and set aside.
Sauce, same pot (~8 min)
- Melt the butter, stir in the flour, cook 1 min.
- Whisk in the milk gradually; simmer ~4 min until it coats a spoon.
- Stir in the carrot and zucchini; cook 2 min until soft and disappearing.
- Off the heat, stir in the cheddar, parmesan and nutmeg until smooth.
🍱 To assemble
- Lift out the baby’s portion, then season.
- Fold the macaroni back in; box with the steamed broccoli.
Notes
- For totally invisible veg, stick-blend the sauce before adding the cheese.
- Reheat in the steam oven with a splash of milk. Keeps 3 days.
- Add diced cooked chicken for extra protein if you like.
Changelog
- v2 — fixed the steam-oven and sauce steps so they render as numbered lists (blank lines before each list block).
- v1 — first version.