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The history of mac and cheese is a fascinating side note that takes us from the experimental kitchens of 14th-century Europe to the industrialized production lines of the United States.
Pasta makers in 14th century Italy and England combined dried pasta with aged cheeses, creating the first versions of macaroni and cheese.
Cooks layered strips of hand-cut pasta with grated hard cheese in clay pots, mixing the ingredients with butter.
Cooking the mac n’ cheese over open hearths.
The Italian kitchen manual "Liber de Coquina" described a dish of fermented cheese melted over flat pasta, while England's "Forme of Cury" detailed a recipe that mixed fresh hand-rolled pasta with aged cheddar.
These early cooking methods would become what we know as macaroni and cheese.
In 1769, Elizabeth Raffald published "The Experienced English Housekeeper," which included the first documented recipe for macaroni and cheese in English cooking.
The recipe called for boiled macaroni tubes mixed with butter and cheese.
She layered the pasta with fresh cream and cheddar, then topped it with grated Parmesan.
Under heat, the cheese melted into the hollowed pasta while the top browned to a crust.
This exact recipe became the blueprint for the dish we know today.
In 1784, Thomas Jefferson traveled to Paris as the American Minister to France.
There, he tasted his first macaroni and cheese.
He wrote detailed notes about the pasta-making process and ordered a macaroni mold from Naples to create the curved tubes.
In 1789, he shipped this mold along with several boxes of macaroni to his home at Monticello in Virginia.
Jefferson's records show he imported 86 crates of macaroni and multiple wheels of Parmesan between 1789 and 1801.
His enslaved chef, James Hemings, learned to prepare the dish while training in Paris.
On February 6, 1802, at a presidential dinner, Hemings served macaroni in a cheese sauce to Washington politicians and diplomats.
The dinner guest Daniel Webster described it as "a pie of macaroni, cooked in a way which is a mystery to most Americans."
In 1824, Mary Randolph published "The Virginia House-Wife," introducing a mac and cheese recipe that made it simple to cook for the average housewife.
Her version used three ingredients: macaroni noodles, sharp cheese, and fresh butter.
She layered these in a baking dish and cooked them until the cheese melted into a golden crust.
The recipe was free from the cream sauces and complex spice blends common in European versions—making it practical for American kitchens.
Randolph's cookbook sold thousands of copies across Virginia and neighboring states.
The recipe helped mac and cheese become a common table dish in America.
Factory innovations in 1885 transformed how Americans ate macaroni and cheese.
New industrial machines could shape pasta into uniform tubes at ten times the speed of hand-rolling.
Steel roller mills ground semolina flour so fine that pasta dried without cracking.
Meanwhile, dairy factories in Wisconsin and New York churned out 50-pound wheels of cheddar cheese for $0.15 per pound, down from $0.45 in 1870.
The industrial revolution slashed the cost of macaroni and cheese's core ingredients.
A working family in Chicago could now buy a pound of macaroni for $0.08 and enough cheese for a casserole for $0.12.
Just fifteen years earlier, those same ingredients cost more than a day's wages at $0.75 total!
By 1890, the Ladies' Home Journal printed a macaroni and cheese recipe that fed six people for $0.25—about what a textile worker earned in two hours.
Cookbooks began listing it under "economical dishes" rather than "fancy preparations."
In 1942, American and Canadian families faced strict food rationing because of World War II.
The U.S. government limited households to 2 pounds of meat and 4 ounces of cheese per person each week.
Kraft's boxed macaroni and cheese, introduced in 1937 at 19 cents per box, helped the average Joe continue to eat the dish.
Each box contained dried pasta and powdered cheese that required only boiling water and margarine to prepare.
Sales of boxed macaroni and cheese tripled between 1943 and 1945.
The blue boxes filled kitchen cabinets across North America as families sought meals that wouldn't spoil and didn't require rationed ingredients.
A mother in Detroit could feed her four children a hot dinner for less than a dollar, while saving her family's precious meat and cheese rations for other meals.
The war ended in 1945, but boxed macaroni and cheese had carved its place in North American kitchens.
Kraft sold 50 million boxes in 1946, making mac and cheese a ubiquitous Americana dish.
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