Mac & Cheese
By amy • • Sep 27th, 2009 • Category: Columns, Prepared Foods
We’re doing it for the children. For years, Shelf Life has resisted the idea of taste testing packaged macaroni and cheese, not only because all neon-coloured meals make us nervous, but because the topic seems over-explored. Is there anything consumers don’t know about this stuff? We know that per capita, Canadians buy more of it than anyone else. We know that sales have shot up in the wake of an uncertain economy. We know about the suspicions surrounding tetrazene in these products, and the alarming amounts of sodium. We know about the folk rumour that the box is healthier than the contents. We know that a certain brand has become preeningly aware of its status among students, so its TV ad campaigns riff on dorms, sex, and cooking mac and cheese on radiators.
Millions love this product in spite of its faults, but Shelf Life is not entirely down with the show. Sure it’s a guilty pleasure; God knows we’ve done our share of dancing with the demon cheese product. But whenever people go on about how iconic it is, we smile weakly and change the subject – to us, it’s discomfort food. In the same way that Stephen Colbert established the difference between truth and truthiness, Shelf Life has to draw a line between food and foodiness.
But at the same time, we know our kids are going to eat it, especially when they’re away from home. So here’s the deal: if the next generation can learn from our trials, Shelf Life will rate these products. We’ll glow orange for a better tomorrow. In the old days, teens needed information about sex. Now, not so much – today, our young people need to make the right decisions about food. And who knows? Even as they’re scarfing down all that tasty polyfiller, these kids’ college educations might pay off. Perhaps some gifted dude will discover that cars can run on packaged cheese powder ( and the tar sands would become irrelevant, replaced by vast bubbling tracts of macaroni and cheese). Or some bright spark may learn that extraterrestrial life forms aren’t interested in our technology or our social organizations but really want to buy Black Sabbath records, stagger into our kitchens and make macaroni and cheese.
Shelf Life has a message for the nation’s innocents: this column depicts Your Brain On Mac And Cheese, and we can only hope you pay close attention to the results.
Putting the needs of the many ahead of their own are this week’s expert judges: Food Jammer and zeitgeist entrepreneur Nobu Adilman; Food Jammer and culture swami Micah Donovan; and food journalist and culinary doomsday researcher Signe Langford, all in Toronto. Space limitations prevent us from evaluating every product in a given category; entries reflect the luck of the draw. Items are blind taste-tested and awarded between zero and five stars.
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Brand One
Annie’s Homegrown Nobu: Packaged mac and cheese is not usually where I roam. I have a perverse interest in Brand One, though, because it’s pretentious – it’s got pasta that looks like fancy sea shells. But the pasta tastes bland, and it’s dry in the middle. It all smells … mystical. Micah: I eat packaged mac and cheese about once a year; it takes me that long to forget I went there. There’s a ribbed shell texture here, with a lack of cling; the sauce and the pasta aren’t holding together – they seem to be the product of separate committees. Signe: The pasta is nasta! It’s too pale, and the whole dish is too runny – you have to eat it with a spoon. The trick with packaged mac and cheese is to use substitutions. I use real salted butter and cream instead of milk, and I dump in a really good quality spicy Mexican salsa. Brand One Total HALF STAR 1/2 |
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Brand Two
Nativa Organics Nobu: At first glance it looks cohesive and authentic, but the minute you actually bite down it squirts out sweetness that tastes like a cheese candy cigarette. I don’t mind the pasta texture, it’s got a certain squeak. Brand Two smells like the inside of a multiplex. Micah: This might be the least fake mac and cheese of the bunch. The thickness and texture are alright; there’s some passable chewiness here. It’s side dish – if you can get over the fact that it tastes a little like Cheez Whiz. Signe: Brand Two is not that hard on the eyes – you get your nice little elbows, and the colour isn’t a screaming neon. It ‘s not too runny, and not too salty. I’d definitely eat this if I was eighteen again, stoned and sitting in my basement with my rabbits, playing cards. Brand Two Total : SIX AND A HALF STARS ******1/2 |
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Brand Three
Life Choices Nobu: It reminds me of KD, but lighter in colour. Tasting Brand Three is like screaming down the highway at 200 miles an hour and pushing the eject button. My senses are exploding. The texture is sticky, it tastes like charred cardboard, and it smells like chemically aged burnt cheese. Micah: Did you know that in the States you can’t take photographs of food manufacturing sites? The secrecy around what we eat is incredible.This a classic example of an industrial foodstuff. It’s got a weird, too-structured taste, like a political press release. Signe: Brand Three is my favourite. It’s an evil treat. I would definitely not jazz it up with vegetables or attempt to make it healthy. It’s got an irresistible smell – very dairy, a touch of the barnyard maybe, like there’s some real cheese in here. It’s an icon, man, so I’d put ketchup on it and not look back. Brand Three Total SIX STARS ****** |
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Brand Four
Kraft Dinner Nobu: The pasta is like plastic pellets, really soft ones. The sauce is watery, and smell is what bad memories are made of. It doesn’t get better. Brand Four tastes like a plastic-wrapped cheese sandwich from a vending machine. Micah: Limpid, soggy texture, watery taste, an aroma like weak cheese – Brand Four is a real disappointment. It gives you all the satisfaction of a bogus paycheque. The pasta elbows are a little longer than the others; the whole thing looks like a lower-achieving KD. Signe; To me it smells like nothing, absolutely nothing, and there doesn’t seem to be any flour in the pasta. The pasta is a bit soft but passable. The colour is bright orange. The flavour is absent. The judge is unimpressed. Brand Four Total ZERO STARS |
Results: Life Choices and Nativa are the top scoring brands in a very low rent field, which means that if you have to go there, hope for the best but prepare for the worst. As for the remaining two, the best that can be said is that they make for glorious, blobby pictures – to view visit our flickr page.
Off The Menu: Is there no hope? Must the children suffer? As far as improvements go, unlike the homemade variety packaged macaroni and cheese doesn’t easily lend itself to upgrading. While chefs like Toronto’s Mark McEwan and high-end restaurants such as New York’s Waverly Inn like to drizzle their cheesy, crusty comfort food with a little truffle oil, Shelf Life can only afford to rummage around in the back of the fridge for emergency aid. And lo and behold – when we hit the bottles things looked up.We doused our mac and cheese with hot sauce, and liked the results. Even better was Worcestershire sauce, which turned out to be so effective that it became something quite awesome – a mac and cheese enabler.
[...] folks at Shelf Life Taste Test review 4 different kinds of macaroni and cheese. Or, as they call it in Canada: Kraft Dinner. [...]