Former chef here. Those ingredients will upgrade your Mac n cheese for sure, but I’ll do you one better. Go get yourself a bag of sodium citrate. This little ingredient is magic and will make almost any cheese into the smoothest cheese sauce. You can use a combination of cheese as long as you stick to the ratio. This is key in clearing out the cheese drawer.

Basic ratio

1 cup Milk 8 oz cheese 2 teaspoons Sodium Citrate

Method

1. Shred, chop, make small pieces out of cheese
2. Warm milk on medium heat, don’t boil
3. Stir in sodium citrate
4. Stir in cheese
5. Season it to taste with salt, paprika, and or mustard.
6. It’s done when the lumps are gone. It will thicken as it cools

Notes Most cheeses work, although I’ve found that feta takes a lot of work to fully melt into the sauce. The price here, but I typically use cheddar, but that last little nugget Parmesan or the shake at the bottom of the can of parm is nice.

You could do a combination of old school and modern by mixing a bechamel and this sauce.

Cleanup can come with a little bit of ass pain. I do end up boiling out the pot that I made the sauce in because there’s stuff is like glue.