mY mac and cheese jones

     I'm not someone who normally has anything to do with meals that come in a box off the supermarket shelf, I know they belong to the unhealthy processed food group,  just so much
salt, sugar, modified corn starch, hydrolyzed yeast extract, sodium phosphate
and artificial flavor and dye.  
    And it’s not like there’s any reason why I would have to eat that sort of thing; I know how to cook healthy food from fresh ingredients, so why would I eat processed food from a kit, least of all
macaroni and cheese from a kit? 
    It’s not that I don’t like macaroni and cheese;  I love mac and cheese just the same as every other member of the human race  though I seldom indulge in it; I figure
it’s probably one of the most calorific entities you can put into your mouth.
 But if I must have mac and cheese I can whip up a delicious batch of
 home made  in the crockpot, where the calories at least come from real milk, real
margarine, real cheddar cheese and real – well, sort of real – velveeta. *
     But here’s the thing: I also love the Noodles & Company macaroni and cheese, which is how this story  beings.
    Last week  I picked up Tommy at the airport after a business trip and as it was on the late side of dinner time we both agreed that some Noodles & Company would be good.
    Tommy got the penne rosa, and I got what I always get, the
macaroni and cheese.  And it was, indeed good, with a light but creamy sauce and topped with finely grated cheddar.
     So  good, in fact,  that the next night after work when I was on my own for dinner all I could think
of was another round of Noodles & Company mac and cheese.
    I headed for the restaurant, but the traffic was bad on Hamilton
Road, and there was no other route.
    While I sat in traffic trying to decide how badly I wanted Noodles & Company mac and cheese, the thought popped into my mind of zipping into the Krogers just up ahead and seeing if I could rustle up the ingredients to whip together a Noodles & Company knock-off. 
I pulled into the Krogers parking lot.
    But by the time I dragged into the store I’d lost my mojo for cooking or driving, I just wanted to eat.  
That’s when I thought of  the mac and cheese in a box. 
     I headed for the boxed-food aisle and checked out the wares. Oh, well, why not just this once? What harm could one fake-food dinner do? Along side the
standard-issue neon orange mac and cheese there was a white variety with a photo
on the box of pipe-shaped pasta that looked just like the Noodles & Company
mac and cheese.
    I grabbed the white stuff.  The white looked more wholesome than
th orange, though I held no illusions that there was really any difference
between the  two, except for the neon orange dye.  
     So I went home and cooked up my fake white macaroni and cheese
according to instructions:  1/3 cup of milk, ¼  cup of  butter – actually I used I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter.  It tasted salty even for me, a saltaholic.  So I upped the milk to ½ cup and the ICBINB to 1/3 cup and tried it again.  OMG.  It was smooth;  it was light; it was tasty!  I scooped some into a bowl and topped  it with finely shredded sharp cheddar; it was ICan’t Believe It’s Not Noodles &
Company!
    I scarfed down half the batch then finished the rest of  it for lunch the next day. 
That night Tom arrived home and for dinner I fixed fish with my boxed mac
and cheese surreptitiously prepared with the extra milk and ICBINB and topped
with shredded cheddar. I served it up in a blue glass bowl. 
Tom didn’t suspect that her’d been served a mac and cheese
knock-off.
    The next day we ate the left-over mac and cheese for lunch and
the following day Theresa and Phill arrived for a visit.      
  “How about some mac and cheese for lunch!”  I cried.
    “More mac and cheese?”  Tom asked as I once again set the blue glass bowl full of shredded-topped pasta on the table.
    His question hit me like a wake-up call. I’d been eating
macaroni and cheese for the past four days.  And I felt like I wanted to keep eating
it.  But not any macaroni and cheese.  I only wanted my Noodles
& Company knock-off, full of  starch and yeast and 
preservatives and whatever addictive additives they put in it that was
giving me this  macaroni and cheese Jones.
    The next day I read about the study on carbs and processed food
and fat cells.  I went upstairs and stepped on my bathroom scale.  It
read 132.6 pounds, 2.6 pounds over my fighting weight. 
I had  to face that I had a mac and cheese Jones, and that I’d taken a hit by the Fat Cell
Mob.
    That was 4 days ago and I haven’t eaten any macaroni and cheese
since. I think I’ve been scared straight.

*If you’d like a really good and easy crock-pot macaroni and
cheese recipe:

1pound of macaroni, cooked, drained, and
rinsed

1stick of butter or margarine

3 ½ cups of milk

 1 block of velveeta cheese, (the smaller block of the two
possible blocks)  cut into cubes 

1 cup shredded sharp cheddar
cheese
Put all ingredients into a crock pot,  cook on high for about 3 hours. Enjoy! 8)