Before I had my daughter, my meals for the most part consisted of the fastest of fast food joints and the best takeout. After all, I was a busy college girl and then later a busy career woman. Now that I have a daughter, I’m still incredibly busy, but want to provide healthy meals for my growing girl, instead of feeding her the junk I subsisted on the last few years.
That sent me on the hunt for healthy, yet easy, recipes. Now, I’m no Paula Deen and not every single recipe I make is uber healthy (my daughter IS, after all, a huge fan of hot dogs and mac and cheese), but for the most part, I want my meals to be low-sodium, low-calorie and contain ingredients chock full of all the good stuff that keeps you healthy, like vitamins, healthy fats and protein. I guess you could say I’m a quasi-clean eater.
Of course, my job is a whole lot easier because I focus on those healthy ingredients. This is the reason I love Silk Soy Milk so much! Lactose and dairy free, Silk Soy Milk is an excellent source of omega-3’s, antioxidants and contains 50 percent more calcium than dairy milk. Plus it’s low in saturated fat and cholesterol-free.
Unlike other soy milks made from soy proteins that are chemically extracted, Silk is made from whole soybeans, preserving the proteins, flavones, essential fatty acids, omega-3’s and fiber, and it bears the Non-GMO Project Verified Seal. The Non-GMO Project Verified Seal means that it has gone through a verification process to ensure the product was made per consensus-based best practices for GMO avoidance. In other words, it’s not genetically modified and awesome!
But silk Soy Milk isn’t just a healthy ingredient. It’s an incredibly healthy alternative to drinking dairy milk. Plus, it tastes great, too!
This weekend, I took my daughter’s love of mac and cheese and went on the search for a recipe with ingredients closer to the Earth than the stuff made from a box. There are so many tasty looking recipes out there and it was a little overwhelming at first, so I took some of the elements of each of those recipes and created a pretty awesome mac and cheese dish, if I do say so myself. I used low-fat cheese, a simple rue (I promise it’s easy), some spices and of course, Silk Soy Milk to make it healthier than most other versions.
The recipe is below, so you can try it yourself! For my entire shopping experience, check out my Google+ album.
Homemade Mac and Cheese Recipe
- 1 lb elbow macaroni
- 6 tbsp butter
- 6 tbsp flour
- 2 tbsp powdered mustard
- 6 cups Silk Soy Milk
- 1 cup onion, diced finely
- 2 large eggs
- 24 oz sharp cheddar, shredded
Assemble ingredients.
In a large pot, cook pasta until al dente. Meanwhile, melt the butter, whisk in the flour and powdered mustard until smooth. Stir in the milk and onion. Simmer for ten minutes.
Temper in the egg. (How do you “temper in” an egg? Good question. Check out the process here.) Next, add 75 percent of the cheese. Stir the macaroni into the mix and pour into a 2.5- to 3-quart casserole dish. Since mac & cheese can never have too much cheese, top the mixture with the remaining cheese. Melt the butter and stir in the bread crumbs to coat before topping the macaroni with the bread crumb mixture.
Now it’s time for the oven! Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.
When the half hour is up, remove from oven and let sit five minutes before serving. Look how cheesy!
We had ours with my healthier Sloppy Joes. It was a super-tasty meal! For other recipes containing Silk Soy Milk, check out Silk’s Facebook page. You can also find Silk on Pinterest and Twitter!
I am a member of the Collective Bias® Social Fabric® Community. This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias® and WhiteWave. All opinions are my own. #cbias #SocialFabric
Looks delicious!
Looks super yummy! Btw, love the new look of your blog! 🙂
Thanks, Heather!
Yum! Great recipe choice for Silk. I am a big fan of Silk soy milk and love how easy it is to sub in for recipes. Thanks for sharing. Can’t wait to try the new flavor myself.
Thanks, guys! It was so super easy to use silk in place of milk and tasted great!
This looks amazing!!! I have got to start eating before I read food blog posts- I am so hungry now for some good comfort food! 🙂
Mac & Cheese is a GREAT comfort food! And yes, I have the SAME problem! lol
I have always wanted to try Silk, but haven’t known anyone who has tried it! Now, I won’t be scared! Thanks so much! 🙂
It’s really tasty and good for you! If you try it, let me know what you think!
I tried Silk after seeing it on that commercial where everyone loves it in the cereal……not so much with me. But I never even thought about using it in a recipe! Great idea. I’ll try that next time. Maybe it’s something I need to develop a taste for.
I think it is definitely different when you’re used to drinking cow’s milk your whole life, but we like it. And I can’t tell the difference when using it in a recipe! 🙂
WOW that looks delish!! Thanks for sharing, we love silk here too. We just tried the berry silk and my kids are in love.
We haven’t tried that yet, but I’m looking forward to checking out all the flavors!
That does look delicious! I tried two different mac n cheese recipes last weekand I’m all mac-ed out. I pinned this for my next attempt!
Thanks for pinning it! We eat mac and cheese A LOT in this house, too!
Okay I want to come to your house for Mac and Cheese, that looks so yummy!! I never thought to use Silk Soy in my Mac and Cheese I will have to use it the next time I make it :)!
lol! The more the merrier!
Looks super yummy!
Thank you! It was!
Looks so good!….now if I only knew how to cook….
ha! Cate you crack me up! It’s actually pretty easy!
We’re grain free here so no mac n cheese for us, but I LOVE that Silk has committed to non-GMO soy. Good for them!
Definitely great to know! I’m so glad there are more companies focusing on health and quality!
Looks delicious! I’d love for you to link it up to my Tutorial Tuesday Blog Hop tomorrow if you’re interested. http://thebreezybirdie.blogspot.com/search/label/Tutorial%20Tuesday
Looks like I missed it! I’ll link up next week. Thanks for the invite!
This looks so yummy and good for you too!!
I’m willing to try it! Looks wonderful!
Let me know if you do! I love hearing feedback on the recipes I share!
I had mac n’ cheese for lunch, but with this gloomy weather I think that I want some more.
I always want comfort food when it’s gloomy out! This is one of those extra comforting foods for sure!
This sounds awesome and looks delicious! can’t wait to give it a try!
Let me know if you do! 🙂
I wonder if you could use plain soy milk to make boxed mac and cheese. We are trying to reduce our level of milk consumption.
I wouldn’t see why not! Give it a try! 🙂
It never occurred to me to use soy milk! Why not? I love it!
Looks delicious! We love mac and cheese around here!
This looks so good. Thank you for the recipe..
Okay now I’m hungry! Looks so yummy…
I have got to try this recipe it looks super good. I have not tried soy milk before but I have been wanting to try it. I am always looking for healthy recipes.
This looks amazing! I have a confession. I have never made macaroni and cheese from scratch. I always make it out of the box. Partially because I’m not a huge fan. I’m thinking that it might just be better this way and I may actually like it. I will have to try it. Thanks for sharing!
It’s a lot different than the box kind. So much tastier!
I’ve never made it from scratch either and I only eat the boxed stuff from Kraft. I have eaten other people’s homemade Mac & Cheese though and it was good so I should try it sometime. Thanks.
I think you would really like it! The trick is to use a sharper cheese to bring the flavors out.
I have never tried soy milk before!
yum yum! Thanks for sharing 🙂
Wow, that mac and cheese looks delicious! Thanks for sharing the recipe.
Thanks for all the comments! I always love to hear your feedback!