Frozen Macaroni & Cheese dinners for those busy nights

Just ask anyone who's ever lived with me - macaroni & cheese is my go-to, default meal. When I was little and would hardly eat anything? Macaroni & cheese was one of my favorite foods. (As was broccoli. True story.)

Until I had to stop eating gluten, Annie's shells and cheddar was approximately my favorite thing on the planet. Their GF version doesn't thrill me as much, although I do like it. I find that DeBoles rice pasta and cheese dinner is much closer to the flavor of the original Annie's (for some reason, Annie's uses a different cheese in their GF dinner than in their original).

Just last night, I decided I needed to cook up that box of DeBoles that had been sitting in my pantry. Remember that broccoli-love I mentioned? Mmm, they taste great together.



But what I really loved when I was a kid was the Stouffer's frozen macaroni & cheese entrée, and since the start of my gluten-free diet, I've been a fan of Amy's rice macaroni & cheese. The problem is, a frozen entrée sells for upwards of $3 at my local Shaw's, and also it's not the best nutritional choice out there.

So, a week or two back, I pulled out my Gluten Free Gourmet Cooks Comfort Foods, and did a little calculating. If a 9"x13" casserole makes 8 servings, what size stoneware dish do I need for an individual serving? Then, I went online and bought eight 16-oz ramekins with fitted rubber lids, and got ready to cook.

Let me take this moment to send my thoughts to the family of Bette Hagman, The Gluten-Free Gourmet herself, who passed away recently. She has given us all a great deal, and will truly be missed. Although I didn't follow her recipe exactly in this case, and haven't technically baked any of it yet, this one is


I mostly followed Bette's recipe for macaroni & cheese casserole, with two ingredient changes: in place of the butter, I used olive oil; and for the cheddar cheese, I used Cabot 75% reduced fat cheddar. I tasted the sauce, and trust me, nothing's missing.



I combined the cooked macaroni with the sauce back in the boiling pot (after rinsing pot and macaroni well with cold water), stirred them together, then spooned the mixture into the ramekins. I covered each with its lid, then stacked them in the freezer. Stoneware can go from freezer to microwave or oven to dishwasher (if I had one), so it's perfect for homemade frozen dinners. Looking forward to quickly grabbing one of these on a busy night when I want something yummy and don't have time to cook it!