Wise and powerful Goldfish of Knowledge.
How do you make the cheese sauce that good? I keep trying and all attempts fail.
I am a failure to all of sauce-kind!
start with a roux! 2 tbs butter melted over medium heat in a saucepan, add 2 tbsp flour and a few shakes of salt once it's melted (gluten free works fine if you use one of the 1-1 flours) and stir it CONSTANTLY for a couple minutes until it turns light brown, then dump in a cup of milk and switch your spatula for a whisk- just beat the shit out of it until it's smooth. add your seasonings at this point, I used garlic and smoked hot paprika for this one. add about a third of a cup of sour cream and whisk until smooth, then let it bubble away for a few minutes until it smells insane. turn the heat down and add 8 oz of shredded cheese of your choice in batches, whisking between batches to make sure it incorporates. season further to taste and top your noodles with it.
I used a sweet farmhouse-style cheddar from Northwoods co but you can really use any cheese- just make sure you shred it yourself. you can even use not-very-melty cheese like aged cheddar if you incorporate a couple of melty cheeses along with it, or a couple slices of kraft american singles if you want to cheat.
this recipe is for about 8 oz of cooked noodles. enjoy!
JOKES ON YOU I WAS ALSO A WISCONSINITE ALL ALONG
for real though I just wanted to explain the kraft singles thing a little more- it's not for flavor, but for the stabilizers!
there's barely any actual cheese in this, but there is enough sodium citrate and glycerin that if you drop a couple of slices on top of a cheese that absolutely doesn't want to melt, like aged cheddar or pleasant ridge reserve or something, the stabilizers will not only convince that cheese to incorporate, they will also magically prevent the sauce from breaking and allow you to reheat it easily later.
tldr: it's a cheap and easy way to convince fancy intractable cheeses to behave! use it in any application that you want to make a dairy-based sauce smooth and unbreakable.
