20 Dinners in 20 Days, Day 2: Crock Pot Mac and Cheese

I am on a roll. I had the most productive day today since summer began.  I completed a canvas project for my BFF that I've been planning for what seems like forever. I'm working on a few more so I'll do a tutorial once I finish a couple more, but here is a sneak peak:

She has the same 3 birds tattooed behind her ear and she is a huge Bob Marley fan and she was thrilled.  Not to toot my own horn but I was pretty proud of myself too.

 I also made a sourdough starter, for bread I hope to bake when it cools off a bit (not anytime soon since it is forecasted to be over 113 degrees for the next 5 days, yikes).

So I was looking for something easy, breezy to make for dinner.  Nothing says easy like the crock pot, and Mac and Cheese is always delicious.

I found a bunch of recipes on pinterest, but nothing that I really loved so I decided to take a chance and wing it a little. Spoiler alert, it worked out.

Here's what I did:

I bought the Ragu cheese sauce by accident, but I'm glad I found a way to use it.

I cooked the noodles to Al dente, which for the whole wheat pasta was about 7 minutes

While the noodles were cooking I mixed the cheese sauce with  1/2 tsp of salt and pepper, 1 cup of milk , 1/2 cup each of mozzarella and Cheddar

As an afterthough I also added 1 tbsp of butter and 1 1/2 tbsp of flour 

I had these in the fridge so I threw them into the sauce too.

Added the noodles and stirred to combine. Then  let cook on low in the crock pot for 3 hours stirring occasionally.

Cartie's plate, the first of three helpings :-)

 This came out smooth and creamy and yummy, and again no oven!

*There were a ton of leftovers, since I still haven't mastered cooking for two, so I added a can of tuna and some peas and carrots and Day 3 Tuna casserole #BOOM

Crock Pot Mac n Cheese

1 Jar Ragu Double Cheddar Sauce

Shredded Mozzarella and Cheddar Cheeses 1/2 cup of each

1 Cup of Milk

1 tbsp of Butter

1 1/2 tbsp AP Flour

Dash of Parmesan Cheese

salt and pepper to taste

1 13.5 oz box of Elbow Macaroni cooked to Al Dente

Combine ingredients and cook on low for 3 1/2 to 4 hours, stirring occasionally.

This was really easy and good, not as good as the old fashion oven baked version, but a nice summer option.  Do you have a go to mac and cheese recipe? Thanks for reading I already have a great idea for day 4 that I can't wait to share...until then stay glitzy!