Southern Mac ’n’ Cheese

Anybody who doubts that macaroni and cheese has a Southern pedigree need only be directed to any cafeteria from Virginia to Alabama to observe the heaping spoonfuls being plopped on virtually every plate that passes down the line. History has not recorded whether this was the dish Thomas Jefferson had in mind when he sent an emissary to Naples for a macaroni machine, but it’s for sure that by the mid-nineteenth century, the casserole was evolving from layered macaroni and c