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It’s NOT just like mom used to make.
A crew of Long Island eighth grade boys beat out 260 entries to earn the title of best mac’n’cheese recipe in the state — with ingredients like sweet corn, Muenster cheese and garlic toast breadcrumbs.
Eleven Southampton Intermediate School kids in the last-period cooking club also used mozzarella, cheddar, bacon and shredded chicken under a pie crust for their award-winning and super aromatic pot-pie MAC.
“Security guards came into the classroom because they could smell it down the hall, everybody loved it,” said Charles Holle, one of the self-proclaimed “Mac Island Mariners.”
“We didn’t expect to win necessarily, but we knew that it had a chance,” he said of the recipe that took first place in Cornell University’s Mac & Cheese Challenge, netting the kids a $300 prize for creative academic endeavors.
The close-knit group made the “spontaneous” decision to participate when the contest started last September, with little to no real experience.
“They were very excited and really wanted to try it out,” teacher Christina Duryea told The Post.
Lack of exposure didn’t matter as the pals were hungry for a win when Duryea told them about the contest on day one.
“The next week, we were already working on recipes, and it just kind of all fell into place,” added teammate Cole Collins.
Their task, per the competition, was “to develop their perfect macaroni & cheese recipe” and submit it on paper to judges, who would independently prepare the dish based on the students’ cooking recommendations.
“We had no clue what the competition was doing because it was private, so we only knew what we were doing,” Collins added.
Duryea’s students knew from the get-go that they had to stand out before the late November deadline, so, without hesitation, they adopted an orthodox approach, using barbecue and buffalo sauces.
“We actually made buffalo mac and cheese balls,” said team member Christopher Glorioso.
“So we did those, and they’re pretty good — but we thought we could do better.”
The gang bared down like they had to impress Gordon Ramsay, fought through creative differences, and designated set responsibilities as they finalized their winning garlic mac and cheese chicken pot pie.
Collins said that once the boys saw faculty rave about the recipe, they knew it was a real winner for the middle school division.
Duryea then took things one step further and brought her bunch on a field trip to nearby Mecox Bay Dairy Farm, where her father works, for a detailed tour of how cheese is made.
“We got to really actually understand the agricultural practices,” Holle said.
“That actually helped us understand a lot more about the recipe.”
After a few more weeks of tweaking toward perfection and creating a locally focused marketing campaign with a fishing theme as a nod to LI, it became a waiting game, as the teens had knots in their stomachs for almost a month after submitting.
The winning notice shocked everyone from Duryea to the children themselves and was the best Christmas break present they could have asked for, they said.
“It’s not just luck, but it was so surprising when we got back that victory letter,” student Read Wilutis added of the recent good news.
Duryea said she was most impressed by how the little chefs learned to collaborate — and how their teamwork yielded a product superior to that of hundreds of their peers across the Empire State.
And the Mac Island Mariners may not be done yet.
“I haven’t told them yet, but there is an ice cream challenge,” Duryea said.
“We’ll see if we’re going to do that or not.”
