I lived a decade in Atlanta and one of my favorite restaurants is Food 101. Their philosophy was to take comfort food (meatloaf, onion rings, tomato soup), and do a gourmet riff on American classics. I lived a block away from the place and I was there once a week.

In that vein, I’ve been thinking of mac-n-cheese lately. If you’re a purist, or have your favorite, you probably don’t want to read further, because I’m going to take it apart and put it back together again. Not because I think my take is the best version there ever was or will be, but because I just wanted to play with a classic.

So: New Mexico Chile, Three Cheese Mac-n-Cheese, with criminis, and (of course) bacon.

Say Cheese!