The Best Boxed Mac and Cheese: A Blind Taste Test

The verdict: You might be tempted to assume Kroger’s boxed mac and cheese is like most others—it does, after all, look almost exactly the same. Its straight tube of a noodle is a faint buttercup yellow, and the slight sheen suggests a decent amount of sauce has managed to cling on. But upon first taste, you’ll see why Kroger is different: Its sauce is so sweet, we wondered if this was truly meant to be a savory dish.

Photograph by Isa Zapata, Prop Styling by Tim Ferro, Food Styling by Sean Dooley

Somehow Sauceless: Whole Foods Macaroni and Cheese

What’s inside: A relatively long list of ingredients here, with guest stars like silicon dioxide and titanium dioxide. The former is an anti-caking agent, and the latter adds a white-ish color to the sauce.

The verdict: This mac and cheese looked mysteriously sauceless. That’s because the thin sauce had trouble grabbing on to the smooth noodles and instead pooled at the bottom of the bowl. In the end, tasters were grateful that there was less sauce because it had a strange artificial twang—like cheddar that was left uncovered in the fridge for a week. Associate cooking editor Antara Sinha noticed a “slight pepperiness” after each bite that didn’t compliment the cheese and, to Carly, it tasted sour.

Photograph by Isa Zapata, Prop Styling by Tim Ferro, Food Styling by Sean Dooley

The Impressive Upstart: Goodles Cheddy Mac

What’s inside: Goodles is a relatively new macaroni and cheese brand, which offers an updated, nutrient packed take on classic boxed macaroni and cheese. Its whole deal is that it contains more protein, fiber, and nutrients sourced from plants. That’s probably why their noodles are made from wheat flour, chickpea protein, and wheat protein. It also explains why the ingredients list features “nutrients extracted” from a whole host of sources (broccoli, spinach, kale, pumpkin, sweet potato, sunflower seed, cranberry, chlorella, maitake mushroom, shiitake mushroom, to be exact).

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