Macaroni and chop meat. I am not sure if this was just a Jersey saying or generational.
What in the hell is chop meat some of you may be asking yourself. It’s also know as ground beef or hamburg here in VT.
Macaroni when I was growing up in Elizabeth, NJ was any pasta except for lasagna. It wasn’t called pasta. Ever.
In restaurants, they had fancy names for their macaroni like linguine & clam sauce, penne vodka or baked ziti. But where I come from it was all macaroni.
Macaroni and chop meat is also know here in America as goulash; not to be confused with the Hungarian kind. I’ve also heard it called American Chop Suey which is so wrong! I saw a show about Asian cuisine in which they made it crystal clear there is no such thing as chop suey in Chinese cuisine.
A Chinese woman who was over 100 years old who was the first woman to ever own and cook in a Chinese restaurant. She had her own story about chop suey when Chinese food was still considered exotic.
When the interviewer asked her what chop suey was she laughed. She said it means chopped up shit thrown in a wok. It was named chopped suey for the unknowing American customers. She was a fireball guzzling down booze and cursing like a sailer. 🙌🏼 She is my hero!
Macaroni and chop meat is one of a handful of dishes that I haven’t changed when I make it. I’ve been making it for as long as I can remember. I’m not sure who I watched make it, but I still do it the same way with the same simple ingredient. Jazzing up macaroni and chop meat is pasta with meat sauce; this is not.
The only thing that I’ve changed about the dish is the macaroni. Originally, I used the classic elbow macaroni. When we had to go gluten free I made it with gluten-free penne pasta that fell apart and sucked up all the sauce. It sucked so bad I stopped making it.
Now I make it with our gluten-free spätzle. The beauty is no boiling necessary for our “pasta.” It can go straight into a soup, sauce, gravy or casserole without having to boil it. The spätzle doesn’t get mushy or fall apart. Brilliant!
With all the fancy-ass cooking that I do, it’s refreshing making something so simple, comforting and familiar. It’s like a grilled cheese sandwich with butter, white bread and yellow American cheese.
The macaroni and chop meat that I make is a pound of chop meat, 1 diced onion, salt, 1 28oz can of plain old tomato sauce and a pound of macaroni.
The beef is sautéed with the diced onion that has been seasoned with kosher salt until the onions are translucent.
Once the onions are translucent, you add the tomato sauce. Cover and bring to a simmer. Simmer and stir often for 30 minutes adding water if the sauce looks too dry. This is a looser sauce than my regular “sauce.”
Next, the cooked elbows or in my case spätzle gets mixed it. Cover, and let simmer for 20 more minutes adding water if it gets too dry. How do I know if I should add water or not? You just know.
I check to see if it needs more salt, it usually doesn’t since tomato sauce can be salty. That’s it. I serve it as is. No spices, no parmesan cheese, no black pepper…just plain. I love it with buttered white bread. Mmmm!
I’d love to know if anyone else called this dish macaroni and chop meat. I’d also love to know how others make it. One time I ate at a friends house that were serving macaroni and chop meat with melted American cheese melted on top of it. I told my father about it and he said adding American cheese is sacrilege. 🤣
Please share in the comments section I your experiences with this dish; I am dying to know.
Happy Friday guys! Time to go! It’s dinner time! Yum! Have a great weekend! ☺️
I also had goulash as a child growing up. We made it the same. We used macaroni. It was a delicious meal for fall and winter suppers. I was from Michigan but now live in the west. I still make goulash. Yummm.
My mother made it with Campbell’s condensed tomato soup instead of the tomato sauce & without onions. Called it American Chop Suey.
Cook the ground beef in pan. Keep the fat. Add jar sauce. Put over any type of pasta. Best meal!