Creamy Pesto Mac and Cheese with Spinach

Very easy and the kids all cleared their plates! Added a handful of shredded mozzarella and some croutons on top per someone else's comment and because my kids are obsessed with croutons, too. Didn't have heavy cream but whole milk worked well enough. Will be doing this regularly, I'm sure.

Added 1 shredded chicken breast

Followed someone else's notes and added croutons! I also ran out of parmesan (only had 1/4 cup) so I added a handful of monzerella for extra cheese. I also added the whole jar of pesto bcuz I love pesto. Awesome and easy!!

Delicious. I paired it with garlic green beans and used fresh spinach instead.

I don't love the spinach because the texture of cooked wet spinach makes me sad, but otherwise this is a very nice, easy weeknight dish. Also got me over my fear of making a roux, which is awesome. :) I would love to try this with some other veggies; maybe peas, or oven baked kale. Chicken would also be great in it. As is typical with Budget Bytes recipes, I added probably 3x the salt and 2x the parm. Beth isn't kidding about the sauce's taste being greatly reduced after adding it to the pasta/spinach: it would definitely be hard to overdo the flavor intensity of it.

A nice lazy day meal and/or comfort dish. The pesto really elevates it, although I’ll try adding more elements next time like chicken or croutons. The sauce is quite thick, but you can easily add more milk to thin it out.