Ingredients: grape tomatoes, green beans, shallot, thyme sprigs, elbow macaroni, evaporated milk (canned), cheddar-jack cheese, butter, panko bread crumbs, and seasoned rice wine vinegar

The first step was to prep the veggies. Mince the shallot, remove thyme leaves from sprigs, and halve the tomatoes. Also, fill two saucepans with water and bring to a boil. 

Next, boil the macaroni and blanch the green beans. Blanch = boiling for only a few minutes, then either dunking them in an ice bath or running under cold water:

Next, combine one half of the shallot and the can of evaporated milk in a clean saucepot. Once warm, add the cheese, the drained macaroni, salt, and pepper. I'm starting to realize that I never add enough salt to things during these kinds of steps. 

In a separate bowl, the breadcrumbs were prepared combining with half of the thyme and melted butter:

Pour the macaroni mixture into a casserole dish, top with the crumbs, and bake until browned:

While that cooled, I prepared the veggie salad by combining the remaining shallots, thyme, rice wine vinegar, olive oil, green beans, and the tomatoes:

Like I said in the prep section, I think I need to be a little heavier handed when a recipe says to "salt and pepper" to taste. This was a little bland, but I think it was my own fault. My husband demolished the tomatoes and beans right away. The mac and cheese lasted for two whole meals. Yummy yummy!

We went ahead with another Home Chef box. It will be delivered on the 13th. I am contemplating making a YouTube review along with my blog post. Stay tuned to see how that turns out!