Food You Can Eat: Celebrity Sunday Matinee: June Lockhart’s Franco-American Macaroni and Cheese

June is correct. In the Franco-American ad, she says, "la sauce c'est tout."

25/6/23 MatthewCrawley 19
Who invited this clown over to the Jupiter II for my gratin de macaroni?

We will just have to get this out of the way first:

So happy birthday to June Lockhart. 98. Good for you, June. Today is a ripe birthday anniversary for celebrities. Ricky Gervais, Carly Simon, the increasingly deranged Jimmie Walker, and two who met sort of tragic fates, Anthony Bourdain and George Michael. 

New York-born June was born into a performing family. Both her parents were actors and a grandfather was a concert singer. She made her film debut in a 1938 version of A Christmas Carol, alongside her parents. As who, though? A heavily disguised Tiny Tim? She went to Westlake, in Beverly Hills, so very nice. 

She also had a bit part in Meet Me in St. Louis, an absolutely wonderful musical from the Golden Age of Musicals, and got top billing in 1946’s She-Wolf of London

I’ve seen She-Wolf three or four times. It’s on Youtube, or at least most of it is, but you have to hunt for it, because there’s another, more recent She-Wolf of London, and An American Werewolf in London, which is fun.

But fame struck when she played the TV Mom on Lassie. Here’s a good piece of trivia: She replaced Cloris Leachman in the role. Then, she played the TV Mom on Lost in Space, and her fate was sealed. She was also on Petticoat Junction but I don’t remember that playing in reruns when I was growing up so I only vaguely know what that was.

Personally, there’s not much to say. She was married a couple of times but last divorced in 1970. According to wiki, she participated in every Democratic campaign from Harry Truman to Hubert Humphrey but that also would have ended in 1968. Imagine her phone banking from her trailer on the set of Lost in Space. “Hello, this is June Lockhart, better known as Dr. Maureen Robinson from the Jupiter II. I may be Lost in Space but I fear our country is lost on earth, so I am encouraging you to vote for Hubert Humphrey…”

So the Franco American Macaroni and Cheese shown in the video is self-explanatory but I don’t think it’s produced anymore. The French do have a version of macaroni and cheese, it’s called gratin de macaroni. This is a recipe adapted from Eugénie Brazier, La Mère Brazier

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eug%C3%A9nie_Brazier

Ingredients
1 lb macaroni
4 oz gruyère, shredded
4 oz smoked gouda, shredded
3 Tbs butter
3 Tbs all purpose flour
2 cups whole milk or 1 cup milk + 1 cup cream, heated
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper

Instructions 

1. Preheat oven to 400F. Cook macaroni according to package directions, rinse, drain, set aside, you may use fresh or dried. 

2. Make a white roux by heating butter in a small sauce pan over low-medium heat, then whisk in flour slowly, whisking to prevent clumps from forming. The mixture should bubble a little and keep whisking until it turns a golden yellow, avoid browning. 

3. Whisk in hot milk slowly, add salt and pepper. Stir with whisk until it starts boiling, cook for one more minute. Turn off heat, add half of the cheese, stir and set aside. 

4. In a 9X12 casserole dish, layer the ingredients in order. First macaroni, then sauce, then the remaining cheese. Bake in oven for about 15 minutes until hot and bubbly, if the top hasn’t browned yet, place under broiler for 3-5 minutes until you see brown spots on top.

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19 Comments

    • Oh no! Flashbacks. We always had dogs growing up, it was part of the whole expected experience, lots of kids, a dog or three, a suburban ranch or Cape Cod or split-level house, a mother to manage this circus, but ANYWAY we used to feed our dogs Ken-L Meal.

      • I think the packaged human chow and dog chow markets developed roughly in parallel. Both Franco American and Ken L Rations in the 50s and 60s were trying to break Americans of the habit of going to the butcher shop every couple of days for meat for the family and bones and scraps for the dogs.

        As far as dog raising habits, the little bit in that commercial where the June Lockhart clone opens the door and the dog comes in is interesting.

        In those days, the ratio of inside-outside time for American dogs was pretty much reversed from today. Dogs stayed in the yard or often roamed free in the neighborhood like Snoopy. With the possible exception of fancy little dogs, the idea of letting them inside to lie around on the couch all day was pretty rare.

  5. Skip the flour and add a can of evaporated milk and this would be fantastic for crock pot mac and cheese.

    Also known as the best way to do mac and cheese at summer BBQs. Or any potluck.

      • Hahahahaha

        I mean you could simmer 2.5 cups of whole milk on the stove until it reduced down to about a cup and add that instead. Or just buy the can of evaporated milk.

        Not to be confused with the can of condensed milk, which is sweetened. 🙂

      • I once had a very drunken Brit sidle up to me at a party and paw me a little bit and say to me, “I’m not wearing any pants.” I slapped him away and said, “Of course you are. Those are Levi’s 501s aren’t they?” Then I remembered that “pants” in Britain meant underwear, and that American “pants” are called trousers. In any event, despite his good looks, I turned him down, because if he were willing to do this to me, there’d be no end to it, and I’d rather not die from an STD.

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