If eating mac and cheese for breakfast is wrong, I don’t wanna be right. Because this breakfast mac and cheese is loaded with flavor and is low key a super filling, high volume meal.
How filling?
Two servings weighs roughly 3/4 pound and has just 470 calories. Unlike your avocado toast, that’s a BIG breakfast!
How to Make Breakfast Mac and Cheese
As usual, this breakfast mac and cheese is super easy to make. If you can cook pasta (or microwave pre cooked pasta) and scramble eggs, you’re ready to rock.
I love customizable recipes, and this one certainly fits the bill. Here are a few quick tips on ways to make this breakfast mac and cheese even lower calorie:
- use all egg whites instead of using the four whole eggs
- omit the sausage or use chicken/turkey bacon instead
- swap the crispy topping for an extra serving or two of cheese
- use half the amount of pasta
I’ll include specifics on things like the egg whites substitution in the recipe card below.
The recipe calls for Banza pasta shells, which are a chickpea pasta that’s higher in protein and lower in carbs than traditional wheat pasta. Feel free to use any pasta you’d like, though.
For more recipes you can make with the Banza pasta shells, check out my 5-ingredient BBQ chicken mac and cheese or taco pasta bake.
If you don’t have Banza on hand, regular pasta works just fine. I compared protein pasta options against standard pasta for my ultimate protein mac and cheese recipe and found the macro differences on a per serving basis to be rather small.
Other Breakfast Mac and Cheese Ingredient Notes
If you wanted to use something other than the light alfredo sauce, you could use more Greek yogurt and add more cheese or a bit of light butter to the sauce. The cottage cheese blend from my Hawaiian macaroni salad might be a good way to boost the protein content.
You’ll find the turkey sausage crumbles near the bacon and breakfast sausage in your grocery store. If you have trouble finding it, you can use my homemade version or reduced fat pork sausage. I also have a recipe for homemade chicken breakfast sausage patties in case you’re looking to make breakfast sandwiches as well.
And because I know you’re wondering, yes, you can use Frosted Flakes instead of Corn Flakes for the topping. Don’t tell anyone, but I actually used Frosted Flakes in my first test batch. It adds a contrasting sweetness that’s actually really great if you wanted to add some spice to the dish with black pepper or hot sauce.
If you make this breakfast mac and cheese, I want to see it! Take a photo of your creation and tag me on Instagram @mason_woodruff.
Breakfast Mac and Cheese
Ingredients
- 8 oz Pasta Shells, I used Banza chickpea pasta
- 4 large Eggs
- 1 1/2 C 368g Liquid Egg Whites
- 3/4 C 180g Light Alfredo Sauce
- 1/2 C 113g Fat Free Greek Yogurt
- 1/2 C 56g Cheddar Cheese, I used shredded
- 9.6 oz bag Jimmy Dean Turkey Sausage Crumbles, or your choice of meat
- 2 Tbsp 28g Light Butter, I used Land O’ Lakes with canola
- 2 C 56g Corn Flakes, crushed
Instructions
- Preheat an oven to 400F.
- Cook the pasta according to its packaging.
- Whisk the eggs and egg whites together before adding to a large skillet over medium heat. Fully cook.
- Add the alfredo, yogurt, cheddar, and sausage to the cooked eggs and heat until the cheese is fully melted, stirring well.
- Drain the water from the cooked pasta and add it to a 13×9 glass baking dish. Pour the egg mixture of the pasta and stir well.
- Melt the butter and add to the crushed corn flakes. Stir well before adding over the top of the pasta and egg mixture.
- Bake for 12-15 minutes or until the corn flake topping is golden brown.
Notes
- Each serving has 6 WW Smart Points (blue plan).
- Macros per serving without the crisp topping: 201 calories, 20g protein, 15g carbs, and 8g fat
- If you’re using all egg whites, use 2 1/3 C (570g) liquid egg whites.
- To omit the alfredo sauce, add 1/2 C (113g) Greek yogurt and an extra 1/2 C (56g) cheese (cheddar or mozzarella get my vote).
This breakfast mac and cheese is dynamite. Since my local food store doesn’t carry the turkey crumbles I use ground chicken instead and season it up with sausage seasonings (and I spied a new post from Mason on breakfast sausage seasonings) instead and it works great! This also freezes and warms up well but you probably won’t do that because it’ll be gone! 🙂
I LOVE mac & cheese! The only person who might be more obsessed with it than me is my younger brother. I was able to make this for our family to eat & my brother who is typically very particular about his foods couldn’t even tell the difference between this & regular Mac&cheese! Him along with the rest of my family loved the idea of putting eggs & sausage in it, making it a breakfast food because we usually don’t have mac&cheese for breakfast haha;) Anyways I highly recommend this dish it’s unique & delicious!
Pasta for breakfast. Sold. This was my second Mason dish and I followed the ingredients and steps exactly as shown. I did omit (forgot to buy) the light alfredo so used the recommended 1/2 C Greek yogurt and an extra 1/2 C cheddar. Loved the macros on this and it tastes delicious!
I love this breakfast mac. I don’t use the premade sausage bits I cook my own sausage. So its probably not as healthy but 🤷🏼♀️ still good! I also save my cornflakes for each separate dish because I don’t like when they get soggy. This dish is a life saver on busy mornings!!
This is what we make when we’re going away to a “microwave only” vacation. We don’t put any topping on it as it probably would get soggy. If you’re afraid of egg whites don’t be – somehow it takes on like a ricotta texture? It really works
I made this for meal prep this week and the cornflakes + hot sauce combo is so damn tasty! Can’t wait to eat this in the morning! 10/10 will definitely make this again.
This is hands down my favorite meal prep breakfast! I leave out the cornflakes/topping and it’s lower calorie without it. I also add more egg whites and have found it doesn’t compromise taste. I found a low calorie Alfredo sauce elsewhere online that I make to go with it since my store doesn’t sell that and it works great!
I’ve already had to make this dish twice in one week and have come to the conclusion I probably will need to make this every three days and keep it as a seriously staple. My picky teenage son loves this dish as much as I do, and he’s also using it as an after-school snack. I can’t complain since it’s far healthier than what he could pick up, and he’s getting needed protein for his age and activity level.