Macaroni is pasta in the form of short curved tubes. Macaroni cheese, a bowl of macaroni, cook the macaroni.
Britain says macaroni cheese and America macaroni and cheese for the same dish. In the eighteenth century a macaroni was a young man affecting extravagant continental fashion, which is the joke in Yankee Doodle.
1nounmacaroniPasta in the form of short curved tubes.
“The kids had macaroni with cheese sauce for dinner.”
macaroni is a pasta.
Italian maccaroni names the pasta, of uncertain origin, perhaps from a Greek word for a barley food.
Latin
*maccare
Ancient Greek
μάκαρ — blessed; favored by the gods
Medieval Greek
μακαρία — food made from barley
English, today
macaroni
Built from
From Italian maccaroni, of uncertain origin. Variously derived from late Medieval Greek μακαρία (“food made from barley”), from Ancient Greek μάκαρ (“blessed; favored by the gods”), or from maccare, from Latin maccare of the same meaning. Compare Sicilian maccarruni (“a single piece of macaroni”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA