Home of the Grilled Cheese Sandwich
Let me start off by thanking @goldbedr and @allisonlemons for giving me great suggestions for tonight’s grilled cheese. Unfortunately, prior to seeing the ideas, I had already devised one of my own. These ideas will definitely make an appearance in the near future, as I …
Soon after I started cooking grilled cheese sandwiches and blogging about them, I began emailing a few different people who are involved in the restaurant business and have a special tie to grilled cheese. I was interested in hearing why they are so interested in …
Welcome back to bread and lots of it. As I couldn’t eat bread for the past week because of Passover, I thought I would overdo it this week with a double decker grilled cheese. Tonight’s sandwich was an homage to the traditional grilled cheese with some updated flair. Instead of using typical white bread I chose sourdough bread. Instead of using American cheese, I chose Parmesan, Mozzarella, Asiago. Instead of two slices of bread, I used three. The traditional pairing with a grilled cheese is of course tomato soup, of which we partook in this evening. The only difference between typical tomato soup and the tomato soup we used tonight was that I added some of the leftover Parmesan cheese on top. It was a great touch.
ingredients:
This week we have a few cheeses to learn about, all of which are awesome. Let’s first start with the Parmesan cheese, which I bought pre-shaved.
The best known of the Italian hard cheeses Parmesan is a heady cow’s milk cheese that showcases a golden rind, straw-colored interior and rich, sharp flavor. As a popular table cheese and cooking ingredient, Parmesan is made throughout the world, particularly in Argentina, Australia and the United States. However, none of these renditions can compare to the Italian original, the preeminent Parmigiano-Reggiano…learn more.
In my opinion, this was my least favorite of the three that I tasted prior to cooking. The first piece I tried had a subtle taste and then a great unexpected finish. However, I tried a couple more pieces and none of them had that great unexpected finish that I experienced with the first piece. They were just bland in my opinion. I was rather disappointed, although it seemed to work well with the other cheeses when cooked.
Now onto the Mozzarella cheese…
Italy’s most famous cheese mozzarella is a soft, mild, fresh white cheese. While best known as a grated topping for our favorite pizzas, true Italian mozzarella has so much more flavor and complexity to offer. If you’ve ever tasted a melt-in-your-mouth ball of “Mozzarella di Bufala Campana” (DOP) perhaps no further explanation is needed…learn more.
Honestly, who doesn’t like a good Mozzarella cheese? This one had a great creamy, soft texture that was perfect for the base of the sandwich. Oddly enough, and this is not a bad thing, this cheese reminded me of a good string cheese. Yum!
Finally we have what is quickly becoming one of my favorite cheeses: Asiago. It seems that this cheese has come on strong lately.
Asiago may not be as famous as Italy’s other grand varieties, but it’s a cheese well worth knowing – it just may surprise you! Smooth to crumbly, or sweet to savory, Asiago can assume many different flavours and textures according to age…learn more.
This Asiago had an amazing, crumbly texture and a taste that was in your face and dominant. This was probably the best cheese of the night, at least during the tasting phase. Yum!
Overall, this grilled cheese was good but not great. As the sous chef suggested, after we cooked the sandwich, a softer bread might have been a better choice for a double decker grilled cheese. This was crunchy and yummy, but just slightly difficult to bite into/eat. It also might have overpowered the cheese. I will always be a fan of sourdough bread and after tonight’s grilled cheese, that has not changed, there just may have been a better bread to choose for this evening’s double decker grilled cheese.
Oddly enough, when you mix three distinct cheeses, their flavors all blend together and create a new flavor. Tonight, I did not taste parmesan, mozzarella, asiago in the grilled cheese individually, I simply tasted whatever their child would taste like. Odd analogy, yes, but I think it fits. Anyway, the oozey, melted cheese did taste very good, I just wonder, again, if the bread overwhelmed the cheese.
Since we were strapped for time, and because I have never made tomato soup before, we just used canned tomato soup. It was very yummy though. Some people are dippers and some are not. For some reason, I am not really a dipper and ate most of the first half of my sandwich without dipping. However, after some nudging by the sous chef, I dipped the second half and it softened up the sourdough and actually made the grilled cheese much better. I believe the soup toned down the bread and allowed the cheese to shine through a bit more, making the sandwich much better.
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Overall, this was a good double decker grilled cheese that was definitely made better by dipping the sandwich in the tomato soup. Some changes could be made, including the bread and maybe making it single decker, but overall it was a good night. I am sure that this grilled cheese could be made with many different combinations so let me know in the comments if you have any other cheese pairings in mind.
With the Passover holiday continuing, tonight, I replaced “normal bread” with our lovely friend matzoh. Even with having to eat it for 8 days straight every year, it is starting to grow on me. It seems that most Jews dread this holiday simply because of …
Not until I recieved an email from Kathi @ panini happy (and a comment from the Daily Spud) did I know that April is National Grilled Cheese Month. How is that possible? How did the grilled cheese man not know that April is Grilled Cheese Month?! Readers, you have failed me by not cluing me into this fact. I have even disappointed myself since I am trying to blog about all things grilled cheese. Tsk. Tsk. Tsk.
The worst part about finding out now? Passover is just one day away and there is no way that I can celebrate until next week. I mean, I can celebrate with matzoh, as I plan on doing Sunday, but it just won’t be the same. I guess I will just have to force myself to wait until the holiday is over. Oh well. If you have any suggestions on how to mark this special occasion, please leave your thoughts in the comments. Hopefully with all of our minds, we can come up with something great.
If you Google “National Grilled Cheese month 2009,” there are plenty of web sites mentioning the occasion. In total, Google tells me that there are 94,200. Once I hit publish, you can add one more. The first few sites, I can’t look through them all, are worth a quick glance. Plus, the first site below gave me the two images in this post.
In addition to the articles above, that are simply about the greatness of grilled cheese sandwiches, there are also a couple of contests going on to celebrate the wonderful occasion:
I hope to enter both of these contests, after I decide which of my previous sandwiches to enter. If you have suggestions as to which of my sandwiches I should enter, please leave a comment below. It would really make my job easier!
Anyway, happy National Grilled Cheese Month! (I guess a Jew did not decide that April would be National Grilled Cheese Month, huh? 🙂
Because today was a travel day, I was just returning from Chicago, there was no Sunday Dinners. Next week I will return with a special Passover edition, which should be interesting. Even though I wasn’t cooking tonight, I still want to keep everyone posted as …
This week, I decided that I was going to call AOL’s bluff and see if they really knew grilled cheese sandwiches. I was about to put them to the test. I decided that I was going to follow one of AOL’s recipes. Ever since I …
When I decided to create a new grilled cheese sandwich each and every Sunday, I stumbled upon something. I found a project that combined all of my loves (photography, cooking, web/design) into one grandiose idea. I had been thinking of how to do that for years and here, out of nowhere, it just popped into my head when I was off in some other world. Amazing.
There is just one problem. Currently, it is just a hobby. There is nothing wrong with that as hobbies are great. I am just wondering how I am able to turn this interest into something that could make me money while still retaining all the fun?
Honestly, I do not know. (Cookbooks? Not enough recipes. Ads? Not enough visitors.) This project is probably too new to truly be able to make anything out of it. However, I do not think it is too early to start thinking about it. Sure, I currently have two jobs that are doing me just fine, but this is my own doing. This is my own creation. This is my own invention.
Every Sunday, I look forward to cooking a new grilled cheese and then writing about it for everyone to read. I look forward to new blog ideas popping into my head. I look forward to finding new grilled cheese ideas to write about. Grilled cheese restaurant just opened up in [insert city here], I want to write about it and maybe even visit it.
I want to continue this but at the same time, I don’t want to burn out you, the reader, or me, the creator. I want to continue this as long as I and you enjoy it. I enjoy breaking down people’s stereotypes about grilled cheese sandwiches so much that I could see myself doing this full time. Sure, it is a crazy thought. Sure, I know that very few people make much money from blogging, but aren’t we all allowed to dream? Isn’t that the best part of life?
There is just one problem: What is the next step? Sure, I probably need to continue to visit and comment on other blogs but will that do the trick? Will that begin to “get me out there?” Maybe, only time will tell. I am beginning to build up a good readership among my friends, which is good, but unfortunately, I have only so many friends. I really just need to get into people’s heads. If I become the guy who makes and loves grilled cheese sandwiches, I would be ecstatic. Sure it is a quirky thing to be known for, but what is wrong with that?!
Shane Kearns, the Grilled Cheese Guy. That has a nice ring to it. Let me know what you think by adding your two cents in the comments below. Plus, if you have any suggestions on how to improve this site please leave them below as well.
I apologize for the delayed write-up for this week’s grilled cheese, but my MacBook Pro had to return to Apple as it had a dying hard drive. Luckily, all of the data was retrievable, including all of my grilled cheese/Sunday Dinner documents. *phew* Now onto …
Commenting Guidelines?
The other day PaniniKathy tweeted about an article on the Food Blog Alliance entitled Comments: how to give as good as you get. It is a great article for blogger and commenter alike. I highly recommend taking two minutes to read it. After reading that …