Mmmmm…Monte Cristo sandwiches. Didn’t know they existed until college. I have a strict rule that prohibits me from making them at home (I’d like to maintain just a little circulation), but…yummm! Excellent grilled cheese relative.
Also, I’d like to note that because of this thread, I’ll be enjoying a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup for lunch today.
GT
PS If you don’t know what a Monte Cristo sandwich is…, here’s a recipe with a picture and nutritional info. This one recommends raspberry jam or maple syrup. I’ve also seen currant jelly, blackberry jam and grape jelly served with these.
Thick-cut, dense, white bread; two slices of American cheese, two slices of crisp bacon, two tomato slices, tiny dab of mayo. Put the sammitch together, butter both outside faces, cook in heavy iron skillet slowly so that the bread reaches golden perfection just as the cheese melts enough to stick the insides together. Press GENTLY from time to time with the spatula. Cut diagonally and try to get a bite of bacon with every bite of sammitch.
How many Weight Watchers points is that? Shit, I’ve been so good lately, and now I want a grilled cheese.
I like mine with thick “Italian-style” bread (the kind from the supermarket with the sesame seeds), two thick slices of provolone, brushed with extra-virgin olive oil on both sides. It’s even better toasted in the toaster oven. Serve on a cold night with my homemade minestrone, or by itself with some tomato sauce for dipping.
If I’m doing it traditionally, I’d use either the same bread or, preferably, sourdough, the sharpest cheddar I can find, and plenty of butter. I’m fond of Alton Brown’s method with the two cast-iron skillets–heat both (one a little smaller than the other) up, put sandwich in one, put the other on top.
I dunno how the term “toasted cheese sandwich” is generally applied (you don’t hear that much where I’m from), but toasting implies browning the bread with dry heat, which would mean placing it under a broiler or putting it in a toaster. Since the latter is not recommended for cheese sandwiches, I’d imagine that a toasted cheese sandwich was at least finished off in the oven, if not cooked there entirely.
Yes, we are all victims of an effective advertizing campaign circa 1954, exactly right.
Mmmm, mmmm, good, indeed.
Count me in the camp that stay’s clear of ‘cheese food product’
(For our British friends, this term is a legal waffle that allows them to put the word ‘cheese’ on the label, insuring the product will be dispayed in the cheese section of the store where it will sell best. It denotes a product that began with some actual cheese, which contains live culture, in it, which is then so processed that when finished no longer really contains any live cheese culture. It is, however, THE cheese on every cheeseburger sold on this continent, and that’s a lot of burgers. It’s because prior to the name change from ‘cheese’ to ‘cheese food product’ we hapless consumers, dating back to the 50’s, thought it was cheese, go figure.)
But I digress,
But I came here to spread the word that All the Gods That Be created the grilled cheese sandwich to be with chillie sauce.
Spread inside with the cheese of your choice, mmm, and maybe a little on the plate for some dipping. My favorite is Yeo’s Sweet Chillie Sauce, nectar of the Gods I tell you. They make a hot as well, get the sweet, it is ambrosia, I promise you will not be disappointed.
Ketchup is for babies. You know you have the chillie sauce right there in the fridge. Get it, try it. That’s all I’m saying…
Place the sammich into a frypan on low flame. As the cheese melts gloriously, the butter begins to crisp slightly in the bread, turning a beautiful golden brown. Turn over as the bread takes on a lovely brown tone.
Cook other side to equal color. The cheese will have melted completely. This guarantees that each mouthful will be a complex thing to negotiate. You take a bite and as you draw the sammich away, the muenster cheese strings out in these wonderful long runners of melted cheese.
This sammich is excellent for a first date meal. Nothing impresses a gal like watching her first date guy pull huge runners of melted muenster cheese away from his face, across his plate and out into air.
Cartooniverse
****** the Liss Bakery is in Philly and bakes what is without doubt the most perfect marbled rye bread on the entire planet.
Oh, wow, I forgot all about cheese slices. I only use brick cheese, and never thought to specify… though I suppose… do they sell “Colby-Jack” cheese food product?
Those slices are unholy. However, my husband adores Velveeta, and wants me to cook him up some grilled cheese with that unholy, unpious, pope-repelling stuff.
shudder
…
sigh All right. I like the stuff. I’ve cubed it up and put it in chili and served it with tortillas.
Take two perfectly soft pieces of white or 7-grain bread and butter both sides.
Sprinkle one side of each with parmesan cheese.
Drop some butter in the skillet too, just for the hell of it.
Put one piece in the skillet, parmesan cheese side down. Stack with slices of extra sharp cheddar and mozzarella. Top with bread slice, parmesan cheese side up.
Brown both sides; cover to melt the cheese, if necessary.
Then don’t share it with anyone, no matter how much they beg.
The English language is a wacky thing. A toasted sandwich at a takeaway place is cooked on the hotplate but I would be willing to bet that most Kiwis (and probably Aussies) own a toasted sandwich maker…hmmm a sandwich press?)
If you ask for a grilled sandwich here you will get funny looks. Grilled things are cooked under the ovens grill, not on top of it.
Grated Romano or Parmesan (the GOOD stuff, not from a can) is very good this way too. In fact, I am expected to make garlic toast with my spaghetti. I do this with the good bread, the good cheese, and an olive oil/butter combo. I might add a little garlic powder or Mrs. Dash garlic and herb mix on top. I can’t eat raw garlic, but I can eat garlic powder.
The Italian or French style bread is also very good for making French toast, but that’s another subject.
I created a pretty damn good toasted/grilled/fried cheese sandwich last week. I sauteed some sliced mushrooms and onions in one pan, just until the onions were soft and yellow, brushed the inside of the bread slices with crushed garlic, then put the 'shrooms and onions on with some grated fontina cheese. Grilled/fried/whatever the outside to a nice light brown. Delicious!
Beware of Doug’s Ultimate Chilled Grease 'n Pigwich
Sqooshy, square-cut store bread, whether white/wheat unimportant
Cheddar. Must be cheddar. Sharper the better
Bacon or ham
Fry in very little butter, smooshing down with spatula, till cheese is goo and bread is about as brown as French toast usually is. Serve with unlimited amounts of ketchup.
Two slices of Wonder white bread. (There are very few things I’ll use white bread for.) Spread outside with a bit of margarine. Spread the inside of one slice with margarine.
Spread some Vegemite on the margarine on the inside.
Well, my favorite way that I came up with one day when I was bored would be provolone or mozzarella inside two pieces of bread, fried in olive oil, garlic salt, and parsley. Dipped in marinara sauce for bonus points.
Let me add that if you are a person that puts mayonnaise on the inside of a grilled cheese, and you offer to make a grilled cheese for someone, for cripe’s sake LET THEM KNOW! I had a roommate that almost caused me to go into shock by surprising me with that llittle twist!
I haven’t been reading this thread – so imagine my astonishment when I found myself making a grilled-cheese sandwich for dinner. (Rye bread, pepper-jack cheese, for the record. Yum!)
People, People. Drag out the waffle iron. This works great if you DON’T like a lot of cheese in your sandwich. Put too much in and most of it oozes out, creating a mega-cleanup problem. The ridges give the sandwich a highly-crusted and tightly-compacted texture that is unattainable by any other means. Now, herein, the recipe: Two slices of seeded rye bread, buttered on one side. Put one slice buttered side down in the heated waffle iron. Lay on 2, just 2 mind you, slices of Swiss, Jarlsberg or Cheddar cheese. Top with the second slice of bread, buttered side up. Close iron and allow it to work it’s magic. Usually about 3 minutes. Enjoy it with a mug, gotta’ be a mug, of Campbells Tomato Bisque soup[made with milk]
