Few of us want to make a complicated lasagna for solo dining -- by day six, you'll never want to see lasagna again! In this series, AOL Food staffer Sarah LeTrent taste-tests simple recipes suitable for a "table for one."
Oh, beloved pimento cheese; the Southeast's answer to cheese dip and queso.
The bright-orange spread is nothing more than extra-sharp cheddar, mayonnaise, diced pimiento peppers and cracked black pepper. Homemade pimento cheese is a snap to make and leftovers are a cracker's best friend. You could spruce up the spread with serrano peppers, garlic, cayenne, different types of cheese or even bacon. But to most, nothing is better than the classic four-ingredient mix between two pieces of bread.
The pimiento is a small cherry pepper which loses the "i" in cheese-spread form to become plain ol' "pimento." Known for its sweetness, you'll probably recognize it in the jarred and diced forms. As a relative of the red bell pepper, many cooks -- including Matt and Ted Lee -- even admit to substituting the latter for pimientos.
In "The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook", they write, "Conventional pimento cheese recipes call for canned pimentos, but we broil a fresh red bell pepper, skin it and cut it into small dice before mixing it with cheese. Sure it makes some eyes roll in Charleston, but we think this is a simple route to a more vibrant and sophisticated (less chemical-tasting) pepper flavor."
When I was a kid, I loved grilled cheese with a crusty outside and soft melted cheese inside. I've probably eaten hundreds of grilled cheeses in my lifetime and now that I'm a healthy chef, I haven't stopped enjoying them; I just make them smarter. So you can still savor a grown-up version, keeping the gooey melted cheese, but with some add-ins to make it healthier and more flavorful.
A Crust Above the Rest I love to use thinly sliced whole grain breads like pumpernickel, rye and wheat. Not only do they taste great when they crisp up, but whole grains have a host of health benefits including fiber and minerals. Use cooking spray and a teaspoon of olive oil to lower saturated fat, but keep that delicious crusty texture that makes grilled cheese so heavenly.
Get more delicious grilled cheese tips from Jennifer after the jump.
It's National Grilled Cheese month, folks, and boy are we fans. Americans chomp upwards of 2 million sammies each year. Of course, as is typical of populist foods nowadays (burgers, fried chicken, mac 'n cheese) even high-minded artisans like Terrance Brennan and Thomas Keller have gotten into the act to put their spins on the classic. Brennan will take it one step further at Artisanal, his New York bistro and paean to all things fromage, with a grilled Cheese Sandwich Contest on April 29. It should be quite the showdown, with food-lebrity judges to boot.
But wait! You don't need to be local to enter this thing, and still have till Friday to wow the cheesemonger with a creation that will win you one of 12 places in the cookoff. And we're going to help you cheat. With the deadline looming, we went straight to Brennan for tips and were unsurprised to find that he hews close to a simple, winning formula: Use good bread, great cheese and no more than three ingredients.
Fave fromage? "I just love a good Comté," he says. His bread of choice, which he prefers on the crunchy side, is pain campagne. "It's a good bread and it's still kind of a little airy. [With] a baguette, you have too much bread. It's a texture thing." Stay away from using Parmesan for filler, he warns, but feel free to dust the outside with a few shavings as a seasoning agent to get a swell crust.
Not on the East Coast but need a fix? Head to L.A., where the Grilled Cheese Invitational began with a few dudes in an artist's loft caught up in a dare over which of them was a grilled cheese god. Seven years later the summit has more than 100 participants and processed cheese giant Kraft as a sponsor. Not bad for a simple little sammie.
Got a recipe that would destroy the competition? Let us know in the comments.
The distinctive smell of barbecued provolone topped with chili and oregano will forever remind me of a barbecue I went to in Buenos Aires. Before being served a series of different meats in a typical Argentinian asado, grilled provolone is often eaten with a savory chimichurri sauce that's made with parsley, cilantro, garlic, salt, pepper, onion, and paprika with olive oil, lemon juice and vinegar.
In supermarkets thoughout Buenos Aires, you can find frozen provoleta that you can simply heat up in the oven or microwave. Sometimes you can even find it stuffed with ham, bacon, red peppers, and tomatoes. This incredibly rich and crispy treat makes me think of the salty Greek appetizer Saganaki - fried Greek cheese. I'm wondering if one can find these frozen provoletas in supermarkets in the United States. Although it's easy to make, the frozen ones I purchased in Argentina were absolutely delicious!
While both recipes seem identical, the first one also offers an excellent recipe for chimichurri sauce. When entertaining, I highly suggest you make this dish as an appetizer. It's sure to be a crowd pleaser.
Oh, how I wish I had taken a picture of my meal tonight. Unfortunately, the three of us were ravenous fiends who had no time to sit for a second and appreciate the food on our plates. What did we eat? A mystery soup (my friend refuses to tell me what was in it), a salad, and the rich, fatty, and delicious croque monsieur -- otherwise known as French ham and grilled cheese topped with bechamel and more cheese.
I have made a lot of things for these guys over the years -- bisques, fajitas, fish and chips, sauteed tofu, stuffed mushroom caps... -- but nothing has ever gotten the praise that a couple plates of croque monsieur have. I'm talking moans of surprise with almost every bite, as if it was an ongoing, neverending shock of quiver-inducing flavor. The vegetarian got the sandwich sans meat, while the rest of us had prosciutto slipped inside, instead of ham.
I think it's my new holiday favorite. We always get set on big productions of food for the holiday, but why go to all that effort when you can get the same, or an even better, response from a simple, saucy ham and cheese?
When I was a kid, I had a very strict and immobile belief on the idea of grilled cheese -- it was always cheddar melted between slices of white bread with a can of Campbell's tomato soup. It had to be Campbell's, the can was not to be diluted with water (blasphemy!), and it would only be consumed with the sandwich. No tomato soup without the sandwich, and no grilled cheese without the soup.
These days, I'm a smidge more open-minded. I kill for grilled cheese with tomato, and sometime I even sass up my old mainstay with something like the tuscan bean soup above. But some of the old sentiment lingers. I can't imagine the thought of tomato soup without the sandwich, unless we're talking tuscan bean, minestrone, or something similar. Likewise, unless I add other ingredients to the cheese and bread, it seems lonely without the soup.
But what about you? Do you have strict grilled cheese beliefs or habits? Share below!
Quick tip: To cut cooking time for grilled cheese without a panini press, heat a large and small cast iron skillet. Put the sandwich in the larger pan, and then pick up the smaller skillet and press it down on top of the sandwich.
I love grilled cheese, whether the cheese is lumped between two pieces of bread with other goodies, or done my dad's way, open-faced and broiled until the center is gooey and the perimeter is crisp. Along with a cheese omelet, it's my favorite late-night snack -- especially if you add tomatoes.
And today, I'm in a whirlwind of grilled cheese fantasies because the Kitchn just referred back to a really great AOL Food list of awesome, gourmet cheese sandwiches (that Bob blogged about last year). After thoughts of homemade cheese delicacies, I started thinking back to grilled cheese outside the house.
Some places have recognized the wonder of grilled cheese. If you research the W Hotel, you'll find that many guests have noted their great grilled cheese, whether it has crab added to it in New Orleans, or tomatoes in San Francisco. I had the latter, practically drooling at the thought after a long night out with friends. My friend and I both ordered the gc and fries, and when it arrived, alcohol-fueled, 2-AM chatter was replaced with heavenly groans. It's that good. It wasn't too fancy. In fact, it was pretty simple, but tasted perfectly wonderful.
Do you ever bother to order grilled cheese out of the house? And, if so, have you had any worth mentioning?
Ah, the grilled cheese sandwich. Everyone takes it for granted. Get a couple of slices of bread and a few slices of cheese and you have yourself a meal. Maybe throw in a bowl of soup with it. But the grilled cheese is actually one of the more versatile sandwiches you can make. I often add tomato to mine, or mix up the type of cheese I use. I often toast the bread too (healthier).
AOL Food has a gallery of various grilled cheese recipes for you to try, including a Buttery Fig and Blue Cheese Melt, a Dutch Grilled Cheese (which includes onions, cumin, Gouda, and caraway), a Smoky Southwestern Grill (which includes mozzarella, goat cheese, and tomato on Italian Bread, and The Best Grilled Cheese, with cheddar cheese on sourdough bread. There are eight sandwiches in all.
Well, to think we forgot to mention that April is National Grilled Cheese Sandwich Month! While I doubt I could actually make and eat a grilled cheese sandwich every day for the 30 days of April to "celebrate," I'll probably do a couple and post them here later this week. But until then, we'll have to make do with the Top Eight Grilled Cheese Sandwiches in New York, as selected by Grub Street. And don't think they're all fancy schmancy paninis or Thomas Keller's at Bouchon Bakery. There's a diner in there that's got some Kraft going, too.
And when I see "we" I'd like to make sure you know I mean other people.
People have been seeing images of Jesus and The Virgin Mary in a lot of food the past several years. We had those grilled cheese sandwiches, someone had some chocolate with a holy image on it, someone else had a cinnamon bun, and I think that someone even had a greasy pan that had a holy figure on the bottom of it. And this is on top of images that have been seen in non-food places, like windows and pieces of wood.
In this L.A. Times piece, we learn that the phenomenon is called "pareidolia," which is the perception of patterns where none are intended. Professor Steve Guthrie says it's a survival instinct, and the way that humans are hard-wired. Of course, this all means nothing to true believers, but it's an interesting article nonetheless, especially during this Christmas season.
I went through a phase in adolescence, where I wouldn't eat grilled cheese sandwiches. It was kids' food and I was a grown up -- wasn't I? But at some point these simple sandwiches became a nostalgic comfort food, and these days I've learned how to dress them up to match my most grown up tastes. Some keys I've found to making the perfect grilled cheese....
Just say NO to the microwave! Yes, I know -- it's the fastest way to make them, but it just doesn't have the same crisp a pan-fried grilled cheese does.
You've turned away from the microwave -- now turn away from the toaster. Toasting your bread in a pan or on a griddle with a bit of oil or butter makes the perfect crispy-on-the-outside, soft-and-warm-on-the-inside toast as the foundation for your perfect sandwich.
A grilled cheese doesn't have to start with plain white bread. Pick your favorite type (I personally think sourdough makes the best grilled cheese base) and start toasting. And, yes, as soon as you turn your back on the bread, it's likely to burn.
We love grilled cheese here at Slashfood, but we understand that not everyone has the money or the space for a big panini press to make fancy grilled cheese sandwiches. Heck, if you're a college student, you might not even have a stovetop to do it in a pan. Well, if you're in a pinch, SouthPhillyBlocks has a photo essay on how to make a grilled cheese sandwich with an iron. Not a cast iron skillet, but a clothes iron. Like the kind you use to press your shirts.
Using the iron is not a new idea, but SouthPhillyBlocks isn't just the photo tutorial. They treated it like an experiment, and found that the Wool setting is the best one to make a grilled cheese.
A new competitive eating world record was set over the weekend when eater Joey Chestnut out-ate the competition by eating 49 grilled cheese sandwiches in 10 minutes. Sonya Thomas and Pat Bertoletti tied for second place with 37 sandwiches each. All three passed the former record of 36.5 sandwiches.
There is a video available here of the event, which was held at the Arena Football Fan Fest in Las Vegas. It is a fascinating sight - if mildly disgusting - for anyone who has never witnessed a professional eating competition. The crown cheers on the eaters while they battle the sandwiches, which an announcer describes as being glue-like. Sonya, who weighs 105 pounds, really has her technique down to a science and Chestnut, in a post match interview, describes how much concentration is needed to compete, given that your body doesn't really want to eat all that grilled cheese.
When I was a kid, I loved grilled cheese with a crusty outside and soft melted cheese inside. I've probably eaten hundreds of grilled cheeses in my lifetime and now that I'm a healthy chef, I haven't stopped enjoying them; I just make them smarter. So you can still savor a grown-up version, keeping the gooey melted cheese, but with some add-ins to make it healthier and more flavorful. 
Ah, the grilled cheese sandwich. Everyone takes it for granted. Get a couple of slices of bread and a few slices of cheese and you have yourself a meal. Maybe throw in a bowl of soup with it. But the grilled cheese is actually one of the more versatile sandwiches you can make. I often add tomato to mine, or mix up the type of cheese I use. I often toast the bread too (healthier).
And when I see "we" I'd like to make sure you know I mean other people.
I went through a phase in adolescence, where I wouldn't eat grilled cheese sandwiches. It was kids' food and I was a grown up -- wasn't I? But at some point these simple sandwiches became a nostalgic comfort food, and these days I've learned how to dress them up to match my most grown up tastes. Some keys I've found to making the perfect grilled cheese....
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