Grilled Cheese: Dreaming the Impossible Dream

With just one attempt so far, my Grilled Cheese Quest is off to a slow start, but don’t fret the epic journey will continue soon with attempt number two. In fact, it is likely to be principally a weekend effort. That being said, it is with great anticipation that I await the weekend.

Part of me truly want to believe in the power of intention, so it did not surprise me that the morning after announcing my grilled cheese ambitions that a grilled cheese recipe sat atop a pile of scattered recipes on the conference table at my office. A coworker must have gotten a one-a-day Food Network calendar recently and left it out for folks to sift through.

This is a picture of a recipe!

The recipe in question looked delicious from the picture in the corner. It called for a grilled sandwich with Portobello mushrooms, scallions and manchego cheese. Now, the mushrooms raise a question of how much extra stuff can go into a grilled cheese before it becomes something else. This is something that needs to be addressed soon, hopefully after I decide where to draw the line. This post though is about the mysterious second ingredient, the manchego cheese.

Manchego cheese is new to me, and everything about it intrigues me. As my wife can attest, I love saying it – Manchego! – because it makes me feel a bit like a Spanish bull-fighter. Wikipedia tells me it comes from La Mancha , Spain , home of the legendary quest-goer Don Quixote, and is usually sold with his picture. It is made of the milk of sheep. Mmm.

At lunch today, after a delicious Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich by the lake, I escaped the cold by going on a cheese hunt at the grocery store. There are a lot of cheeses, and manchego I found way off in an easily over-looked corner of the cheese display. I can only assume that the manchego cheese at this grocery store was aging nicely.

It is only sold in wedges, which I was expecting, but means it is not very grilled cheese friendly. It bore the seal of the Man of La Mancha and was wrapped in tinted cellophane that sharpened its red exterior. Surprised how hard it was, I turned it over in my hands, looking for a soft spot that would make me believe it could make a good grilled cheese. That’s when I saw the price.

Admittedly, the first number I saw was the price per pound of $17, but the unit price was still close to $9. I had seen the prices of some of the other cheeses and was already feeling discouraged about my Grilled Cheese Quest, but this was truly disheartening. This resolution suddenly appeared to be much more expensive than I was prepared for.  Perhaps with this resolution, I'm just tilting at windmills.

Long story short, while there are many types of cheeses and breads, I predict the bulk of my search will deal with cooking techniques and garnishes.  Maybe if I get another check from Google this year I can try to be a little more adventurous, so remember to support our sponsors... or at least click on their ads, often.