Why Does Grilled Cheese Have To Be “Adult”?

Adulthood Isn't Everything It's Cracked up To Be

It's National Grilled Cheese Sandwich Day again and in honor of the event, I'm going to whip up a couple of grilled cheese sandwiches for supper tonight. And you know how I'm gonna do it? I'm gonna do it in a manner that will make every hoity toity, highfalutin food snob in America cringe and squirm. I'm gonna take two pieces of plain white bread, slather them inside and out with some rich, creamy butter and slap two slices of American cheese between the slices of bread. Then I'm gonna toss the sandwich onto a hot flattop griddle and sear both sides until the surface of the bread is GBD (golden brown and delicious) and the cheese inside is nice and melty. And to be even more diabolically evil about it, I'm not even going to use expensive upscale deli American cheese. Nope. I got me some cheap pre-sliced cheese from the restaurant supply – five pounds for ten bucks – and that's what I'm gonna use. Bwah-ha-hah! I will, however, draw the line at grocery store bread. I will be using my own homemade white bread, thank you. I do have a few standards, you know.

Frankly, I don't know when everybody went nuts. When I was a little kid – admittedly, a long, long time ago – the aforementioned procedure was the one and only way to make a grilled cheese sandwich. It's the way my mother made it, it's the way my grandmother made it, and its the way every restaurant, diner, and drive-in in town made it. You asked for or ordered a grilled cheese sandwich and that's precisely what you got: cheese inside of bread, grilled. Nowadays, they call such a preparation a “kid's grilled cheese” or a “junior grilled cheese.” If you want to be seen as a grownup, you have to have a “gourmet grilled cheese” or an “adult grilled cheese.” I'm sorry. Maybe it's just the weird places my increasingly feeble mind tend to wander, but whenever I see “adult” used as an adjective, I start thinking of “adult” beverages or “adult” movies or “adult” toys. And that's just not someplace I want to go with my innocent little slice (or two) of comfort food.

Besides, who's to say that adults can't enjoy the same things they enjoyed as kids? I've never stepped into a Dairy Queen and seen an “adult ice cream cone” on the menu. Or an “adult” root beer float at A&W. What, pray tell, is “adult” about over complicating a simple pleasure like grilled cheese?

“Oh, but the adult palate is so much more evolved.” Poppycock! Yes, my palate is a great deal more refined these days than it was a half-century ago and I can detect a lot of subtle flavors and nuances I couldn't back then, but you know what? I've never outgrown “unsophisticated” comfort foods like a grilled cheese. Or mashed potatoes or macaroni and cheese or a good plate of spaghetti with tomato sauce, for that matter. Hell, those things, too, have to be tinkered with and upgraded to some cockamamie “gourmet” status because, apparently, the old fashioned way mama made them just isn't good enough anymore once you “grow up.”

Taking a timeless classic like grilled cheese and adding avocado and peppers and mustard and mayo and ham and pickles and salsa and pesto and tomatoes and God knows what else is not making the sandwich “adult.” It's adulterating it! Okay, occasionally I'll put a couple of strips of bacon on a grilled cheese sandwich. And when I do, I don't call it a “grilled cheese” anymore because it's not. Only a grilled cheese – cheese and bread, grilled – is a grilled cheese. Adding bacon makes it a “grilled cheese and bacon” sandwich. Throwing ham on a grilled cheese doesn't make it an “adult grilled cheese.” It's a frickin' ham and cheese sandwich! And adding peppers and pickles and such doesn't elevate it to “gourmet” status. It just paints a mustache on the Mona Lisa and junks up a classic.

“But American cheese isn't even cheese!” Oh, get your nose down before you drown in a good rain. Sometimes I'll “fancy up” a grilled cheese by adding some Cheddar or mozzarella or provolone or some other less “pedestrian” cheese product, but good ol' American remains the foundation and the basic building block. If I really want to go upscale, I'll butter the outside of the bread and coat it with some finely grated Parmesan – the real stuff, not the crap in a can – before it hits the grill, producing a nice crispy, cheesy crust on the outside of the sandwich. But it's still just the two essential elements: bread and cheese.

I've baked my own bread for many, many years. Better tasting, better quality, and far healthier than the chemical and preservative laden bread-like substances that populate supermarket shelves. I can bake any kind of bread you want, but mostly I use King Arthur bread flour to bake the plain white sandwich bread that I use for grilled cheese. I don't use wheat or rye or seven-grain or pumpernickel or brioche or challah or ciabatta: just give me plain white bread. Is it “healthy?” Probably not. Is it delicious? Damn skippy! And I'm not eating them three times a day seven days a week, so who cares about “healthy?” Show me a doctor or nutritionist who'll tell me a plain grilled cheese sandwich with a nice steamy bowl of tomato soup once a week is going to contribute to my early demise and I'll show you a quack.

I don't need a $15 “grilled cheese” with a pedigree tracing the origins of the cheese back to a particular cow on a particular farm outside a particular French or Italian village. I don't need “comte” or “boschetto al tartufo” or “raclette” or “toma” or “chaource” or any other cheese I can't readily identify or even pronounce on my grilled cheese. Kraft is fine, thanks. Maybe Borden in a pinch. I read someone who waxed rhapsodic about a place that served a grilled cheese made of Annelies cheese, caramelized onions, thinly sliced pickles and coarse grain mustard on sourdough bread. They referred to the cheese – of which I have never heard – as “dreamy” and called the sandwich “life-changing.” See why I wonder when the world went nuts?

Do yourself a flavor: if you've got a bakery in town or a supermarket with a real bakery section, go get a loaf of quality white bread. While you're at the supermarket, nip over to the deli and splurge on a half-pound or so of decent American cheese. Yellow or white, doesn't matter; they both taste the same. When you get home, take out two or four or six or however many slices of bread are necessary and spread them lightly with real butter. Not that plastic abomination that is margarine. Real butter, please. Salted or unsalted as you prefer. Only butter has certain proteins that will produce a wonderful nutty flavor when heated and browned. Now place one or two slices of cheese – three if you're feeling particularly bold – between the slices of buttered bread and form your sandwich. Butter both sides of the outside. Don't overdo it. Greasy is not good. If you have a griddle of some sort, great. If not, a skillet will do, especially if it's cast iron. Now heat that sucker up and spray just a little butter-flavored cooking spray on the surface or melt just a little more butter on it to help lubricate things. Place your sandwich on the hot cooking surface. Restaurant trick: we use something called a “domed lid” to cover things like burgers and sandwiches as they cook. It helps retain moisture and speeds the melting process by concentrating the heat under the dome. Try it; you'll like it. Leave the sandwich in place long enough to get a nice golden color on one side then flip it over. Press it down a little with your spatula to flatten it out a bit and to help the melting cheese get nice and gooey and spread around inside. When the other side is golden, take the sandwich off the cooking surface and put it on a plate. Cut it across or diagonally as you prefer and then as you take your first bite, allow the innocent, child-like peace and tranquility that is a good grilled cheese sandwich to fill your stomach and soothe your soul. After all, sometimes adulthood – like an “adult” grilled cheese sandwich – isn't everything it's cracked up to be.