Grilled Cheese with Bacon and Red Onion

Grilled cheese and bacon is old news. Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt.

But adding sliced red onion? Solid, buddy. Real solid.

probably don't need any directions or ingredients for this one. I will say that putting the cheese in the middle (i.e. bread, bacon, cheese, onion, bread) did help the loose ingredients to stay in place while I chomped. Also thought it might be good with a little mustard sauce, if you want to go all French-fancy on things.

Fancy English Muffin Pizzas

Todays lunch is english muffin pizza, but with some new ingredients:

Ingredients:

1 english muffin

2 slices of salami

store bought pesto

shredded parmesan or asiago cheese

banana peppers

Directions:

Toast the english muffins until they're crispy. Take them out and spread the pesto on each half. On each half, put a slice of salami, sprinkle some cheese, add a few banana peppers, and sprinkle some black pepper and granulated garlic. Re-toast until cheese melts.

Grilled Cheese

I've not been cooking a whole lot lately, but I have rediscovered my deep love for grilled cheese sandwiches. I, and my doctor, blame Tim, who makes amazing grilled cheeses and melts. Now, one hardly needs a recipe for a grilled cheese. It's rather self-explanatory. Still, there seems to be a technique that I'm starting to get down (again, thanks to some tutelage by Timmer). But my latest obsession ala grilled cheeses is olive tapenade. 

This probably isn't a true olive tapenade, but I've been crushing up marinated green olives (in white wine, garlic, herbs, etc. I buy them already marinated), a few kalamata olives, and a couple sun dried tomatoes with just a dash of olive oil. Then I spread that on the bread before adding a slice of pepperjack cheese, then sliced portabella mushrooms, then a bit of shredded mozz (for stretchiness). Holy o'golden, it's my new favorite thing.

And while this isn't a cooking note, it is an eating note. If anybody happens to find themselves in Lawrence, KS, can I recommend Zen Zero? The drunken noodles are fanFREAKINGtastic.

Prosciutto and Crispy Goat Cheese Stacks

I made this for lunch today. Blammo.

Ingredients:

2-3 slices Prosciutto

1 English Muffin

4-5 ounces of Goat Cheese

Panko, or other large-flake Bread crumbs

Olive Tapenade

Olive Oil

Directions:

1. Coat the bottom of a saute pan with some olive oil, and set it over medium-high heat for a few minutes.

2. While that heats up, portion the goat cheese into halves and make two patties out of it. It's a good idea to get your english muffin toasting at this point, too.

3. Turn your microwave to 30% power and microwave the goat cheese for 30-45 seconds, just until the surfaces get a bit soft. Even better, you could just leave the goat cheese out for a couple hours to come to room temperature. 

4. Spread a bunch of bread crumbs on the bottom of a bowl and drop the goat cheese patties into it, covering top and bottom, and all sides. Press the bread crumbs in a little bit so they don't come off when you fry them.

5. When both patties are well coated with bread crumbs, place them gently into the hot pan. Let them sit for just enough time to crisp up the bread crumbs. Flip, and remove from heat before they start to melt and ooze all over.  About 1 - 1 1/2 minutes on each side will do the trick. 

6. Take your toasted english muffin, drizzle it with olive oil, put a slice of prosciutto on top, put a goat cheese patty on top of that, and top it with a little bit of the olive tapenade. You don't want too much tapenade because the goat cheese is already pretty tangy. 

7. Crack some black pepper on top, and sprinkle with crushed red pepper (if that's what you're into). If you want to make it look fancy, sprinkle some chopped fresh basil on top. 

PS - I have these great cajun panko bread crumbs that are the freakin' bomb. If you've got something like that, use 'em. I like to throw the leftover crumbs into the hot pan for a minute, and then sprinkle them on a salad to have with this. Wowza. 

Country French Salad

Oh Yeah, kids. We're doing it up, warm salad style. This recipe is a good way to get yourself eating greens in the winter, when you probably want something hot. It adds a few calories in the form of egg and bacon, but sometimes you gotta grease up roughage to make it taste right, am I right?

Hell yeah.

Ingredients (for one person)

-3-5 slices of bacon

-1 egg

-1 head of romaine lettuce, cut in half lengthwise. (you only need 1/2 for this recipe, so stick the other half in the fridge)

-dijon mustard

-honey

-1 small shallot

-red wine vinegar

-olive oil

-salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Get the bacon frying in a medium sized saucepan. Also, fill a small saucepan with about 2-3 inches of water and and 1/8 cup of vinegar to it. Bring this to 180 degrees. You can use a thermometer if you want, but you'll know it's at the right temperature when there are bubbles along the sides of the pan. 

2. While the bacon is cooking, whip up the dressing by mincing the shallot and combining it with a teaspoon of honey, a tablespoon of the mustard, a few splashes of vinegar and some olive oil to top it off. Whisk or beat together with a fork. 

3. When the bacon is nice and crispy, remove it to a paper towel for draining

4. Pour off most of the bacon fat in the saucepan and turn the heat to low

5. Put 1/2 of the head of lettuce flat-side down in the pan. Be careful. The amount of water in lettuce can make things splatter a bit. 

6. While the lettuce warms, crack your egg into a small bowl and slip it gently into the 180 degree water. Leave for 3-5 minutes. 3 minutes should still leave a bit of liquid in the center, while 5 minutes should mostly solidify things. If you hate runny centers, you can leave the egg in there for up to ten minutes and it should be fine. 

7. When the lettuce is mostly warmed, pull it off the heat and chop it into wedges. Remove the egg from the water with a slotted spoon and place it on top of the warmed lettuce. Crumble the bacon on top, drizzle the dressing on top of that, salt it, pepper, and chow down. Blammo.

Oh yeah - this is good with bread. Especially Braden's extra garlic-y garlic bread. Recipe to come.