Submitted by Dan Alvarez
Serves: 1
Grilled cheese: That staple of Americana. The sandwich we all run to, young and old, to satisfy that inner child. The gooeyness. The creaminess. The combination of bread-cheese-bread that just throws us in the way back machine and drops us off at Memory Town.
Ah, but times, they are a-changin’, my friends. It’s time to feed the outer grown-up. Check this out.
2 Slices of fresh sourdough bread
1 cup of good blue cheese
4 Tbsp. Skillet bacon jam
1 Shallot, diced fine
1/3 Cup of baby bella mushrooms; sliced thin
1 sprig of fresh thyme
1 Tbsp. butter
1 Tsp. Olive Oil
1/4 Cup of good drinking red wine
To taste Salt & Pepper
Take a small sauté pan and add in your butter, thyme and olive oil. Bring to a medium heat and once the thyme is fragrant, and in your mushrooms and onions. Sweat them down until the onion is translucent; add in your red wine and reduce heat to medium-low. Simmer until wine reduces. Add salt & pepper to taste.
Take your bread and butter one side of each slice. On the other side of the sourdough pieces, spread the bacon jam all over. Top 1 piece with ½ the blue cheese. Add your mushrooms and shallots (be sure to remove the thyme - no one wants to eat a stick), then top with the rest of the blue cheese.
Grill the sandwich in a non-stick skillet (yes, like you normally would for an ‘old school’ grilled cheese), until the blue cheese is melty and fragrant. Enjoy.