perfect grilled cheese.

leave it to alton to craft the perfect grilled cheese. after a satisfying (but hot!) run outside, i decided to make grilled cheese. i don't think i've ever made real grilled cheese before! i've toasted 2 pieces of bread in the toaster oven with a slice (or 2!) of cheese in between, but i've never made frying-pan grilled cheese. at least, until now.

alton's technique is simple, smart, and perfect:

1) take 1st piece of bread, spread with 1 tsp mustard, then cover with a cup of good quality shredded cheese (sounds like a lot but it actually ended up being around an ounce). i used a mix of emmentaler and aged hirtenkase. sprinkle on some fresh ground pepper. i actually put on 1/2 the cheese, then tomato, then the other half, but this is optional (obviously).

2) top with 2nd piece of bread, spray with olive oil

3) take 2 pans that can sit inside one another, and heat each on high (on separate burners). when pans are hot enough so that a drop of water will go sizzzzzzzzzzle on the pans, take the pans off the heat.

4) put your sandwich in the larger pan, sprayed side down. spray the top, and spray the bottom of the smaller pan (so that it doesn't stick to the top of the sandwich). put a can in the top pan (unless your pans are cast iron, in which case, they are heavy enough to smush the sandwich).

5) wait 3-5 min until your sandwich looks gooey and toasty.

best grilled cheese i've ever had!

w/ a granny