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All You Need To Enjoy Your Cheese

partysugar — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 08:57:32 -0700

It's National Cheese Day, so I decided to scour the web and highlight a few essential tools to help you enjoy cheese to the fullest. For slicing perfect slices of cheddar and Gruyere, choose a wooden board with an attached metal cutter. For softer cheeses, like Brie, use a special edged knife that allows you to smoothly spread cheese on crackers, toasts, and fruit pieces. Hard cheese such as Parmesan requires a cheese plane to create thick shaved sheets that can be placed onto pastas and salads. For wine and cheese parties, a wooden cheese board is essential for displaying a variety of cheese types. A box grater is useful for pizzas, tacos, gratins, and more. Lastly, for those special occasions, a shiny fondue pot allows you to savor melted cheese - it's an indulgent splurge that you won't use as often as your box grater, but it's one that you'll definitely delight in. To check out all these finds, scroll through the box below.

Which Cheese Can You Not Live Without?

partysugar — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 05:57:31 -0700

A Brief History Of Cheese

partysugar — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 01:18:31 -0700

Today is a very exciting day... it's National Cheese day! Cheese has been around for thousands of years, dating back to at least several hundred years BC. Cheese and cheese-makers are mentioned in the Bible, Homer, and Aristotle. Legend believes that cheese was "discovered" by a young Arab nomad who was traveling by horseback across the dessert. At the time milk was stored and transported in sacks made from animal skins, and as the horse galloped it churned the milk separating the curd from the whey. When the nomad stopped for a drink he was met by the pale watery liquid and edible lumps of curd. The technique - that involves expelling the water from milk, salting the milk, and demineralizing the milk's sugar compounds - was adapted all over Europe and the Middle East by the ancient Greeks, Romans, and Middle Aged monks. Today there are many different kinds, so grab a hunk of your favorite and enjoy National Cheese Day!

The Great Grilled Cheese

partysugar — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 00:03:19 -0700

Usually I don't really care that much about celebrating the random food holidays that are out there (unless of course it involves making a specialty cocktail then I'm ready and willing!), but I am super excited about today's nonsense food holiday. Drums please, it's National Grilled Cheese Day (actually this month is National Grilled Cheese Month too)!

YumSugar and I love cheese so much that we marked this one on the calendar months ago. I'm a big fan of enjoying the simple pleasures of life and nothing is as wonderfully good as slices of cheese melted between two pieces of toasted, buttery bread. On average I consume about one grilled cheese a week and practically lived on these little sandwiches in college. I love them made with individually packed American cheese slices and wheat bread as much as I love them made with CowGirl Creamery's goat cheese and fresh baked focaccia. Gourmet or down-home style, a grilled cheese is easy to make if you are patient. Never make one over high heat because the bread will toast before the cheese has melted. For more tips on making the perfect grilled cheese and a classic recipe that can be tweaked to your liking, read more

Use a nonstick pan for best results rather than a cast iron grill to ensure that the bread does not stick to the pan.
Place a lid on top of the pan while you are cooking the sandwich to thoroughly melt the cheese without burning the bread.
If using a bar of cheese, grate it rather than slice it. Grated cheese melts quicker and more evenly than slices no - matter how thin they are.
Consider the thickness of the bread, the thinner the bread the sooner it will toast. When using a thicker bread, like a roll or focaccia, pull some of the inside out to have a nice bread-to-cheese ratio.
Use a low temperature, never higher than medium.
Although you may use olive oil, I find that butter makes the tastiest grilled cheeses. Use room temperature butter that will spread evenly to prevent splotchy toastiness.
Preheat pan before you place sandwich inside it. Flip with a spatula.

Grilled Cheese Sandwich
From the Fannie Farmer Cookbook by Marion Cunningham

2 slices Cheddar, American, or Swiss cheese
2 slices white bread
2 tablespoons butter

Put the cheese between the slices of bread. Heat 1 tablespoon of the butter in a skillet or grill and when melted add the sandwich.
Gently press down with a spatula once or twice during the grilling.
When one side is golden, add the remaining tablespoon of butter, turn the sandwich over, and brown.

Serves 1.

Print recipe with images | without images

Source: Sally's-Place

The Great Grilled Cheese

partysugar — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 06:49:31 -0700

Grilled Cheese Day is Sunday and so we're celebrating grilled cheese sandwiches and all their melty goodness this week . To get you in the mood, I've round up a bunch of my favorite grilled cheese recipes. To take a look at them - warning, they may make you hungry! - click on the start button.

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How Do You Cut Your Grilled Cheese Sandwiches?

partysugar — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 05:53:27 -0700

I'm not much of a picky eater, but I do confess to sometimes being a perfectionist. I like things a certain way. For example I like water before I go to bed every night in my favorite plastic pink glass, I like my iced teas in a special glass as well and I won't eat a homemade grilled cheese sandwich unless it is cut into four triangles. It's all psychological, I know that a grilled cheese doesn't taste different if it is cut into squares or triangles or not cut at all but I like it cut into triangles. I'll have to ask DearSugar if this is considered obsessive compulsive behavior... Also, I'm wondering if maybe I'm not alone, so reader, how do you cut your grilled cheese sandwiches?

Noteworthy Nibbles - Sept. 1-8, 2009

YumSugar — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 14:30:50 -0700

Even though Memorial Day seemed like yesterday, Labor Day's already crept up on us. If you don't have major travel plans for the long weekend, celebrate Summer's last hurrah with a gaggle of glorious food festivals, big and small.

Enjoy potjie, a three-legged South African cooking pot, in Texas, butterbeans in Alabama, and hamburgers in Pennsylvania.

The two events I'm really dying to attend? The famed Best in the West Rib Cook-Off and upstate New York's yearly Buffalo Wing Festival. Where will you make an appearance this weekend? Let us know in the comments below!

St. Paul, MN: Minnesota Cooks! - Sept. 1
New York, NY: Slow U: Ice Cream, From Sugar and Snow - Sept. 1
Millersport, OH: Millersport Sweet Corn Festival - Sept. 2-5
Sparks, NV: Best in the West Nugget Rib Cook-Off - Sept. 2-7
Morgan City, LA: Louisiana Shrimp & Petroleum Festival - Sept. 3-7
Village of Pinehurst, NC: Pinehurst Food & Wine Fest - Sept. 3-7
Sonoma, CA: Sonoma Wine Country Weekend - Sept. 4-6
Kerrville, TX: Kerrville Wine & Music Festival - Sept. 4-6
Indianapolis, IN: Indianapolis Rib America Festival - Sept. 4-7
Rusk, TX: Texas Potjie Festival - Sept. 4-7
Denver, CO: A Taste of Colorado – Sept. 4-7
Cleveland, OH: Taste of Cleveland - Sept. 4-7
Fallon, NV: Fallon Cantaloupe Festival - Sept. 4-7
Hamburg, PA: Taste of Hamburg-er Festival - Sept. 5

To see the rest, read more.

Pinson, AL: Alabama Butterbean Festival - Sept. 5
Irvington, VA: Irvington Stomp - Sept. 5
Hatch, NM: Hatch Valley Chile Festival - Sept. 5-6
Millbrae, CA: Millbrae Art & Wine Festival - Sept. 5-6
Buffalo, NY: National Buffalo Wing Festival - Sept. 5-6
Shawnee, PA: Pocono Garlic Festival - Sept. 5-6
Arthur, IL: Amish Country Cheese Festival - Sept. 5-7
Bernalillo, NM: New Mexico Wine Festival - Sept. 5-7
Martin, TN: Tennessee Soybean Festival - Sept. 5-13
New Orleans, LA: The Big Two Revisted: Sazerac and Ramos Gin Fizz - Sept. 8

Source

6 Ways to Reinvent Your Grilled Cheese

YumSugar — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 05:50:34 -0700

April's almost over, which means we have just a few more days to celebrate National Grilled Cheese Month. So get thee to a frying pan! Like Tom Colicchio, you've probably been eating grilled cheese sandwiches since you were a kid, so here are six creative ways to reinvent the classic.

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Cheese 101

YumSugar — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 10:55:18 -0700

Since today is National Cheese Day I thought I'd pull out some of my cheese serving techniques. You may have seen these a while back, but cheese talk is never out of style and besides, that expensive cheese you bought needs to be treated well.

Cheese should be refrigerated in the original wrapping until ready to use. Keep it in an area where it will be less likely to pick up the other odors/flavors floating around in the fridge.
Once unwrapped, wrap hard or semi-soft cheese in wax paper (it's better than plastic) and if possible store in a sealed plastic container. Use a fresh piece of wax paper each time. Soft-cheeses do not need the wax paper and should be kept in a sealed container.
Consider double wrapping potent (aka stinky) cheeses so that their odors do not escape.

To see the rest of my tips, read more

Remove cheese from fridge an hour before serving, so that it can be up to room temperature. Only remove what you're planning on eating.
If you're going to eat it in a day or two, the cheese can be left out at room temperature.
If mold develops on hard or semi-soft cheeses (such as cheddar and swiss), it's okay to cut it off. To be safe, cut a half inch of cheese off on all sides with visible mold. If it shows up on soft cheeses (such as brie), then say good bye and toss it out.
Speaking of mold, keep blue cheeses away from other foods and definitely in separate containers. The spores in the blue cheese can migrate to other foods.
Don't freeze your cheese. A lot of people say you can, but if you do, use the cheese for cooking only. The flavor and texture are definitely diminished after freezing.

Moldy Cheese or French Château?

YumSugar — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 05:30:04 -0700

Today, Oct. 9, is National Moldy Cheese day. To celebrate, I thought I'd quiz you with a second round of last year's popular game, moldy cheese or French château? I'm going to list a bunch of French names, and you tell me if it's a mold-ripened kind of French cheese or a French château. Ready? Let's begin!

Source

Take the quiz