See what I did there?

Sometimes indecision can lead to greatness.

For example, I love John Stewart’s Indecision election coverage. He always makes it very clear how much of a hot mess politics can be on both sides of the old aisle.

I’m not so indecisive about politics though.

I’m more indecisive about sandwiches.

On this occasion I was torn between making a grilled cheese sandwich or a club sandwich. My indecisiveness led me to just smack them together and call it good. And trust me, it was really good.

Grilled Cheese Club

Yield: 1 sandwich

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients:

3 pieces of bread
2-3 ounces Monterey Jack cheese, grated or sliced
1 chipotle pepper, diced
1 tablespoon salsa
1/2 avocado, sliced
2 slices bacon, crispy
Cilantro
Butter

Directions:

1) Butter two pieces of bread. Slice or grate the cheese and dice up the chipotle. Cook bacon either in a pan until crispy or on a wire rack in a 350 degree oven until crispy, about 15 minutes.

2) In a small skillet, add one piece of buttered bread, butter side down. Top with cheese, pepper and salsa. Top with other piece of buttered bread, butter side up.

3) Cook grilled cheese over medium heat for about 6-8 minutes, flipping occasionally until bread is browned and cheese is well-melted.

4) Toast other piece of bread. Top with bacon, sliced avocado, and cilantro.

5) When grilled cheese is done, add entire sandwich to the top of the open-faced part of the sandwich.

6) Slice and serve immediately!

A Tex-Mex Flair

When slapping together a grilled cheese sandwich and a club sandwich, almost any toppings will work. This is more a post about a simple idea rather than an exact recipe.

I decided to go with a tex-mex version though with chipotle peppers, cilantro, avocado, and salsa. Feel free to adapt to your tastes.

Some of my personal favorite flavors.

The Grilled Cheese

You might ask why I wouldn’t just shove all the ingredients into one grilled cheese sandwich.

The answer is two-fold. First, I don’t think they would all easily fit. Second, things are just better when they are stacked. Take my word for it.

The grilled cheese sandwich itself is pretty basic. I always recommend buttering the bread for a grilled cheese, but you don’t necessarily have to go as heavy on the butter as I do. I have a heavy butter hand – no question.

Butta that bread.

Add one slice of bread, butter side down, into a small skillet and then top with cheese, diced chipotle pepper and salsa. If you want to not have it be super-spicy, leave out the chipotle and just use some salsa.

Also, your cheese will melt easier if it’s grated. I didn’t grate mine on this occasion because I just plain forgot.

Some spicy stuff.

Cover this with the other piece of bread (butter side up) and cook it over medium heat until the cheese is melted and the bread is nice and brown. It’ll probably take about 8 minutes.

The key with cooking a grilled cheese is not to cook it over high heat. If you do, the bread will brown before the heat has time to transfer through to the cheese and you’ll end up with a burned sandwich.

Just keep it over medium heat and flip it every few minutes and you should be good to go.

The Club Section

I just couldn’t make a club sandwich without bacon. It’s not to say that you couldn’t, but I couldn’t.

I like to bake my bacon in the oven on a wire rack at 350 degrees so it gets nice and crispy.

The only way to do bacon.

Toast your third piece of bread and then add your bacon to the bread.

You’ll also need to slice up some avocado and grab a few cilantro leaves. I went heavy on the cilantro because I wanted a lot of herb flavor, but use it to your tastes which for some people is not at all.

Sandwich building 101.

Stack the avocado slices and cilantro right on top of the bacon. Notice that I didn’t put down any mayo or anything. You don’t really need it for this sandwich because the avocado has a creamy texture to it and there’s lots of cheese in the grilled cheese half.

Half of a sandwich.

Putting it all together

This isn’t rocket science, but I was pretty giddy while making it.

When your grilled cheese is done, it’s as simple as plopping it right on top of your club sandwich half.

Stacked up!

Slice it up so it’s easier to eat and you’re good to go.

I just love the layers in this bad boy. It was really good.

This worked.

This might be a bit more complicated than a normal grilled cheese, but it’s also more filling and has some really complex flavors which I liked.

The thing that takes the most time for the recipe is actually cooking the bacon. If you’re rushed you could leave it out or sub it with deli meat or something.

While indecision created this lovely thing, you should be decisive about making it as soon as possible.

Crazy good nachos.

Nachos are a frequent occurrence in our house. They tend to be pretty quick to make and are a great way to use leftovers. You can put almost anything on nachos and it’ll be good.

Also, I happen to be married to a Tex-mex fanatic.

So yea… we know our way around a chip.

My problem with nachos, mainly restaurant nachos, is that sometimes they are made in a careless way. Throw some crappy chips on a sheet pan, pile on a metric ton of random toppings, and coat everything with a two inch layer of cheese. Once you sit down to eat it, it’s like a scavenger hunt: searching through a mound trying to find that one perfect chip. The chip that is crispy, has just enough of each topping, and some melted cheese.

Sometimes it’s hopeless.

So while nachos are a quick weeknight meal for us a lot of times, sometimes I like to really spend time on my nachos to make them something special. I call these Sunday night nachos because while you could make them on a weeknight, they are better if you can spend some time with them.

The time you invest will pay pretty awesome Tex-mex dividends.

Sunday Night Nachos

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

15 corn tortillas, cut into sixths
1-2 cups vegetable oil, for frying chips

Bean Mash:
2 cans kidney beans, drained and mashed
1/4 red onion, minced
Handful of cilantro, chopped
Salt and pepper

Ground Beef mixture:
1/2 medium onion, chopped
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 pound lean ground beef
1/2 cup chopped peppers, poblano, red pepper, jalapeno, etc.
1/2 Cup salsa
1 Tablespoon chili powder
1 Teaspoon cumin seeds
1 Teaspoon paprika
Salt and pepper

Cheese Sauce:
1/4 Cup unsalted butter
1/4 Cup all-purpose flour
2 cups milk
2 cups grated cheese (I like Monterey Jack)
Salt and pepper

Quick Guacamole:
2 avocados
2 limes, juice only
1/4 red onion, diced
Handful of cilantro
Salt

Directions:

1) For the chips, cut the tortillas into sixths. Add a cup or two of oil to a large sturdy pan and add chips in small batches over medium-high heat. Cook the chips, turning occasionally, until they are lightly browned and not bubbling. Then remove them to a paper towel to drain. Salt lightly.

2) For bean mash, drain beans and lightly mash together with other ingredients. It doesn't have to be smooth.

3) Use any meat or veggie mixed with onions, peppers, salsa, and spices as a second topping for the chips.

4) For cheese sauce, start butter and flour over medium-high heat and cook, whisking frequently, for about 4 minutes. Roux should turn lightly brown. Then slowly whisk in milk until smooth. Once mixture thickens, whisk in cheese. If mixture is too thick, add more milk a few tablespoons at a time. Keep on low heat until needed.

5) Take each chip and top with a small amount of bean mash and meat mixture. Add finished chips to baking sheets.

6) Bake chips for 5-6 minutes at 350 degrees to meld flavors.

7) Stack chips on plates, pour cheese sauce over chips, add a second layer, more cheese sauce, top with guacamole.

Serve immediately!

Making the Chips

Betsy and I burn through a lot of tortilla chips. We snack on chips and salsa a lot or make quick nacho dishes pretty regularly.

But, when I’m looking to make a serious nacho dish, I spend the time to make my own chips. For some reason store bought chips are pretty flimsy. It’s almost like they start with corn tortillas that are 1/2 the thickness as corn tortillas that you buy in the store. While taste and texture is the main motivator for me, making your own chips is also about 75% cheaper than buying the chips.

To make the chips, you don’t need to really deep fry them as some might think. I usually just add a cup or two of oil to a large heavy skillet and get it going over medium-high heat. Then I add my chips in a single layer and cook them, flipping occasionally.

You don't need a lot of oil.

You’ll know they are done when they stop bubbling and are golden brown (that means most of the water is out of them).

When they come out of the pan, let them drain on a paper towel and season them with a pinch of salt. These guys will be crispy and sturdy: important for nachos.

Thick and crispy!

The Toppings

For me, the toppings on nachos are almost secondary to the chips and the cheese. This is because I’ve learned that almost anything is good on nachos. Any leftover veggie or meat that you have can easily be mixed with some spices and used as a topping.

For this version though, I made a few mixtures that I used for my toppings. The first was a quick bean mash. I just drained a few cans of kidney beans and mashed them up with some red onion, cilantro, and salt and pepper.

It’s almost like refried beans, but there’s no need to cook it really because we’ll bake the nachos later.

Doesn't get easier than mashing beans.

For my meat topping, I cooked my onion and a few diced peppers in a bit of olive oil over medium-high heat until they were soft. Then I added some spices (cumin, chili powder, paprika, salt and pepper) and finally my ground beef.

Once the beef was completely cooked, I stirred in a tiny amount of salsa just to round out the flavors a bit.

Actually pretty optional.

Meanwhile, I mixed up a quick guacamole. This isn’t my full-fledged guacamole which normally includes serrano peppers, shallots, and maybe some tomatoes. This is a quicker version that mainly just has a lot of lime juice which will go great with the nachos.

Not optional.

The Cheese Sauce

A lot of times nachos get in trouble in the cheese department. Don’t get me wrong, I love cheese as much as the next guy, but sometimes people over-do it. Restaurants are particularly guilty of this. They’ll just add pounds of grated cheese to each nacho dish and that works for the first minute or so that you are eating them, but eventually all that cheese solidifies into this strange layer that’s almost impenetrable.

That’s why, when I have time, I like to make a cheese sauce. It’s easier to distribute over the nachos and will stay liquid and gooey even at room temperature. So even if the nachos cool down a bit (which they will do), your cheese will stay melty.

To make the sauce, you need to start with a basic roux, which is just butter and flour whisked together in a pot. I usually cook mine over medium heat for about 4 minutes. It’ll turn a light brown color and that’s when you know it’s done.

You'll roux the day you don't try these.

At this point, slowly whisk in the milk. If you whisk well and start slowly, you shouldn’t develop any lumps in your sauce. If you do have a few lumps, you can usually whisk them out as the sauce heats up.

Once your milk is whisked in and the sauce is thick, go ahead and add in your grated cheese.

What's sunday night without cheese sauce?

Once the cheese is melted, keep the sauce on low and stir it occasionally. If it gets too thick, add a bit more milk to thin it out. Keep it warm until you need it.

Baking the Nachos

The next step for these nachos might be considered a bit overkill by some, but I like it. When I have the time, I like to literally top each chip individually.

This might sound crazy, but what you have to remember is that these chips are way sturdier than normal chips. They are way more filling. When we are done, 15-20 of these nachos will be a very good meal.

And once you get the hang of it you can top them really quickly. It’s takes me under five minutes to do. I just pick up a chip, add a small amount of bean mash, followed by a small spoonful of the beef topping, and add it to a sheet pan. Repeat.

A little OCD never hurt...

The benefit of this is that there isn’t any one perfect chip.

They are all perfect. Every single chip will have the perfect amount of every topping.

Once you get all your chips topped, I recommend sticking them in a 350 degree oven for about 5-6 minutes just to heat them up nicely and meld the flavors.

Plating the nachos

FINALLY! It’s time to eat.

Now that you have your cheese sauce done and your chips topped, you can stack them up!

Layer one.

Once you have one layer of chips and cheese on a plate, you can add a second right on top.

Again, the great part about this is that the toppings are perfectly distributed. Even when you get down to the bottom layer, the chips are just as crispy and just as good as the top layer.

Stack 'em up!

Top the second layer with more cheese sauce and a good dollop of guacamole.

These are ready to eat!

There's no good chip here. They are all good.

I get that these might be too much work for some people. Nachos are supposed to be easy right?

But seriously, you’ll be well-rewarded if you can find the time to make these happen. Make them on a weekend when you can pop open a cerveza and take your time with them.

What do you think? Worth it or crazy talk?

The pita just dove right in.

This is one of those special dips (you know the kind) that takes practically no time to prepare but gives the impression that you were slaving away for hours peeling artichokes and chopping olives. It also won the poll last week!

OK. Actually, if you can convince someone that you peeled like 20 artichokes then you are partying with the most gullible person on the planet. But still, people will be impressed because it’s a delicious thing and the flavors are fairly complicated considering it’s really only a few ingredients tossed together and baked up.

Artichoke and Olive Dip

Yield: 8x8 dish

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

1 (15 ounce) can artichoke hearts, chopped
1 (8-10 ounce) jar olive tapenade, no specific brand needed
1 Cup grated Asiago or Parmesan cheese
1 1/2 Cups grated Monterey Jack cheese
1/2 Cup fresh basil, chopped (plus some for garnish)
1 Serrano pepper, diced (optional)
Salt and pepper
6 pita breads
Olive oil

Directions:

1) Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Cut pita chips into sixths and peel apart each side. Each pita should make 12 chips. Lay out chips on two baking sheets and drizzle with oil and a pinch of salt.

2) Cook pita chips for 10-15 minutes, stirring once until they are a light golden brown. They will continue to crisp up out of the oven as they cool.

3) Drain and chop artichokes and chop basil and pepper if using it.

4) Add veggies in a medium bowl with olive tapenade and grated cheese. Stir to combine and pour into a 9x9 baking dish or a 2 1/2 quart round or oval dish.

5) Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes until bubbling and browned around edges.

6) Let cool for a few minutes then serve immediately with pita chips.

Making the Pita Chips

This dip is so simple to make that the least you can do is make some nice, homemade pita chips for your guests. Of course, if you’re in a crunch, you can buy some or also just serve the dip with crusty bread.

But homemade pita chips are so easy and delicious that it makes sense to me to make them any time I get the chance.

Just chop up 5 or 6 pitas into sixths and then peel apart the two sides of each sixth. So each pita should make 12 chips. They won’t all be perfect and that’s okay.

Then lay them out on a baking sheet (probably need two) and drizzle the pita slices with olive oil and a pinch of Kosher salt. Bake at 400 degrees for 10-15 minutes, stirring once halfway through.

It's the little things...

Just be sure not to burn the chips though. They’re done when they are slightly golden brown. They will continue to crisp up as they cool out of the oven also.

Literally, that’s about the hardest part of this dip. Good thing we got it out of the way.

Making the dip

This could be an incredibly hard dip to make if you peels all the artichokes from scratch and made the olive tapenade from scratch, but we’re going to do neither of those things.

Oh. And if you don’t love olives, you can cut back on the tapenade or replace it with sun-dried tomatoes. The original recipe just called for like 1/2-3/4 of a cup of tapenade, but I wasn’t going to keep a tiny jar of tapenade which would quickly get lost in my fridge so I just used the whole jar.

It's okay to cheat here.

Chop up your pepper and basil and grate your cheeses. If you’re using the Serrano pepper, dice it pretty tiny so someone doesn’t get a big bite of heat.

For the artichokes, just drain them and roughly chop them up. Easy enough.

Again, canned or jarred is what you want here.

Combine everything in a big bowl and stir it together! There should be plenty of salt and oil from the tapenade but give it a quick taste anyway and adjust.

I used two kinds of cheese (Asiago and Monterey Jack) for this dip. I figured the Asiago would give it some nice flavor and nothing melts like Monterey Jack so it’s always good to throw into a dip.

Just stir everything together!

Already smells good!

There’s enough oil in this dip that you don’t need to worry about greasing your baking dish at all. Just fill it up!

Bake it up!

Bake this guy at 400 degrees for about 30 minutes until bubbling and browned around the edges.

If you want to get fancy you can sprinkle some more chopped basil on top just to make it pretty.

A sprinkle of basil to make it pretty.

You’ll want to let this cool for a few minutes before diving in, but man is it good.

Dip on a chip.

This is a really nice fall dish. It uses mostly canned/jarred stuff and is completely warming.

If you make this though, I highly recommend the homemade pita chips. They’re maybe the perfect chip for this dip.

Yum.

One of my favorite things to see at a restaurant is a good macaroni and cheese dish that’s baked in individual cast iron dishes. The cast iron distributes the heat well so the mac and cheese is baked evenly and the edges are really crispy and delicious.

The problem of course is that I don’t have any mini cast iron dishes laying around to bake my mac and cheese in.

But I do happen to have one really large cast iron skillet that I figured would work just as well! You could put a ton of add-ins in this dish to make it your own. Lobster? Poblano peppers? Go crazy. I kept this version pretty standard though.

Cast Iron Mac and Cheese

Yield: Serves 6.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

1 pound elbow macaroni
8 ounces bacon
1/2 medium onion, diced
5 dried arbol peppers, crushed (or 2 Teaspoons red pepper flakes)
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
4 Tablespoons all-purpose flour
3 Cups whole milk
16 ounces cheese (I used 8 ounces of Monterey Jack and 8 ounces cheddar cheese)
1/4 Cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 Cup bread crumbs (optional)
Salt and Pepper
Maybe a drizzle of olive oil

Helpful Equipment:
A Cast Iron Skillet

Directions:

1) Cook macaroni according to package instructions and set aside.

2) Cut up bacon into 1/4 inch cubes and cook in cast iron skillet over medium-high heat until very crispy and browned. If bacon appears dry, drizzle with a bit of olive oil.

3) Remove bacon from pan and add onions and crushed peppers or red pepper flakes. Cook until onions are soft, about 5 minutes, stirring continuously. Remove onion mixture and combine with bacon.

Do not wash the skillet, but set it aside for later.

4) In a medium saucepan, melt butter and whisk in flour over medium heat. Cook until the roux is a light brown mixture, about 5 minutes. Continue to whisk and slowly pour in milk. Once all the milk is incorporated, whisk until smooth and turn the heat down to low.

5) Whisk in shredded cheeses and a pinch of salt and pepper to taste.

6) Combine cheese sauce with elbow macaroni and stir in bacon mixture. Pour the macaroni and cheese back into the cast iron skillet and top with grated Parmesan and/or bread crumbs.

7) Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes until cheese is browned.

8) Cool for 10 minutes before serving.

Prepping the Ingredients

I used some bacon and spicy Arbol peppers to give some flavor to the macaroni and cheese. Cooking all this stuff in the cast iron skillet that you eventually bake the mac and cheese in also seasons the skillet.

Start by chopping your bacon into pieces and then cook it in a large cast iron skillet over medium-high heat until the bacon is really crispy. If you want, add a drizzle of oil to the pan to get the bacon sizzling.

While the bacon cooks chop up an onion and also crunch your dried peppers if you’re using them. You can also just use red pepper flakes though.

The flavor party.

When the bacon is crispy, take it out of the pan and add your onion and dried peppers. Cook them in the bacon grease until the onions are soft. Then mix everything together and set it aside. Whatever you do, don’t clean or wipe out the skillet! That said, if there’s a pool of grease left over, pour out some of it. You just need a coat of oil.

Lots of flavors here.

Also, while this is happening, cook the elbow macaroni according to the package. I would recommend under-cooking it by a minute or two or else your mac and cheese might be a bit soggy.

Making the Cheese Sauce

This cheese sauce, like any good cheese sauce in my opinion, is based on a Roux which is just a mixture of flour and butter.

Start by melting the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Once it’s melted, add your flour to the butter and start whisking! It’ll bubble a bit and start to turn slightly tan. If you’ve never made a roux before, it isn’t that hard. Just remember not to let it sit for too long or it’ll burn.

After about 4-5 minutes of cooking your roux should be a nice light tan/brown color. Like this:

The Roux is on!

Once it gets that color, slowly start whisking in your milk. This is the only tricky part of making a cheese sauce like this. If you add your milk too fast, then you can’t whisk all the roux in evenly so you’ll end up with a lumpy sauce. Don’t worry about it too much though, just don’t dump in all your milk at once and you’ll be fine.

Once all the milk is in the pot, it should have the consistency of a light gravy.

Then whisk in all your grated cheese and season with salt and pepper. The longer you stir it on the burner, the thicker it will get.

This was a really good cheese sauce!

Maybe my best cheese sauce ever!

The Skillet

Remember that skillet that you cooked the bacon and onions in? I really hope that you didn’t wash it. Here’s my dirty pan ready for baking!

My favorite thing.

Back to the Macaroni

Once your cheese sauce is done, stir it into your drained macaroni. To be completely honest, this was very delicious just like this. If you don’t want to bake it or don’t have a cast iron skillet, it’s perfectly acceptable to serve it just like this!

You could eat it like this.

Baking the Dish

Assuming you do want to bake it though, stir in your bacon/onion/pepper mixture and then pour all of it back into your cast iron skillet. My skillet is a 15 inch skillet and it fit perfectly.

I didn’t have any bread crumbs around or I would’ve added some on top, but I did have some Parmesan so I grated some of that on top. I figured it would brown up nicely as well.

Accidentally no bread crumbs!

Bake this for about 30 minutes at 400 degrees. The mac and cheese should have a nice browned crust. Be sure to let it cool for 5 minutes or so before serving it up!

This is hard to beat.

If you’re intimidated by any part of this recipe, just remember that it’s really hard to go wrong with mac and cheese. Even if your sauce is a bit lumpy or if you overcook the macaroni a bit, it’s still going to be delicious. You’d have to work to make this dish not delicious.

I really liked baking it in a cast iron dish because of the crispy edges, but like I said, you could definitely just serve this up as a creamy style mac and cheese dish also.

Bust out your cast iron and give this a shot!

The BALT.

A good BLT is one of my favorite sandwiches in the world. But even still, that doesn’t mean it can’t be improved! A few weeks ago, Betsy and I were looking for a quick lunch and I happened to have all the stuff for a BLT sandwich. I ran down to the store and grabbed a good loaf of focaccia and came back to make some sandwiches!

These are my quick keys to making a really awesome BLT:

1) Use the best tomatoes you can find. Good fresh juicy tomatoes can really make the sandwich.

2) Bake your bacon until it’s really crispy. Try to get really good, thick bacon for these. More on the bacon later.

3) I think mayonnaise is essential on a normal BLT. If you’re doing one of the alternative versions in this post though, you can skip it.

4) Toast the bread. Gotta toast the bread!

So, let’s make some!

The BALT and The Spanglish

Yield: 2 sandwiches.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

6 thick strips of bacon. Some people go crazy on the bacon, but I'll show you a trick that can make a little go a long way.
1 ripe tomato
A few leaves of crispy lettuce
Focaccia bread
1 Avocado (if you're making the BALT)
1/2 Cup Monterey Jack (or your favorite) cheese (for the Spanglish)
1 Fried egg per sandwich (for the Spanglish)

Directions:

1) Lay bacon out on a wire rack over a baking sheet and bake at 350 degrees until very crispy, about 15-20 minutes.

2) Slice bread and brush on bacon grease. Toast bread in the oven on a clean baking sheet for 5 minutes. You just made bacon bread!

For the BALT: Add bacon, sliced tomato, lettuce and sliced avocado to the bacon bread.

For the Spanglish: Leave out the avocado (or include it if you want). Add shredded cheese to one slice of bread as it toasts. Fry an egg in 1 Teaspoon of butter or olive oil. Make sure to fry it over easy so it's nice and runny! Add the egg to the sandwich!

The Bacon. The Bread.

Sometimes people can get a bit out of control with their bacon on a BLT. This might sound like blasphemy to some of you, but I do think it’s possible to have too much bacon on a sandwich.

Trust me. If you get some really nice thick bacon and follow the instructions here, three strips per sandwich is more than enough.

For starters, preheat your oven to 375 and then put a rack on a baking sheet. Lay out your bacon on the rack and cook it for about 15 minutes (depending on the bacon), until it’s really crispy.

Cooking it on the rack will let the bacon grease drip off and also keep your bacon in perfect strips. It’s really the only way to cook bacon if you ask me!

Nice and crispy.

While the bacon cooks, you can get your bread out. I found a nice loaf of focaccia. I wouldn’t use flimsy white bread for these guys, but you could if you’re in a bind I guess.

No flimsy bread for this sandwich.

The Smartest Thing I’ve Ever Done.

Instead of using butter to toast the bread, I just plopped each slice in the bacon grease that had dripped off while the bacon cooked.

This basically makes bacon bread. If you do this the sandwich will taste incredibly bacon-y even if it only has a few slices on it.

Bacon bread!

Don’t toast the slices in the grease though as they might burn. Just let them soak up some of it and then toast them on a separate baking sheet. After a few minutes you’ll have some really beautiful bread.

I could already tell this sandwich was gonna rock.

The Rest of the Party.

No matter what version you’re making, you’ll need tomato and lettuce. I actually like a LOT of lettuce on my sandwich. It’s just how I roll.

One avocado will be enough for two sandwiches also if you’re doing the BALT.

Really nice produce.

The Spanglish

This sandwich was from the 2004 Adam Sandler flick Spanglish. I saw the movie a long time ago, but for some reason I remembered the sandwich.

OH wait. I know why I remembered it. Because it’s the best sandwich ever made. No joke.

It’s really easy to make once you have your BLT fixings ready. Just add some cheese (I like Monterey Jack) to one slice of bread and put it back in the oven for a minute so the cheese gets melted.

Then fry up an egg in a tiny bit of butter. Over-easy is the best way to go here so the egg stays runny, gooey and awesome.

Then top the sandwich with your egg and cheese!

Egg and cheese!

The cross-section shows the real beauty of this thing.

The Spanglish!

It’s cheesy and tastes very bacony even though there’s just a few strips on there. And as you can see, I like lettuce.

The great thing about The Spanglish is that the egg creates almost a sauce for the sandwich.

But whether you make The Spanglish or The BALT or just a plain old BLT, do the thing with the bread in the bacon. Thank me later.

Muy Delicioso!

After my Sophomore year in college, I lived for a summer with a friend in Buenos Aires, Argentina. We had a lot of fun in those 10 weeks (maybe too much fun actually).

While I don’t remember much Spanish unfortunately, I do remember a few things about Argentina: 1) Argentinians are beautiful. It’s something in the water. 2) They enjoy late dinners. If you even hint at hunger before 9PM, you will be mocked. 3) They had the most wonderful beef I’ve ever had in my life. I dream of it. They take really good care of their animals and people respect the animals. The quality is just unbelievable.

Sometimes I try to relive some eating experiences from Argentina and this burger was one of those tries. The key to it is the spicy chimichurri blend that goes on as a topping. In Argentina, this stuff is served with almost every meal. Something about the blend of spices can make good beef taste beefier.

The Argentine Burger

Yield: 4 burgers.

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound grass-fed chuck, ground
1 Cup parsley
1/4 Cup cilantro
1 Tablespoon fresh oregano
1/4 of a red onion
3 cloves of garlic
1 Teaspoon hot paprika
2 Tablespoons red wine vinegar
1/4 Cup olive oil
6 ounces Monterey Jack cheese, grated
Salt and Pepper
Buns

Helpful Equipment:
Food Processor (for grinding the meat and for chimichurri). If you want to make the chimichurri by hand, you can maybe use a blender or just mince everything really finely.
Cast Iron Skillet (or a grill of some sort)

Directions:

1) To make the chimichurri, combine all your ingredients except the beef, cheese, and buns in a blender or food processor and whiz it up. If you don't have a blender, you can very finely chop everything and stir it together with your vinegar and oil.

This will become stronger the longer it sits. It's best in the one to two day range. After that it gets almost too strong.

2) If you're grinding your meat yourself, cut it into chunks and pulse it a few times in the food processor, or you can get your butcher to grind it for you.

3) Form 1/4 pound patties from the ground beef and put a big thumb depression in the center of each patty. Season well with salt and pepper.

4) I cook mine in a cast iron pan over high heat with just a drizzle of oil. Once the pan is very hot, add the burgers and make sure they don't touch. Sear them on each site for about 4-5 minutes per side for medium rare.

5) If you're using cheese, grate the cheese and add it to each burger a minute before they're done. If you have a lid, cover the pan for the best melting.

6) Toast the bun and serve each burger with a lot of chimichurri sauce!

Adapted from Burgers, Fries, and Shakes.

Making the chimichurri

I won’t lie to you. This stuff has a kick to it. I wouldn’t recommend eating it alone and then going out on a Saturday night. You’ll have a hard time socializing with people that didn’t eat it. That’s why the entire country of Argentina eats it for every meal.

Lots of flavors here.

I should also mention that there are a ton of varieties for chimichurri. There are red versions, green versions, hot and mild versions. This version isn’t very hot but it has a lot of flavor to it. It’s pretty acidic which goes well with the red meat.

To make it, roughly chop everything and process it up. If you don’t have a food processor, you can mince everything and stir it together with the vinegar and oil. Remember, chimichurri existed before food processors.

Gets stronger the longer it sits...

Try to make this at least an hour before serving it. If you make it a day or two ahead, it’ll be even more flavorful. I made mine an hour before and it was about perfectly fine though.

The Burgers

I’m putting my foot down. You can’t call this burger The Argentine unless you use the best beef you can find. Don’t use frozen beef patties and tell your friends you are making some Argentine Burgers. If you use crappy beef, you have to call them normal burgers with Chimichurri. Also, the chimichurri will overpower the meat if it’s just some bland freezer beef.

If you really want to make these, find a nice cut of grass-fed, pastured chuck roast. It’ll set you back a few extra bucks, but it’s worth it.

The Grinder of Whole Foods

I’ve written before that most butchers will grind your meat for you so there really isn’t a reason to buy pre-ground stuff. Pick the cut you want and have it ground. The exception to this, apparently, is The Whole Foods at P Street and 14th in Washington, DC (By the way their website advertises a “custom cuts butcher”).

I’ve had meat ground there before, but on this day they refused. That was kind of disappointing to me. Whole Foods is expensive and I’m not sure why they can’t offer a fairly standard service to their customers.

Anyway, no big deal. I’ll do it myself.

I just brought my lovely cut of beef home and cubed it up. I cut off some of the larger pieces of fat to process first. That way they get chopped a bit finer.

DIY Burger.

I processed the fat for a few seconds in my food process and then threw in the rest of the meat. If you’re making a lot of burgers, you probably want to do one pound at a time.

Once it’s ground (or chopped actually), you can form nice quarter pound patties. Be light with the meat. Try not to pack it down too much. Also, to make sure the burgers plump up evenly (you don’t want them to look like a football when they’re done), put a deep thumb impression in the middle of each one. Season them pretty liberally with salt and pepper also.

A proper burger.

The Cast Iron Method

If you have a grill, more power to ya. I, however, do not. It’s possible that not grilling beef is blasphemy in the eyes of an Argentinian, but I had no other options.

Cooking a burger on a hot cast iron pan is really easy though and produces really good results. Heat up your cast iron pan until it’s very hot and add just a tiny bit of oil (maybe 1 teaspoon). Then arrange your burgers around the pan, making sure that they don’t touch or overlap.

Who needs a grill?!

Don’t touch these! You want to make sure they develop a good sear on each side. After about 3-4 minutes, give them a flip. After 3 minutes on side two, add cheese if you’re using cheese. You should use cheese.

Grating the cheese helps it melt much faster.

Say cheese.

If you have a lid that fits your pan, cover it up for another minute or two. The steam will help melt the cheese perfectly.

Perfect.

If you like a medium burger, total cooking time should be about 8 or 9 minutes, give or take a minute or two depending on the size of your burgers and the temperature of your pan.

Once they’re done, add the burger to a toasted bun and top with some chimichurri sauce. The toasted bun is pretty important. It holds up nicely to all the juices from the burger and the sauce.

Served with chips!

This is a simple looking burger, but it’s deceptively flavorful. Each burger is really filling. The beef flavor is really nice and intense and the acidity of the chimichurri is perfect.

If you have time, you could also whip up a batch of homemade chips!

I think I finally found that way!

This was a big bowl of awesome.

Betsy and I love going out for Tex-Mex and it’s a guarantee that we will get the largest queso they serve as a appetizer. We were recently in Austin, TX (home of Tex-Mex) and went out to eat at this joint called Magnolias. They had this awesome version of queso called “Mag mud.” It was a silky smooth cheese dip plus avocados, fresh salsa and black beans. The idea is that you mix everything together to form a “mud” and then devour it.

Macheesmo Mud

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

Basic Pico de Gallo
4 medium tomatoes, quartered, de-seeded, and diced
1 medium red onion, diced
1-2 jalapenos, diced
2 cloves of garlic, diced
2 limes, juice only
2-4 Tablespoons of cilantro, diced (optional)
Salt to taste

Queso Dip:
2 Tablespoons Butter
2 Tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 Cups heavy cream (You could use Half and Half or whole milk if you want to be all... healthy.)
8 ounces Monterey Jack Cheese, shredded
6-8 ounces cheddar, shredded
1 5 ounce can diced green chiles (optional)
Avocados (opt.)
Black Beans (opt.)
Salt to taste

Directions:

1) Make the pico de gallo by chopping and adding ingredients together in a bowl. Leave out the tomato seeds from the mix!

2) Melt butter in saucepan and get it bubbling over medium heat.

3) Whisk in flour and make sure it is mixed well with the butter.

4) Keep whisking it for a few minutes and it will eventually start to turn a light brown color.

5) Turn the heat down to low and slowly add about a quarter cup of cream at a time and whisk furiously while you’re adding it.

6) Add two kinds of cheeses a few handfuls at a time and combine them well.

7) Quickly heat up a can of drained beans with a few Tablespoons of butter.

8) Pour the queso in a big bowl and pile in the toppings!

I immediately proclaimed that there was NO WAY this place used processed cheese for their queso. I had absolutely no evidence to support this and, in fact, they may be the #1 purchaser of Velveeta in the country. I really have no idea. The point is that the dip was awesome and it reinvigorated my quest to master the non-processed queso dip.

Embarrassment

Have you ever been so set on something that you try 4 or 5 different failed methods only to later realize that the simplest method is, of course, the best? That happened to me with this.

I tried a few different methods and tricks and gimmicks to get normal cheese to that creamy smooth silky texture that I know and love. Of course, the easiest answer was to just make a really thick béchamel sauce. Blinded by obsession, I didn’t think about this as an answer until I researched it (via the Google).

Back up the train

Ok, but before you get to the queso dip, you need to make the pico de gallo for this dish. That’s because the pico will actually improve the longer it sits… not the case with the queso.

Pico is important.

Making the Pico

This is a really basic fresh salsa. Feel free to add other things to it to fit your fancy. Basically just dice up all the ingredients.

For the tomatoes, I like to wash out the seeds for this purpose. Then just dice them up. No need to peel them even.

Just the tomato flesh for this.

This will be some good chopping practice, but you’ll end up with a really solid pico de gallo.

Pretty good as is.

The Queso

There are lots of advantages, in my opinion, to learning how to make queso this way if you’re a fan of queso. For one, you can customize it with different cheeses and spices once you get the method down. Secondly, once the queso is made, it’s a lot sturdier than the processed variety which always forms that gross film and gets solid pretty fast.

This dip is sturdy and will maintain its dip viscosity (SCIENCE!) even at basically room temperature.

If I were just making this queso and not planning on topping with other things, I would maybe add some cayenne or hot sauce, some tomato, and maybe even a dash of Worcestershire.

Cheese sauce. Deconstructed!

Making the Queso

Ok. All you really need to make fantastic queso is a medium saucepan, a whisk, and a roux. A roux is just a mixture of flour and fat (normally equal parts) that will thicken up our liquid. The important part about a roux is you need to cook it before you add any liquid to it to cook out the flour taste and grainy texture.

Remember, a little roux goes a long way.

To start, melt your butter in your sauce and and get it bubbling over medium heat. Then whisk in your flour and make sure it is mixed well with your butter. Keep whisking it for a few minutes and it will eventually start to turn a light brown color.

Now you could let this continue to cook and form a really dark roux (which has a very nutty flavor), but we want a lighter product for this sauce. Just whisk it until your roux is a light tan color.

Important step. The most important step is to slowly add your cream to this roux. If you add it all at once, you’ll form little flour dumplings and you’ll never ever be able to un-dumpling them. Slowly add about a quarter cup of cream at a time and whisk furiously while your adding it.

Once you add about half your cream, you should have a very thick creamy sauce and then you can pour in your last cup of cream without worry. Keep whisking though! Turn your heat down to low at this point or your cream will scorch.

You should have a pretty thick sauce at that point, but if not, just let it cook for a few minutes and it will continue to thicken.

Now that you have your base, add your two kinds of cheeses a few handfuls at a time and combine them well. They should melt right into your mixture.

You should end up with a beautiful, silky sauce.

Not bad!

What about the beans?!

I wanted to make some black beans for my Macheesmo Mud to mimic the version I had in Austin. I just quickly heated up a can of drained beans with a few Tablespoons of butter to take the place of the lard that is usually used with refried beans.

When they were warm, they were ready and delicious.

Beans and butter baby.

Next just pour your queso in a big bowl and pile in your toppings! If you need help with the avocado, check out my avocado instructional.

Of course, you’ll want to just mix it all together eventually.

I have no words for how good this is.

Ok. So I’ll admit that the version I made for these photos was a tad bit runny. I don’t think I used enough roux to start the dish (I only used 1 Tablespoon of flour and butter instead of the 2 I suggest above).

But the point is that I think I finally won the debate and created an awesome queso without relying on the microwave and mysterious substances that come in cardboard containers and foil wrap.

PS. I still do love Velveeta. Don’t tell Betsy though.

The Sante Fe Burger got my attention.

Thanks Bobby!

This burger caught my eye for its combination of toppings which include:

- Roasted poblano peppers (for spice)
- A smooth cheese sauce (for cheesiness and spice)
- Blue corn tortilla chips (for texture)

Pair that with a perfect burger and a bun and you are all set.

Sante Fe Burger (Makes 4 burgers)

- 1 large poblano chile
- 1.5 pounds ground chuck (80 percent lean)
- Salt and pepper
- 4 buns
- A few handfuls of tortilla chips

Cheese sauce:
- 1 Tablespoon butter
- 1 Tablespoon all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 Cups milk
- 8 ounces Monterey Jack or Pepper Jack cheese, grated
- Salt and pepper

I ran into a problem right away with the burgers. I couldn’t find any with the fat content I wanted and I actually hate a lean burger. Call me crazy but fat is flavor. So I came up with this idea that maybe has been done before, but I thought I would give it a try. If I needed more fat in the meat, I knew an easy way to increase the fat content: butter.

A muse told me to do this.

Using my hands I mushed the butter in the ground meat until it was evenly distributed. At the end it actually kind of looked like fat, a bit uneven and kind of veiny throughout the burgers.

Shape these into about 5 to 6 ounce patties and salt and pepper liberally. Some tips on shaping burgers:

- Don’t over work them. Just shape them enough to form a patty. If you work them too much they will get tough.
- Keep the seasoning simple in most cases. If you have good meat, then there isn’t a need to do a lot to it. But at the same time, don’t be shy with the salt and pepper.
- Using your thumb, make a small indent in the middle of the burger. As the meat cooks, it will expand and fill in this dent. This is the best way to prevent dreaded flying saucer burger: very fat in the middle and skinny on the outside.

6 ounces makes a big burger.

As far as the peppers go you can roast them beforehand if you need to. Stick them over a high flame for a few minutes and then put them on a plate covered with plastic wrap. The steam will make the skin peel off perfectly.

Can't go wrong here.

Next, make the cheese sauce. You really can’t make this more than 20 or 30 minutes in advance or it will just solidify. Cheese sauce isn’t that hard to make. This is the process.

First, melt your butter in a saucepan over medium heat and when it is melted, whisk in your flour. Continue to stir it for 4-5 minutes until it starts to turn slightly tan. Second, slowly whisk in your milk, a bit at a time. If you pour all your milk in at once, you’ll end up with a lumpy sauce. Do it slowly though and it will be smooth and delicious.

Finally, stir in your cheese which should melt and make a really rich sauce. Stir in your salt and pepper and whisk for a few minutes to make sure it is thick. If it is too thin, just continue to whisk for a few minutes and it should thicken nicely.

The cheese is pre-melted!

As far as cooking the burgers go, it is pretty easy on a grill. About 5-6 minutes a side over medium-high heat and you should end up with a medium burger. Try not to press down on the burgers too much. They will cook faster, but also lose some juiciness.

I was a bit worried about the butter situation.

This is the final setup. There was also a bag of blue corn tortilla chips, but that wasn’t really photo-worthy.

The setup.

As far as putting it together, I slathered the bottom bun with cheese sauce and then added the burger, pepper, more cheese sauce, and then the chips.

Betsy seemed to like it just fine.

Sorry darling!

I really loved the cheese sauce. It brought everything together perfectly.

Damn good.

Oh. And if you were worried, the butter addition to the burger was a good one. It was really moist. I was worried about it falling apart on the grill, but it definitely didn’t. It worked better than I thought it was going to.

Next time you are grilling, give this burger a shot. Definitely a keeper!