Be a grilled cheese master

Not to  brag, but I’m great at grilled cheese.

“Cheese Lorraine,” my very own sandwich, graced the opening-day menu of Goombays Grille & Raw Bar in Kill Devil Hills, N.C. It featured Swiss cheese, a slice of ripe tomato and a schmear of grainy mustard between slices of golden grilled rye.

Sadly, my masterpiece got sliced from the menu after a single season. Diners often failed to read the description and were displeased when served a sandwich rather than Quiche Lorraine.

The other day, I met someone who might have considered that a savory bit of serendipity.

The man’s name was David J. Schneider, executive chef at Virginia Wesleyan College. His Grilled Black Forest Ham and Saga Blue sandwich has won, not one, but two national awards.

Schneider will stuff almost anything into a grilled cheese – vegetables, fruit, meats and cheeses both soft and hard. He’s made a Caprese salad-style grilled cheese. He’s built a turkey with cranberry mayonnaise and slaw sandwich.

And he has a secret that every grilled-cheese lover should know.

But first, his championship sandwich.

Schneider dreamed it up for the 2009 “The Chef’s Wife”/American Culinary Federation awards and took second place.

The sandwich, paired with a salad, took first in the 2009 University & College Fresh ’N Fit Recipe Contest sponsored by the Chilean Fresh Fruit Association.

To the traditionalist, the ingredients sound odd – grilled asparagus, a pungent blue cheese, pesto. But the marriage is luxe.

It’s a voluptuous sandwich that is at once creamy – the blue cheese drips seductively down the crust – and crunchy – brought on by the al dente asparagus and the crisped bread.

The bite of the blue cheese blends with the sting of the Dijon, and that’s all tempered by the fresh asparagus.

Originally, Schneider made the sandwich using grapes instead of asparagus. Brie could substitute for half the blue cheese, he suggested.

But one thing not to change is Schneider’s secret ingredient. He’s banished the butter and instead spreads a sheen of pesto mayonnaise on the grill side of the bread.

“It gives it a real nice, crispy texture,” he said.

And why not add some Parmesan to the mayo? he mused.

A grilled cheese sandwich may seem a humble venue for Schneider, a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America and former executive chef for the Hilton Virginia Beach Oceanfront, including the Catch 21, Salacia and Sky Bar restaurants.

“It’s not like it’s this ingenious thing,” he said. “The flavors are simple; the combination is great.

“It’s basic comfort food.”

And he’s given us the recipe, just in time for soup-and-grilled-cheese season.

Lorraine Eaton, (757) 446-2697, lorraine.eaton@pilotonline.com

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Grilled Ham & Blue Cheese Sandwich on Rustic Bread
Serves 6

12 slices rustic organic grain bread
6 tablespoons Dijon mustard
2¼ pounds Black Forest Ham, shaved
¾ pound Saga blue cheese, cut into 1-ounce slices
18 ounces fresh asparagus, cut into 6-inch lengths and peeled if needed
2 tablespoons olive oil
1½ teaspoons kosher salt
1 ½ teaspoons cracked black pepper
1/8 cup basil pesto
¼ cup mayonnaise
 
Toss the asparagus with the olive oil, salt and pepper.  Grill the asparagus, which should get nice char marks but remain slightly crunchy.  Remove from grill and chill.

Combine the basil pesto and the mayonnaise.

Spread a thin layer of the pesto-mayonnaise mixture on one side only of each piece of bread; this will be the side that goes on the grill. When all pieces have been spread, place them on the grill.

Now turn to the inside of the sandwich. Spread 1 tablespoon of Dijon on six of the slices (not the side with the pesto-mayonnaise mixture). Top each piece of bread with 1 ounce of cheese. On each of the six slices that don’t have Dijon, place 3 ounces of ham and the asparagus divided equally.

Grill all bread slices until golden.

Combine each sandwich by topping the six slices of bread containing the ham and asparagus with the six slices that have only the Dijon and cheese.

Remove from the grill, cut each sandwich on the bias and put on a plate. Serve immediately.

Source: David J. Schneider, executive chef, Virginia Wesleyan College, Norfolk