A Berry Good Grilled Cheese

Berry, berry good, if I say so myself.

The other day I purchased two containers of local strawberries thinking I was going to make some strawberry mojitos.   No dice on the mojitos (oh, we still had mojitos, just not strawberry ones) so I found myself with lots and lots of strawberries.  As I was looking through my recipes, I stumbled across one that I seem to always pass by – probably because strawberry season hasn’t been here for too, too long.  It was a good stumble, too.  I had all the ingredients on hand.  Strawberries?  Check.  Bread?  Check.  Basil?  Check.  Goat cheese?  Check.

Spread one half with goat cheese, top with basil confetti and strawberry slices.  Grill, cut on the diagonal (total MUST) and dig in.  Berry good.  (Recipe inspired by Southern Living.)

On the side, purple asparagus that turned green in the oven.  Not cool, not cool at all.

But strawberries are cool even when they’re hot.

 

 

Impulse Cheese Purchase

Last week I found myself in The Fresh Market.  In reality, I found myself hungry in Fresh Market.  Never a good thing.  But it actually worked to my advantage.  I only purchased two things not on the list:  Peanut Butter Coffee (ummm, I KNOW!) and Smoked Gouda with Bacon.

I think it’s obvious why I picked up the coffee (peanut butter…coffee…together) and the cheese was bought because they had a free sample sitting out.  I usually don’t try food in a grocery store – the fact that it’s been sitting out for no-one-knows how long kind of gives me the creeps.  But I was hungry.  And it was smoked.  And it was Gouda.  And it had bacon in it.  I grabbed one of those little toothpicks, inhaled it in one little bite and my eyes got big with excitement.  It was smokey and creamy.  I knew for a fact Big Guy would fall in love with this cheese.  And he did.  Served in grilled cheese form.

The sandwich needs nothing more than a pat of butter in the bottom of a hot grill pan and some cheese slices sandwiched between two pieces of bread (GF for me).  Grilled to perfection.  Served with a lettuce-less salad.

Thank you, Fresh Market, for providing a free tasting that led to this smokey-bacony-cheesy sammie.