Never Underestimate the Power of... American Cheese

American Cheese.  It is so quintessentially...well... American.  It's something I would guarantee every single one of us has peeled right from it's clingy clear plastic wrapper and eaten, straight up.  And of course, there's the sandwiches it creates.  I challenge anyone out there to say that you don't love an ooey gooey grilled cheese coated in butter and dripping with that yellow melty goodness every now and again.  Sure it's not the best choice to keep within that steamed vegetable and leafy green diet, but you knoow it's good!  

One of our customers actually refuses to eat his grilled cheese with anything other than our yellow american.  Like a fine wine that's turned murky, he'll take one look at bread containing white cheese and, without hesitation, back to us it comes. 

2,000 calories later, this is now gone.

I too adore a good grilled cheese.  However, for some reason in the past year and a half that we've been open, I had yet to eat one with yellow American.  What's more, I had yet to eat anything with American.  Bill is a huge cheese lover and has stocked our menu full of cheeses.  Aged Vermont White Cheddar, Emmentaler Swiss (with the really big holes no less), Sharp Provolone, Gruyere, Fresh Whole Milk Mozzarella, Feta, Gorgonzola, Crumbled Bleu... the list goes on. So, every day for the past year and a half I've made my own sandwiches with one of these 'superior' cheeses.     

That is... until yesterday.  

It started with my serious case of sandwich envy.  Each day I write down customers' orders and watch as Bill constructs their sandwiches.  But, it is that moment they come out from under the fire that makes me need that sandwich.  The aroma as it flies by my nose on it's way to be wrapped, the look of the sauce bubbling up combining with the cheese, surrounding the late addition of lettuce... Mmm MMM!  That sandwich will be mine. Yesterday one came out spilling over with American Cheese.  It looked good. It looked REALLY good.  I had to make my own.  After one bite I vowed never to underestimate the power of this cheese again.  It brought me back.  Back to school days where my mom packed my lunch with the cookies strategically hidden underneath the American cheese and turkey sandwich, back to summer afternoons making open faced tomato and melted american cheeses in my aunt's kitchen.  Back to fun times surrounded by family.  And a cheese that can do that, well, I don't blame our 7 year old customer.  He knows there's just nothing that compares to that look, that texture, that meltiness, and that unmistakable taste of Yellow American Cheese.  

And that right there is a power to be reckoned with.