Me neither.

But tonight, after a long day at work, I wanted fatty, comfort food. This silly no-refined sugar challenge had me so grumpy the only thing that would salvage my mood was a grilled cheese.

Not just a plain grilled cheese though.

A croque monsieur. Or rather, a croque madame por moi.

(I don’t actually speak any French.)

M and I went to Cala Foods last night and I got a humongous loaf of bread – what I thought was a sweet batard, until I got home and realized it was a sourdough batard. Damn. I HATE sourdough. But this bread was so chewy and doughy it almost made up for it.

A croque monsieur is simply a hot ham and cheese sandwich. Add an egg and it become a croque madame.

I buttered the bottom of the bread and broiled it. It was a close call.

Then I buttered, mayoed, mustarded the topside, and added slivers of smoked gouda we got yesterday.

M’s got peppered salami on his, I wanted to croque madame mine. You see this? This is an egg.

And you see this? This is a fail.

For some reason, I thought the egg would just sit and behave on my sandwich half. Instead, I cracked it on and it promptly slid off, breaking its yolk on a cheese shard. >.<

Next time I shall build bumpers out of my cheese bits and fence the raw egg in.

Quell dommage.

Despite that small fail, the open-faced sandwiches came out ridiculously, awesomely amazing. I scooped up my egg and rearranged it on top of the cheese – the way it should have been. The bread was soft and pillowy with just the right amount of density and chew. The cheese, while not melty, gave such good flavor and smoothness. And of course, all the butter and mayo just made the entire thing slide right down. That wasn’t all though.

I sliced up one of my last heirloom tomatoes (those things are a precious commodity) and topped them off with a sprinkle of pepper.

Best sandwich ever. And pretty good beer as well.

After I attacked my dinner, I scavenged for more scraps of cheese and bread. I just couldn’t stop. But M, he ate his half, then proceeded to have me make him another TWO open-faced sandwich halves and devour those, all the while remarking upon how delicious and what a great idea this dinner was.

I know, I know.

Merci,

Jenn