American Cheese

On the way home from work this morning I stopped at my favorite spot, The Black Bean Cafe, and got a breakfast sandwich. It was delicious. When I worked in Exeter I would stop at the Great Bay Campground Citgo and get one. They epitomize breakfast. There are so many ways to have them too. The classic is sausage. egg and cheese, bacon and egg, egg no meat, scramble the egg, over hard,over med,over easy (not to be eaten while driving!)..... For the daily E/A (short for egg amuffin sandwich)it should be on an english muffin and always the cheese has to be American.

The reason for the american cheese is the melt. It is like having a cheese sauce on your sandwich. Many people disagree with the american cheese thing. The thinking is that american cheese is not real cheese. I want to make it clear that that statement is not always true. There seems to be a muddled explanation of american cheese. Cheese food, cheese product, processed cheese, cheese spread, and Kraft. I think that the use of all of these words is what makes it difficult to figure out. While the first american cheese came from the combination of cheddar and other cheeses to produce a creamy textured and smooth melt today it is hard to find an american cheese that is american cheese. I believe that the desire to make everything the same is the reason for this confusion. When Kraft started promoting their cheese products it was rare that we would question what this was. We just knew it was easy to work with to get the desired results. Now adays we seem to be a little more aware of what we eat. The big companies went after money at the expense of taste, slowly changing the original product to something unrecognizable, yet we love it. For an interesting "discussion" on the subject go to Accidental Hedonist.

In any case The Black Bean uses the deli american cheese. It is white and usually Hoffman's sharp. The salespeople say it is cheddar. It is not the cheddar I know, but I like to believe it is cheddar. I do try to watch what I eat, from a natural perspective and more recently how much and often!!. Slowly I am leaning to organic products, but cost still gets into the way of always choosing. I also think that it is becoming such big business we have to watch out for what is and isn't even if labeled so. Perhaps slowly we will not know what labeled organic, natural or pesticide free means. Similar to how no one seems to really know what american cheese is.

When I began to write about the attributes of the breakfast sandwich I felt the importance of the american cheese to its greatness. I still believe that it is the ingredient that holds this sandwich together. I have tried cheddar, provolone and swiss. They do not work. Nancy has tried to take it to another level and made them with veggie sausage, whole wheat english and soy cheese and her eggs, of course. The results, cardboard between cardboard. This sandwich was meant for real american cheese. I will make them with cheddar for others, but will still have them the right way myself.

PS What about cheddarella?