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What's for Dinner? v18.51 — Chopped Cheese [1]

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Date: 2024-06-22  

My younger brother, who is also on DK, is an even bigger foodie than I am. He watches the foodie shows, tries new recipes far more often than I do, etc. Recently, he emailed me about a dish he saw on Top Chef a few years back—the titular ‘chopped cheese’—which has apparently taken off since then, becoming quite popular. Looked good, so I gave it a try, and my stars, was it delicious!

First thing I’m going to do is post a video, which you do not have to watch before reading the rest of the diary, especially since I do mine a little differently. You can watch it later if you want—or check to see if your favorite chef has a recipe of their own.

So the first consideration is the bread; choose whatever type of roll you prefer, but I advise against anything that’s too soft, as it will likely fall apart halfway through dinner. If your rolls are thick, you might want to dig out some of the interior, making shallow pockets; otherwise, the meat-to-bread ratio may prove unsatisfactory (this happened to me the first time).

Second is the ground beef; I’ve done this twice now—once with low-fat meat, and once with higher-fat. Again, use what you prefer (or, as is often the case with me, whatever is on sale). I generally drain the fat from ground beef, which is going to come up later. You will need to decide how much beef you need based on how many you are cooking for, and how large you want the portions to be. I find that 1/4 to 1/3 pound is good for me and mine, your mileage may vary.

Last is condiments: on a burger, I go with ketchup, mustard, lettuce, pickles, and sliced onion (no tomato; not a fan). The onion and cheese aren’t isn’t needed here, obviously. Because this is different from a burger, I only put lettuce on this. But as I keep saying—you do you, maybe after a bit of taste-testing. And if you have to make these more than once to figure out how you like them best, there are worse fates….

Last thing before we get cooking—onions and cheese. You will need to mince some onion, and plenty of it; for three people, an entire medium to large onion (yellow) should do. For the cheese, the only real consideration is choosing one that melts well. Some recipes call for shredded cheese, but my brother and I both prefer to use sliced. I use Muenster—melts well, and the flavor blends well. Sliced cheese holds together better when serving, too.

So cooking—first thing, season the meat; salt and pepper, of course, but I strongly recommend also using garlic powder, in case that’s not part of your standard seasoning for burgers. My brother recommends also using onion powder(!); I thought that might be overwhelming, but he said it really wasn’t.

Unlike burgers, I cooked the meat as one giant patty (as many chefs do), in a cast iron skillet. You can do patties if that’s easier—that’s how Babish does it, among others—but I find it easier this way. Turn the heat on high, because you want a really good char on the meat, for some crunchy texture. Once you have that char on both sides, you’re going to break up the patty with a spatula, so that you end up with a pan full of loose meat bits (like you were making tacos). Make sure all the pieces are cooked through—no pink bits.

In the vid above, and in others I’ve seen, the next step is to sauté the onions in the beef grease; that, however, is not how ghost rolls; I sautéed my onions in a separate pan, in a little bit of olive oil, while the meat was cooking.

After draining the beef fat, I added the onions to the beef, and cooked them together for a couple of minutes to let the flavors blend. I made sure to add the onions when they were almost done, so they didn’t overcook while blending with the meat.

Once the meat-onion mixture is done, it’s time to add the cheese. Make sure the beef mixture is spread evenly in your pan, then either grate cheese over it, or place the slices on top—do not be afraid of “over-cheesing” unless lactose is a problem. (I had a pic for this step, but it didn’t come out; grrrr!) Once the cheese melts, use a spoon to scoop it into the rolls, and serve.

This goes great with steak fries, coleslaw, fruit salad, soda—pretty much anything you’d have with a burger. Sorry for the text-heavy diary; probably takes longer to read and process this than it does to actually cook it!

Bon appétit!

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