Grilled Cheese with Bacon and a Fried Egg

So have you guys heard the news? My friend Kathy of Panini Happy is having a blog event devoted to grilled cheese month! I had actually planned on making something similar to this prior to learning that April is grilled cheese month, but once I heard about Kathy's event, it really lit a fire under me. I had planned on doing this with a different type of cheese, but the thoughtless a-holes at my new TJs ran out of that kind of cheese a few days ago, so I decided to go with a low fat smoked Gouda. Honestly, I have no good reason for going low fat with the cheese. I mean, just look at the rest of the ingredients in this sandwich. In order to use up the rest of the compound butter from my steak "frites", I decided to cook my sandwich in the leftover butter. This ended up being quite a good combination since the flavor of thyme was in not only in the butter, but in the tomatoes. I was worried about the flavors of the sandwich not being right together, but the smokiness of the bacon and the cheese worked nicely with the sweet tomatoes and the mellow spinach and egg and as I mentioned previously, cooking the sandwich in the herb butter worked perfectly well with the other flavors. Despite the rich ingredients, this sandwich did not make me feel weighed down and heavy. So this is my entry to Kathy's event for grilled cheese month. There are so many thousands of ways to jazz up a grilled cheese. How will you do yours?








Grilled Cheese with Bacon and a Fried Egg
(Liberally adapted from Thomas Keller via Food & Wine)

3 slices bacon, cooked and drained
Shredded smoked Gouda cheese
2 slices whole wheat bread
3-4 slow roasted tomato halves
Baby spinach leaves
1 tablespoon parsley and thyme compound butter
1 large egg, lightly fried and lightly seasoned with salt and pepper

Top each half of bread with shredded cheese. Top one half with the bacon, tomato, spinach, and egg and then finish with the other half of bread.

Heat a non-stick skillet over medium heat. Add the butter and add the sandwich. Fry until golden brown, about 4 minutes on each side.