Melty, luscious slices of cheese… The kind that drapes tantalizingly over the cheeseburgers of our dreams. We love ’em. We want ’em. But we’re home-crafted cheesemakers, and let’s face it, hard cheeses made with goat’s milk just don’t melt with the same come-hither glory that cow’s-milk hard cheeses do. We could sneak down to the store and buy that square package of American cheese, yet we can’t bring ourselves to take a shortcut like that. We want our fancy cheese, by golly, and won’t settle for less.
Fortunately, I stumbled across a very good article on Serious Eats written by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt that explains a lot of the why’s and wherefore’s of American-style cheeses. He, too, is in search of the best possible burger and by extension, the best burger cheese. American cheese looks nice, feels nice in the mouth, and tastes… okay. What’s a girl to do when she craves a better-tasting, fuller-flavored cheese and glorious melty-ness?
I reached out to the good people of Serious Eats and requested permission to do this article on Kenji’s recipe for homemade American-style cheese. They kindly agreed, as long as I didn’t repost the recipe in its entirety. You can see the recipe here. Go read it, and then come back here, because I’m going to tell you how I tweaked his recipe a bit to use my aged goat cheese.
In a nutshell, you can make American-style cheese slices by grating your own semi-hard cheese and combining it with gelatin and a little evaporated milk. I make my own cheeses with our goat milk, and make my own evaporated milk from goat milk as well. That way, I don’t need to be concerned when my cow-milk-intolerant friends come over for dinner. (They can eat the same things we are eating and no one feels awkward.) The melted cheese mixture is then poured onto shallow cookie sheets lined with plastic wrap, and cut into slices which can be stacked up and stored in an airtight container in the fridge for up to thee weeks. The whole process takes less than half an hour if you’re using canned evaporated milk; a little longer if you’re making your own like I did. It’s a half hour well spent to give your burgers the kick that more flavorful cheeses have to offer.
Take note that you should buy a block of cheese and grate it yourself at home. Pre-shredded cheese is tossed with starches to keep it from clumping, and you don’t want that extra starch affecting the consistency of your slices.
I experimented with two kinds of cheese slices today. One was made with store-bought cow-milk gouda. Keeping in mind that cow- and goat-milk cheeses have different melting properties, I wanted a “control” recipe to compare my homemade cheese recipe against. Plus I love me some gouda and didn’t have any on hand. For my own cheese, I used a 9-month-old hot pepper jack that I made last summer.
Using Kenji’s recipe exactly as written worked beautifully for my purchased gouda. I used a stick blender to smooth out the melted cheese mixture, but if you have a food processor that you like to use, go for it.
For my homemade pepper jack, I found that I needed to add an extra half tablespoon of evaporated milk to help thin out the cheese mixture, and my cheese didn’t melt as readily as the store-bought, which is what I knew to expect. Applying a little stick-blender magic evened out the consistency just fine, though, and gave me the smooth, spreadable glory I hoped for.
One unexpected side effect of using the stick blender on my pepper jack, though? It drastically increased the surface area of the jalapenos and made my mildly-hot cheese into a hot-hot cheese. I’m not complaining though. Bring on the heat!
When it came time to cut the cheese slab into cheese slices, I deviated a bit from the instructions by adding a second sheet of plastic wrap on top of the slab, and used a pizza cutter to cut the slices. This did not cut the plastic wrap, though, so I followed up with kitchen shears to cut the plastic wrap apart. (Why didn’t I just use the scissors in the first place? Because I didn’t want the cheese gumming up my scissors and making the cuts untidy. That doesn’t mean you can’t just go straight for the scissors though, or leave off the top plastic wrap sheet and cut the slices with a knife.) In case you’re wondering, yes, I used an old clean quilting mat to make sure my slices were precisely 4″ squares. The plastic wrap kept the food off of the mat. You don’t have to be so picky about getting yours square if you don’t want to.
Not in the mood for a burger? No one can resist a grilled cheese sandwich! I have one every morning for breakfast. Before, when I wanted to use my aged goat cheese, I would put a slice in a non-stick pan and toast the cheese by itself, then put it between two slices of buttered bread and carrying on with the toasting. It’s extra work to ensure that the cheese melts, but it gets the job done. Now that I’ve discovered this method for making melty cheese slices, my life has gotten easier. And tastier. Because I can put more cheese on more things!
Oh, you noticed the potato chip roses? Do you like those? They’re easy to make while you’re making homemade potato chips anyway, because a burger this awesome obviously deserves homemade chips. Using your mandoline (or slicing very carefully with a knife), make 5 slices of potato, and cut them in half across the middle. Overlap the half slices as shown here, and roll them up as tightly as the potato will allow without cracking. Secure with a toothpick. Drop the potato roses into 300° oil and fry until golden. Remove from hot oil and drain on a rack above paper towels, removing the toothpick as quickly as possible. If you wait until the potato chip rose is cool before removing the toothpick, the rose will break.
