I wanted to like this sandwich and I wanted to like Chedd’s. The concept it so good: one of the greatest American comfort foods, grilled cheese sandwiches, some of them with added ingredients, done gourmet-style in a hip part of town. But things didn’t work out.
In my opinion, service and ambiance shouldn’t really factor into an epic quest for a delicious sandwich – like the very quest I am on. The sandwich should stand alone, a monument to creativity or classic good taste. But at Chedd’s there was just too much to ignore.
Maybe it was the humorless cashier, the slightly confused sandwich-maker-in-training or the ten minute wait time for what is essentially some melted cheese. Maybe it was the fact that a place specializing in cheese was out of one of its primary varieties, Havarti, or that my clothes smelled like fried grease for the rest of the day.
Anyway, Chedd’s and I got off to a bad start. Although the bread was decent, there was simply too much cheese, and the horseradish havarti they substituted for the regular cheese selection just wasn’t what I was in the mood for.
Grilled cheese sandwiches have a special place in my heart. As a child growing up in Denver, I used to spend a lot of time at a neighbor’s house, where the mom, Judy, was famous among neighborhood kids for grilled cheese sandwiches. I would sit in her kitchen with her three children or some other kids from around the way and gobble them up. Sometimes she cut them into squares or triangles; sometimes she just served them straight. I have no doubt that they consisted entirely of Wonder bread, Kraft singles and dollops of butter but, man, were they good.
It’s hard to mess with something as perfect as that, and perhaps Chedd’s shouldn’t have tried. Then again, I love grilled cheese, so I’ll have to give this place another chance. – Jonathan Shikes
Read about previous sandwiches in Our Weekly Bread.
