Grilled cheese is one of those amazing foods that appeals to kids as much as adults and has endless combinations:  eat it open faced, sandwiched with veggies or bacon, any type of cheese, endless bread options — really any way you like it.  I am currently hooked on goat cheese and cinnamon raisin bread.  I’d love to hear your favorite combo! -Maggie

Grilled cheese is my life. Or it was from the ages of two through 12.  Back then I would happily have eaten a grilled cheese with a glass of  milk for lunch every single day. If that meal was then followed by a  Today’s Special marathon (especially if it included the Muffy gets her  tonsils out episode ) and  an hour or two of Barbie doll accessory organization then I was the  happiest kid on the block.

Unfortunately, it seems my mini-diva self wasn’t very kind to my  sandwich chef, aka grandma. I don’t recall how the habit began, but at  some point I routinely started telling her in a sing-song voice, “If  you burn it, you’ll eat it!”  At the time, I thought this was  absolutely hysterical and now sounds utterly horrifying and  beyond rude.

Could I have been more unkind to grandma? Especially considering that my  grandmother always grilled my white Wonder Bread and orange Kraft  Singles into perfect, toasty brown submission before cutting the gooey  mess into nine neat and tidy squares. The squares were very important to  the whole grilled cheese process. I would methodically eat the outer  toasted ring and save the middle crustless piece (the crown jewel, in my opinion) for last. Sometimes I still do this. But not for this  recipe.

The catalyst for seeking out this fresh take on grown-up  grilled cheese sprung from a jar of Plenty Spicy Jalapeño Inna Jam    that I was gifted for pitching in on their  Kickstarter campaign.

Oh man. That stuff is amazing.

I’ve also recently been eating my weight  in strawberries, but that’s really only a coincidence. My  brain definitely did not make the leap from pepper jelly to  strawberries nor would it ever without the aid of Google. So thanks to the search engine for pointing me to the following recipe which incorporates things that  made me raise my eyebrows in disbelief, but which actually taste like  someone smashed summer on my sandwich.

You absolutely have to try  this. I’ll be flying home to Maine next month and I definitely will be  making one of these for my much deserving grandmother and I sincerely  hope that she admonishes me with the same “if you burn it, you’ll eat  it” mantra that I used on her for so many years.