The Unexpected Bread To Use For Grilled Cheese

What comes to mind when you think of a grilled cheese sandwich? The gooey cheese when you pull the halves apart? Dipping it into a bowl of tomato soup? Even without the photo above, you'd probably also picture two square slices of standard white sandwich bread, but there are many other bread options that taste just as good, if not better.

Food & Wine list six of the best breads for grilled cheese, a few of which come as no surprise, including sourdough and multigrain. Sourdough bread offers that nice crispy crust that many people love. Ciabatta bread is pretty similar, but it uses a different type of yeast for the fermentation process than sourdough does, as The Great Bake explains.

But there's one bread on the list that's not as common for grilled cheese. This bread shares a similarity with the ones you just read about, but it's not one typically associated with the grilled cheese.

So what's the unexpected bread that you can use to make your next grilled cheese sandwich? An English muffin. It tastes good used in a McDonald's Egg McMuffin — which you can get with cheese — so it makes sense that it would also work well with a grilled cheese sandwich. You can find plenty of recipes for it online, not that you need one, but you might get inspired to create your own version after reading through all the options.

Rachael Ray shared six varieties of inside-out English muffin grilled cheese sandwich snacks on her show in 2010. Although she recommends whole wheat or whole grain English muffins for a healthier option, white muffins work just as well. Plus, you might prefer the taste over the other options. 

Food Network shared another version of the recipe (which also belongs to Ray) which they deem English muffin grilled cheese sammies, in which the muffins aren't flipped inside out.

When you slice an English muffin, all those little pockets and grooves make the perfect surface for the melted cheese to settle into, as Food & Wine notes. Plus, the small size of the muffins gives you the option for mini sandwiches without having to cut them in half like you would with other breads. And as Rachael Ray notes, these mini-sized sandwiches can be perfect for both kids and adults who want a little snack.

Another reason English muffins work so well for grilled cheese sandwiches is that they are the perfect shape for adding other ingredient layers, like a round sausage patty, a fried egg, or both. That's right; you can save yourself a trip to McDonald's and make your own egg, cheese, and sausage breakfast sandwich.

An English muffin may not be the most popular type of bread for grilled cheese, but when you consider all the fun you can have with it, it just might end up being your new favorite. Plus, if it's a win with the kids, it's a win for you.