Sunprint Cafe

Sunprint Cafe recently moved to 10 West Mifflin Street, Madison, Wisconsin, after a long residency at One South Pinckney Street.  Famous for breakfast, and a Capitol Square staple for lunch, their menu now includes breakfast, lunch, dinner, Sunday brunch, and drinks.

Their new space was previously occupied by Cameo Day Spa and is very elegant, but it seems like Sunprint isn’t quite settled in there yet.  The restaurant has multiple rooms and is arranged in a way that seems crowded and leaves little privacy for each table. 

Their lunch menu has a pretty good selection of soups, salads, and sandwiches - ranging from burgers to paninis, to vegan items, to grilled cheese.

The grilled cheese sandwich comes on your choice of wheat or rye bread (I chose wheat) and it includes sharp cheddar and jack cheeses on either side of tomatoes.  It comes with a side (I chose tabouli).  The bread was grilled very lightly and was not at all greasy. It was more toasted than grilled.  It was an uncomplicated wheat bread, with rolled oats on the crust.  The cheddar and jack cheese combination, along with the tomatoes, had a quite respectable flavor.  However, the cheese amount was skimpy -- the corners of the sandwich had no cheese coverage.  My side of tabouli was generously portioned and really fresh tasting.  Overall it was not a bad lunch, but not that special either. 

The Tipsy Cow

The Tipsy Cow, at 102 King Street in Madison, has the best grilled cheese.  Ever.  

The bread is Clasen's European Bakery's Artisan Multi Grain Wheat Sourdough, a robust bread containing flax, millet and sunflower seeds.  Sliced not too think and not too thin, it has a brawny texture and just the perfect amount of greasiness.  Between the bread is a munificent amount of 3-year cheddar and Widmer's brick cheese combined in some magical proportion to create optimal melty gooiness, and a tad of roasted garlic -- which isn't obvious as a flavor on its own, but rather amplifies the savory-ness of the sandwich as a whole.        

As if eating the best grilled cheese sandwich ever was not enough, I was able to enjoy it with two of the best former co-workers ever.  They ordered the BLT and the Griddled Turkey & Havarti sandwiches.  Both were works of art, assembled as if they were going to be in the centerfold of a sandwich magazine.  Both sandwiches featured Nueske's smoked bacon which, my friends said, was thick and delicious. 

The sandwiches at the Tipsy Cow are served with a couple really tangy homemade dill pickle slices.  There are multiple side-items offered on the menu (half orders are allowed), for around $6 or $8 each.  We didn't order any sides, but we should have because it seemed like something was missing from our meal.  I, anyway, just didn't want to stop eating. 

The service was good overall.  We were greeted right away and the food was brought out quickly.  Drink refills arrived without asking and before required.  There was a lag between the time we finished eating and the check was brought, but our change arrived quickly.  The restaurant was clean and the staff was friendly.  Also worth mentioning ... the dining room features a well executed chalkboard drawing of the cow catapult scene from Monty Python. 

This was my third visit to the Tipsy Cow, and I've recommended it several times already.  I will definitely return. 

Famous Dave's

We had a Pre-4th of July picnic lunch at work, catered by Famous Dave's.  Lunch included ribs, barbecued chicken, potato salad, coleslaw, corn muffins and mac & cheese.  I won't elaborate on the ribs since they are so famous and you probably already know all about them.  I'll just focus on the mac & cheese.

Dave's Cheesy Mac & Cheese is unique in that it includes corn and chopped jalapeño peppers with the noodles.  The cheese sauce is ample, but light and almost fluffy.  The main flavor of the dish comes from the jalapeños -- not that it's by any means too spicy, just that you can't taste subtle flavors imparted by the four cheeses that are purportedly used to create the sauce.  It's not the mac & cheese that makes Famous Dave's famous ... but it is definitely tasty.

Graze

Graze is the kind of Madison restaurant that is so popular now -- the kind with locally sourced food and hipster waitstaff.  But even though it only opened a few years ago, at One South Pinckney Street, Graze has an established lineage as the sister restaurant to Madison fixture, L'Etoile, and the successor to the former Café Soliel.

My friend Cathy and I went to Graze for lunch today.  We have both been there on several occasions but never together.  I usually get their Farmer John's sandwich with apple slices, provolone, and a delicious homemade mayo on a sourdough baguette, and Cathy's favorite is their Beet & Walnut Burger.  This time, we mixed it up.  She ordered the Smoked Tofu Eggroll Wrap with fries, and I ordered the Grilled Cheese, with mixed greens.

Graze's menu describes their grilled cheese as "Hook's cheddar, tomato, and caramelized onions on pullman loaf with whole-grain mustard."  ("Pullman loaf" is a fancy way to say "white bread.")  The sandwich was well-balanced and pretty good overall.  There was a sufficient amount of cheese but I would have preferred just a tad more.  The tomatoes were very juicy and the onions were sweet and not overpowering.  The bread was quite crispy and quite greasy, a little too greasy actually.  A pretty good sandwich but honestly it didn't quite live up to its $10 price tag. 

I would like to add that I really like Graze's mixed green salad.  It is always so fresh, full of very thinly sliced vegetables and a lot of flavor.  Their home brewed iced tea is also very good. 

Cathy liked her Tofu Eggroll Wrap, but she thought it could have had more flavor.  The fries were excellent though!  They are homemade fries cut to just the right thickness and fried to perfection, served with garlic aioli. 




 

Buck & Badger Northwoods Lodge - #2

Boyfriend took me to see Nonpoint at the Orpheum Theater on State Street in Madison, so I suggested we have dinner at Buck & Badger Northwoods Lodge beforehand.  Based on my previous experience there, I was excited to share this restaurant with him.

This time, I ordered the Baked Mac and Cheese, which was served in a little cast iron cauldron.  The cheese sauce was made with Gruyere and Cheddar cheeses and was delectably creamy and tasty.  It was topped with blue cheese crumbles and bread crumbs, which added a perfect amount of tang and crunch.  This is definitely one of the top Mac and Cheese dinners that I've eaten.

Boyfriend wasn't sure what to get, but ended up with Flank Steak Meatloaf, due in part to my encouragement, "Where else will you be able to get meatloaf made of fresh ground steak?"  He wasn't too impressed with it but he said the bread was good.  Fortunately, hockey was on the TV above the fireplace, so the meal wasn't a total loss for him.

The Coopers Tavern

I have been assisting my friend and co-worker, Jennifer, with a goal to spend the occasional lunch hour enjoying a meal and conversation rather sitting in the office in front of a computer.  Yesterday we were both able to gain a short reprieve from our workload and, being a gloriously perfect Spring day, we decided to have lunch at The Coopers Tavern at 20 West Mifflin Street in Madison, because of their sidewalk seating. 

Jennifer ordered a humbly named but artistically crafted Ham sandwich - locally raised Uphoff Farms ham, stout grained mustard, caramelized onions, gouda cheese and red pepper mayo on Stella's Bakery Spicy Cheesy Bread - with house-made chips.  She shared the chips with me and, in my opinion, they were the best homemade potato chips I have ever eaten, very crispy and light.

I, of course, went with the Grilled Cheese.  Coopers Tavern's version is made of cheddar, gouda, and gruyere on sourdough, and comes with a shot glass of roasted red pepper and tomato soup.  The cheese blend was perfectly melty and flavorful.  The bread was grilled to that ideal point that can only be achieved with sourdough - right between hard and chewy, so you really have to think about each bite and can, therefore, reap the most pleasure from it.  It was a faultless sandwich.  The accompanying soup was probably meant for dipping, but it was also good for sipping.  It tasted very fresh and zesty.

We achieved the goal with this lunch:  good food, good conversation, and on top of that, good weather.

The Cheese Factory Restaurant

The Cheese Factory Restaurant, at 521 Wisconsin Dells Parkway South, in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin, is a unique gem.  It is an elegant restaurant housed in an former cheese factory, with a soda fountain, espresso bar, and a ballroom, that serves only vegetarian and vegan food, and is run by 5-star quality staff from all over the world. 

I have been to The Cheese Factory several times.  Their menu has so many great choices I have never eaten the same entrée twice.  Besides the familiar meatless meals that might hide on many typical restaurant menus (veggie burrito, pizza, etc.), they have seitan and tofu dishes that are works of art.  Last Friday I went specifically to try their famous "The Big Cheese" grilled cheese sandwich which has been lauded in the November 2009 issue of Every Day With Rachel Ray, as one of four over the top grilled cheese sandwiches in the nation.

Though I have never had the same dinner, I almost always start with The Cheese Factory's Wisconsin Beer Cheese Soup.  It is a lighter variety than most beer cheese soups, but quite flavorful.  It's base is Old Milwaukee beer and it includes very finely grated carrots.

The Big Cheese is made of three slices of very thinly sliced sourdough bread, sharp cheddar, Swiss, and Romano cheeses, and Roma tomatoes.  The sandwich's assembly and presentation was immaculate.  Despite being a double decker, the bread didn't overwhelm the sandwich as a whole.  It was lightly seasoned, perfectly grilled, and not too crisp.  The three cheeses complemented each other.  They were melted but semi-solid and not gooey.  This was a very well done grilled cheese sandwich.

2013 Wisconsin Grilled Cheese Championships

Here are some photos from the 2013 Wisconsin Grilled Cheese Championships held on Saturday, April 27, 2013 in Mineral Point. 

Each competitor had 15 minutes to make two sandwiches, one for the judges, and one for display.

You couldn't eat the competition sandwiches, but there were four vendors selling lunch.  We sampled three different sandwiches from Melthouse Bistro, a grilled cheese restaurant that made the trip all the way from Milwaukee.

This is the "Baconmoto" sandwich from Melthouse Bistro, made with Wisconsin aged sharp Cheddar, pecanwood smoked bacon, tomatoes and olive oil mayonnaise on Breadsmith Country French Bread.  My mom, sister, and I all agreed it was incredible.  The Melthouse Bistro cooks grill both sides of the bread before assembling their sandwiches.  Because of this technique, the fillings don't sog out the bread.  This technique especially paid off for the mayo and juicy tomatoes in the Baconmoto.

This is the "Recco" sandwich: Focaccia from Breadsmith and Wisconsin Feta and Fontina cheeses.  Delicious.  You can see it was a little skimpy on the cheese but I wonder if the cooks were just conserving cheese so they wouldn't run out.  (One of the other sandwich vendors had completely run out of ingredients before noon.)

And, this is the "Arla," a dessert sandwich made with Havarti, sweet spiced apples, praline pecans, on brioche bread.  It was basically an apple pie in a sandwich costume. 

We also tried some beer cheese soup from Fox Heritage Farms.  Currently, they are solely a catering company but will be opening Fox Heritage Tavern soon at 131 East Mifflin Street in Madison. The soup was made with Ale Asylum's Madtown Nut Brown Ale and featured lard-popped popcorn on top.  It had a rather disgusting color, but a really full, rich taste.    

There were several vendors including several cheese companies and the Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board, which was giving away free grilled cheese cookbooks.   There were also a few non-cheesy vendors that I think are worth mentioning: 

• Sector 67 - a studio in Madison where engineers, artists, and other creative people can use shop space and tools for a monthly fee.  They had a cool 3-D printer set up that created plastic bracelets as we watched. 
• Miracles on Hoof CR Therapy - a therapeutic horsemanship farm in Spring Green.  I know from past experience that therapeutic riding and hippothereapy are really good programs, so I will give them a shout-out here. 

The event was packed - it was awesome to see so many grilled cheese aficionados.  I ate lunch at a table with a family who came up from Chicago and two ladies from Madison.  The weather was about perfect, and it was a great day for a drive along the hillsides of southwestern Wisconsin.  All in all, a great day and a well-run event! 

Monty's Blue Plate Diner

Last night I went to see Jason Isbell and Todd Snider at the Barrymore Theatre with my friend Jenny.  Before the show, we ate dinner at Monty's Blue Plate Diner, at 2089 Atwood Avenue in Madison, right across the street from the Barrymore.  It was very busy -- there was a holiday-fair-feeling in the air, with people from all walks of life out enjoying the first nice Spring evening in Madison.  There was a half hour wait for a table, but no waiting for seats at the counter. 

Monty's serves breakfast all day, and has an excellent selection of vegetarian foods on their menu.  I had a hard time choosing what to order.  I almost went with the Walnut Bistro Burger, Falafel Wrap, or Ultimate Mac and Cheese.  There are two grilled cheeses on the menu:  one with Swiss, cheddar and Parmesan cream cheese on brioche bread that is served with tomato dill soup, and the Farmer John's Italian Grilled Cheese, with roasted red peppers, provolone, mozzarella and kalamate olive tapenade on sourdough.  I ended up with the Italian. 

The Italian Grilled Cheese was very tasty.  The red peppers added a really bright aspect to the presentation and the olives contributed a lot of savoriness, but didn't overpower the sandwich.  The cheese was warm but not quite melted, which gave it a really good "bite."  This was a 5-napkin sandwich, deliciously greasy.  The bread was a very hard sourdough, grilled perfectly.  It tore up the roof of my mouth and it's still rough this morning ... but no pain, no gain I guess.  The only downfall to the sandwich was that the bottom bread was very, very soggy.  The solidly built crust supported it though, and it didn't fall apart.

Jenny had the Heathen Vegan Shoplifter's Delight, a knife and fork sandwich with Portobello mushrooms, tempeh, onions and avocado.  She said it was fabulous.  The only bad part of our dining experience was that we could not eat one more bite and would have to forgo one of the scrumptious looking desserts displayed in a case by the entrance. 

Overall, it was a good dinner at friendly restaurant.



   

The Koffee Kup

I had the day off of work today and found myself at the Koffee Kup at lunch.  It is a super cute small town diner that has been in Stoughton, Wis., at 355 E. Main Street, a long time.  They serve breakfast all day and have a pretty good selection of lunch offerings.  But since I have a responsibility to my readers, I went with their grilled cheese.   

You can choose from about 5 different cheeses on your grilled cheese sandwich.  The sandwich section of the menu states that customers are not limited to what is listed on the menu but are free to come up with their own ideas.  I went with cheddar on sourdough, and cinnamon apples for a side. 

The sandwich was grilled perfectly and had a buttery flavor.  The cheddar was sharp tasting and scrumptiously stringy.  An honest, simple, and well executed grilled cheese.  The cinnamon apples were very good, like apple pie filling, but not as sugary.  My friend got a BLT with fries.  She's very particular about her bacon, and was pleased that it was cooked perfectly to her specifications.  She was kind enough to share some fries with me and they were excellent.  They were home made with skin on, and very crisp. 

We also got dessert.  I had a brownie a la mode, which was very rich and had a delectable chocolate frosting.  My friend had Fruit of the Woods pie - mixed berries, apples, and rhubarb.  It was delicious and had a good crust. 

The food came out very fast and the service was good.  The waitress brought the check to the table with the food, which I appreciated since I hate waiting for the check after finishing a meal.  All in all, it was a really good lunch, and the whole meal with dessert was under $20 for two. 

Fromagination

Fromagination, at 12 South Carroll St., Madison, Wisconsin, is celebrating National Grilled Cheese Month by featuring a different gourmet grilled cheese sandwich each week of April.  They describe this week's offering as "Crave Brothers' Petit Frere with Truffles and Espresso BellaVitano with fresh tomato and honey."  It sounded so delicious that I walked over in the pouring rain today to try it.

Fromagination is a beautiful, upscale artisan cheese store that also sells cheese accessories and accompaniments, as well as a small variety of sandwiches, soups and salads.  They are a champion of local agriculture.  The staff members are knowledgeable, well dressed, polite but they give off a (deservedly so) cheese-snob air.  Their dining area is limited to a long communal table in the back of the store, and sidewalk tables in the summer, so I got my sandwich to go.

The cheese was delightfully melty and sweet.  The tomatoes didn't add much (being pinkish and out of season).  I got a taste of honey about every other bite, and it was heavenly.  I didn't taste the truffles.  I think the more subtle flavors of the sandwich were suppressed by the bread.  The bread was overly greasy, with small burned bits, and had sesame seeds on the crust.  The toasted sesame seeds overpowered all other tastes the sandwich could have offered.  Unfortunately, the bread slices were assembled crookedly, giving more disappointing crust area per bite than necessary.  Included with the sandwich was a charming square of dark chocolate sprinkled with sea salt, nuts, and dried cranberries.  It was a perfect little dessert. 

Overall, the meal I got for $9.50 and thoroughly rain soaked clothing didn't tally up to what I had imagined.  The foundation of a sandwich, after all, is the bread. 

 

    

The Rigby

The Rigby, at 119 East Main Street, Madison, Wisconsin, is a casual pub-style restaurant with a Beatles / 60's rock / British theme. On the main floor, there's a large J-shaped bar and a mural of record album covers on one wall.  Table seating is upstairs, where a "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" painting featuring a mosaic "Penny Lane" takes up the majority of a wall.  Stained glass umbrella lamps hang from the ceiling. 
 

The menu is creatively written, and includes many tempting choices with names like "Lonely Hearts Turkey Club Band," "The Wrap of John and Yoko," and "Sgt. Popper Burger."   I ordered the "Mozzarella Moon Delight" and my compatriot ordered the "That's a Fish Taco Wrap." We shared a half order of "Help! I Need Some Nachos."
 

The nachos came first.   The half-order was huge for a two person appetizer, but the menu did warn us it would be. They didn't look like anything special ... but the nacho cheese was a delightful surprise.  It had a smooth, glutinous texture, like Taco Bell cheese sauce (I mean that in the most complimentary way possible), and didn't harden as it cooled, but it was obviously made with real cheese and tasted great!   We also appreciated how the nachos were assembled, with cheese layered throughout.  Very few chips were bare. 

 

The "Mozzarella Moon Delight" was a grilled cheese take on a Margherita pizza, with real buffalo mozzarella, tomatoes, and basil.   The innards were really tasty - the mozzarella was super melty and gooey, and the basil contributed an exciting flavor boost.  The tomatoes didn't really add anything, but it is only early April, and there are no good tomatoes here in Wisconsin yet.   I thought it was such a good idea to make a Margherita style sandwich, but The Rigby's version fell a little short, being brought down by the bread. Although grilled to a golden perfection, the rustic Italian white bread was flavorless and too crunchy.   I think the mozzarella would have been complemented better by a softer bread, like flatbread, or perhaps a slightly browner bread for color contrast, maybe with a garlicky mayo as a sauce. I ordered potato chips as an accompaniment.  They turned out to be homemade ruffled chips, a little thicker than commercial potato chips, but not too thick.   They were crispy and were salted perfectly.

My friend ordered the soup of the day along with with her "That's a Fish Taco Wrap."   The soup was a creamy potato bacon.   She thought it had ample, appropriately sized potato chunks and a good amount of bacon, and was probably the most flavorful version of potato soup that she has ever eaten.  The soup was garnished with pita chip croutons that were tasty, but too large and crunchy to conveniently break up and add to the soup.   As for the wrap, in her words, "the fish, warm and moist with a light and still-crispy coating was surrounded in the wrap by lettuce and a nice coleslaw, neither of which was wilted in the least by the warm fish.  The sauce, not too much and not too little, was slightly spicy and very flavorful.   All was assembled burrito-style, in a tightly wrapped flour tortilla, cut in half, and easy to handle."

The staffpeople at The Rigby were really friendly and attentive.  We didn't spend much time waiting around and the check was delivered promptly.   It was moderately priced for downtown Madison.  Although the mozzarella cheese sandwich was a little disappointing, I would still go back to try some of their other menu items.

Buck & Badger Northwoods Lodge

Buck & Badger Northwoods Lodge, at 115 State Street, Madison, Wisconsin, is an Up-North themed restaurant with a fireplace and a multitude of microbrew beers on tap.  Upon walking in the door, you're welcomed by the fresh piney aroma of log-sided walls.  The tables and booths are made of well crafted wood, while the very solid chairs have a rustic branch look.  The waitstaff dress in flannel lumberjack shirts for the full northern effect.

Buck & Badger offers a diverse menu which includes duck, boar, lamb, bison, and … three delectably cheesy entrees:  Baked Mac & Cheese, Grilled Cheese Tomato Fondue, and, my selection, Grilled Cheese with Fig Jam & Sliced Apples. 

The menu described my chosen sandwich as “Great Lakes Gruyere and apple fig jam between grilled sourdough slices.”  The Gruyere cheese blended perfectly with the semi-cooked apple chunks for a sweet, melty, savory taste.  The sourdough bread was grilled perfectly and did not get even a bit soggy before the end of the meal.  It was served with pickles and a pink coleslaw that was quite good.  I also ordered the soup of the day, a vegetarian creamy potato.  It was plain and didn’t have a whole lot of flavor, but not too bad. 

My dining companions ordered and thoroughly enjoyed Buck & Badger’s Duck Salad and Bison Burger.  Complementary chocolate chip cookies came at the end of the meal.  They were crispy, warm and perfect. 

Overall, it was an excellent meal in a restaurant with great ambiance.  I’ll definitely be back to try their other cheesy offerings. 

Mission Statement / Premier Blog Post

This blog is devoted to the elevation and enjoyment of grilled cheese sandwiches, mac & cheese and other carb-filled cheesy comfort foods.  Why does the world really need somebody else taking pictures of their food with a cameraphone?  Well, it really doesn’t, but here you go.