croque-monsieur a la Tuscano
Anna Kate made homemade Best Recipe pancakes for breakfast this morning. They were delicious but I found myself wanting something a bit more complex for lunch. Raiding the pantry I found some crusty Tuscan bread, Parmesan cheese and Prosciutto ham so I decided to try a bit of a spin on the classic French croque-monsieur sandwich by adding a Tuscan touch.
- While medium and small skillets heated on the stove, I sliced the bread into 1/2″ thick slices and then covered one with Dijon mustard and the other with olive oil may0nnaise.
- Next, I sprinkled some dried herbs de Provence on the mayo covered slice before layering on several slices of Prosciutto ham and the second slice of bread.
- I melted butter in both skillets and added the sandwich to the medium one. Once the first side had grilled up to a nice golden brown, I flipped it and added a single egg to the small skillet to fry. At this point I turned the broiler onto HI.
- While I was waiting for the second side of the sandwich to finish grilling, I sliced up 4-5 1/8″ thick slices off a small block of Parmesan cheese.
- After a couple of minutes I transferred the sandwich from the skillet to a small baking sheet, covered the top with the Parmesan and placed it under the broiler for a couple more minutes.
- Once the cheese melted and started to brown at the edges, I removed the sandwich from the oven, placed it on a plate, added the fried egg (sunny side up), and garnished it with some fresh ground black pepper.
All told it took less than 10 minutes to prepare this meal. I took a second to take this picture before diving in. Good stuff!
