What do I think is the best part of a grilled cheese sandwich, a cheese quesadilla, or a pizza? It’s the cheese that has escaped from the edges and browned into crispy cooked bits. One day I’m going to just bake some cheese to a crisp so I can have all the crispy bits I want – there are never enough.
This gorgeous loaf of bread called Casatiello is now another place where I can find some of that yummy cooked cheese. A brioche dough filled with cured meat and cheese bakes into a rich and tender loaf that is a sandwich in itself. Being the first time I had heard of this bread, I thought “how could it be bad?”, and I was right. It had great flavor and stayed moist for days.
I added pepperoni, salami, and cheddar cheese to mine, but there are many different suggestions for variations in the recipe, which comes from The Bread Baker’s Apprentice by Peter Reinhart. If you want to try this or another recipe from this great bread baking book, click here.
I’ll be in the kitchen frying cheese.
Shortbread 
Gorgeous looking bread…makes me want to make it all over again, and again, and again…yep, something about that hot melty cheese!
I loved both the texture and the taste of this bread – I put in cubes of cheese to maximize that meltiness!
WOW! Beautiful. I’ll be making this soon! Did you use it for a cheese sandwich? I’ll bet it was good.
With this bread, you don’t even need to add anything to have a ‘sandwich’ – just toast and eat!
Beautiful loaf. I really loved this one.
Now about that fried cheese, you want easy and great right, try this: Pepper Jack cheese block, cut to 1/2 inch cubes, bake on parchment at 450° 5 to 10 minutes. They’re done when just turning golden, they’ll continue deepening in color when out of oven. Experiment with time to get the crispness you like. Really great.
Thanks, I will definitely give that a try!
This looks delightful, and would be perfect picnic food.