Colorado: America's Dairyland

I just want to thank y'all for all the help with my toaster.

I haven't made the purchase just yet, but I think tomorrow will be El Dia de Toaster Nuevo. 

Instead of the toaster/torturer, I've been using the broiler to do some toasting and melting duties while Mickey is down and out.

For as much as I like to cook, I didn't have a working knowledge of The Broiler and it's many capabilities until a few years ago, when a friend who actually doesn't like to cook introduced me to her.

It sounds crazy, but it had never dawned on me to push that little "broil" button and just watched what happened.

That's because I had no memories of my mom ever broiling anything. We were a Toaster Oven Family and that is where my love of small (large) appliances began.

When I mentioned this to her, she died laughing.

Apparently, she and my dad had a somewhat ugly fusing of toaster/broiler preferences at the onset of their marriage and he and his dinky toaster won out.

My Gran (her mom) was an avid broiler-user and created all kinds of deliciousness with its high heat and super melty powers. However, the love of the broiler didn't join my parents' marriage almost 40 years ago.

So then my mom and I started talking about our favorite broiler recipes.

Which brings me to one of the best broiler sensations of all times: Cheese Toast.

Have you had cheese toast lately?

It is one of my favorite snacks this side of a spoonful of peanut butter. In fact, my college roommates and I used to alternate between chile con queso and cheese toast as our favorite dinner options.

(Health, wellness, and costumes were our top priorities.)

Anyway, it seems cheese toast is a lost art these days.

As part of our daily after-school ritual, the neighborhood kids have somehow roped me into making dozens of chocolate chip cookies everyday for a snack.

Initially, when we decided the Black Horn Posse could walk home by themselves, I bribed them (to ensure their safe arrival) with cookies.

Ever since then, around nine of them tromp through the front yard and into my kitchen, slinging their backpacks all over the place, politely requesting (they're working on the charm thing) chocolate-chip cookies.

And here's the kicker: not just cookies. Hot cookies. Freshly baked. Warm cookies. On the one day I didn't have them coming out of the oven, the kids made me microwave the cookies so the chips would be gooey.

So today I had the audacity(!) to suggest cheese toast as a (questionably) healthier snack alternative. 

You would've thought I suggested pad thai noodles the way they scrunched up their faces and asked, "What in the heck is cheese toast?!"

"Where are your mothers and what have they been teaching you?!" I demanded.

Seriously.

I always thought cheese toast was a staple in every child's diet.

It is like eating cake on your birthday or black-eyed peas on New Year's Day. (Don't even tell me if you don't do that.)

Do I have a point to this blog? A theme? A thesis?

Of course not.

Except to say that I am nominating Cheese Toast for President with Diet Dr. Pepper as its running mate.

Amen.