Rerun: Grilled PB&J

My mom will attest to the fact that for eight years I consumed nothing but peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I’m positive that this strict and rigorous diet is what made me the man I am today. And why not eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches over and over and over? This sandwich is nature’s perfect gift. It’s simply not possible to find three other ingredients that fit together quite the way these do.

Or is it?

My dearest Fridgers, I give you the grilled peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Why? Because there’s no food so perfect that you can’t grill it and make it even perfecter. A bratwurst? Grill it. Steak tartare? Grill it. Graham crackers, marshmallows, and chocolate? Grill it. And yes, the peanut butter and jelly sandwich too.

So let’s walk through the steps required to bring this miraculous thing of beauty to your lips. [Hey, Charlie! What gives? A grilled PB&J? And what was that last week: salami on toast? And what else did I read on these pages? A fifty pound cheeseburger? The fatty melt? I thought you were on a diet. And even more, I thought you were trying to help us. You call this help? This is torture!] I’m sorry, sir. Please hold all questions until the end of the tour.

Let’s begin with the basic ingredients: peanut butter, jelly, bread, and a big tub of I Can’t Believe This Is That Cheap Butter Substitute:

And carrots too. See? It’s healthy! Now, the first step is to grab the jar of peanut butter. Before you open it, however, take a look at the jar and see if you can guess how much peanut butter you have. Looks full, don’t it?

Nope! That’s the First Law of Peanut Butter: you always have less peanut butter than you think. I highly recommend always having two jars on hand. (Or, conversely, always having your hand in two jars.)

Now grab a knife and spread the butter across the bread, like so:

Next is, of course, the jelly. Wonderful, wonderful grape jelly. Theoretically, you could use a different flavor. Of course, theoretically, you could make a peanut butter and Crisco sandwich too. But that would be wrong.

The next step is crucial: clean off the damn George Foreman grill, will you? It’s gross. You’ve probably cooked bacon on it eighteen times in a row, always telling yourself you’ll clean it “tomorrow.” Well, guess what? It’s finally tomorrow. Scrape away:

Now butter one side of the bread and set it butter-side-down on the grill. Right after that, butter the opposite side while you still have a fighting chance:

Lookin’ good so far!

You may have heard the ugly rumor that peanut butter is high in fat. I’m afraid, my friends, this is indeed true. While it does fall in the “good” fat category (due to its nutty origins) it’s still fat and therefore packs a whollop when it comes to calories. But good news is close at hand in the form of a “Fat Reducing” machine. That’s right, kids. Just put the sandwich on the grill and while it’s cooking, Advanced Magical Foreman Technology sucks fifty percent of the fat right out of the food and sends it to your neighbors.

Let the sandwich cook until it looks nice and toasty. At this point the peanut butter and jelly will have gone through a nuclear fusion process, where the peanut butter atoms have bonded to the jelly atoms to produce a new element: Peanutbutterandjellium. It’s in the Carbon group and has an atomic weight of delicious.

Caution: the sandwich you are about to enjoy is extremely hot. (Ha ha! Now you can’t sue me.) But you can send me money—which is exactly what you’ll feel compelled to do when you bite into sandwich perfection.

Originally Posted November 18, 2008