Saturday, July 25, 2009

Ridiculous Eats VI: Local Heroes (pt. 1)

With all my nattering about gigantic and ridiculous foods, I seem to have skipped over my home state. As a Midwestern state, Ohio knows a few things about bigger, badder food. And Cleveland especially is home to a restaurant know for their more-is-more approach to sandwich making. I'm speaking, of course, of Lakewood's own Melt Bar and Grilled.

Located on Detroit Avenue in Lakewood, a suburb of Cleveland, Melt serves a variety of interesting takes on the classic grilled cheese, from the Kindergarten: your choice of cheese of fresh, thick cut bread; to the Spinach Pie: garlic spinach, roasted red peppers, grilled onions, and feta. Melt has something for every taste and appetite. I'm a pretty big fan of the Mushroom Melt, with meaty garlic portabellas, smokey sweet caramelized onions in Port wine reduction, and rich provolone. I also endorse the Wake & Bacon, a breakfast-for-dinner sandwich with fried eggs, bacon, and American cheese.

Not only does Melt boast some of the best sandwiches you've ever wrapped your sweaty little mouth around, they've got beer for days, too! A constantly rotating selection of amazing draught beers is backed by a binder full of bottled selections and, as always, the $2 mystery beer, which is always a fun surprise. I recommend the Old Rasputin Imperial Stout when they have it, full bodied, rich, smokey, and malty. One of the best I've ever tasted.

But the real reason we're here today is Melt's menu monster: the Parmageddon!

A mega-mouthful to be sure, the Parmageddon stacks vodka infused kraut, onions, and Cheddar cheese on top of... wait for it... perogies! It's a meal within a meal!
This isn't Melt's only foray into the land of Ridiculous eats, either. The restaurant boasts an ever changing lineup of monthly and seasonal mammoths, most notably the Godfather which crammed a heaping slice of lasagna between two pieces of bread and a hardy helping of mozzarella. And more recently they've upped the ante with the Purple Parma, an eggplant parm sandwich, and the Big Popper: a beer battered sandwich filled with Cheddar, herb cream cheese, mixed berry preserves, and hand battered jalapeno poppers.
Hungry? Check out their website for details: http://www.meltbarandgrilled.com/home.html
Up Next: It Came from Columbus: the Thurman Burger!

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