Yep, that’s right, tonight’s post is about cheese and crackers. The recipe: cheese, crackers. Instructions: combine, eat.

Sometimes, it’s the very simplest things in life that make you the happiest. The thing about cheese & crackers for me is that they always make me think of my dad. Not the crackers so much, as the cheese. And not even the cheese itself so much, as the act of slicing it. When I was a kid, there was always a big brick of extra sharp cheddar hangin’ out in the fridge. More often than not, it was a Costco sized block. It sat there on the very top shelf in the door, awaiting one of two fates: be sliced and eaten out of hand by my dad, or be grated and sprinkled all over the top of any number of the things we regularly ate for dinner. Goulash (no where close to an “authentic” version, I peeked at the actual recipe years back and discovered it’s true title was “Navy Super Skillet”), Tamale Pie, Enchiladas, Hamburger Pie (in retrospect, this was Shepherd’s Pie, and I loathed it), etc. Somewhere around junior high my parents purchased this bohemoth of a grating device, that had a great big handle that you cranked in order to turn any number of tumbler-like attachments that promised to grate, slice, shred, and generally perform any sort of culinary magic you could possibly wish for. It was so big in fact, that it had three metal feet to which suction cups were attached – the idea being that you had to anchor it to the counter in order to apply the necessary pressure to achieve all your grating goals. Problem was, our counters were made up of lots of little 4″x4″ textured ceramic tiles. Not so good for suction cup grippy-ness. You know what does have a nice smooth, fully suctionable surface? A washing machine. Let’s just say I grated a LOT of cheese in the laundry room in my day.

But I digress. It’s rare that I buy a block of cheese for myself these days, being that I have a lactose intolerate roommate, and I’m rarely able to eat it all before it goes all moldy and yuck. But whenever the hankering for plain old cheese and crackers strikes, I always default to that trusty sharp cheddar. I remember watching my dad stand at the pull-out cutting board, slicing neatly and perfectly down the block in a single smooth, seemingly effortless stroke. He’d pop a slice in his mouth, feed one in tiny bits to the cat, wrap it up and put it back in the fridge. Then the next time he went to repeat this ritual, there would be an added element or two. A sigh. Then a bellow. “Who destroyed the cheese?!?” or ”Who hacked up the cheese??” “What the heck happened to the cheese!?” also made the regular rotation. It was a rhetorical question, of course. Everyone knew what had happened to the cheese. Mom had not hacked up the cheese. Dad had not destroyed the cheese. The cat had certainly not had a paw in marring the cheese. A kid had gotten their grubby little mitts on the cheese. Probably with a butter knife. Occasionally a paring knife, if I was feeling brave. My brother was a guilty party too, he definitely hacked his share of cheese blocks in his day. I simply wasn’t strong enough, coordinated enough, or at one point tall enough to really get that leverage you need to slice cleanly through a large hunk of semi-hard cheese. Certainly not armed with a puny butter knife. Inevitably I’d get about an inch down, and then the knife would shear off and hit the cutting board with a thunk, flinging my shard of cheese onto the counter. I’d keep at it, with the same result over and over again, until the face of the cheese looked like a very poorly constructed, very steep stair case. Occasionally I’d manage to get one entire slice completely intact – half an inch thick on one side, so thin you could see through it on the other. I think the most common result though was the smooth curved slice that occured when I’d start out strong, but then lose momentum part way down. If you repeat this action enough times, you wind up with a block of cheese that resembles something like a half pipe skate ramp.

As you can see from the paper thin corner on my slice in the picture, I still have not mastered the art of slicing cheese. Every time I mess it up, I hear my dad saying “Who destroyed the cheese???”

Sorry dad, it was me. I totally messed up your cheese.