After being on the road for almost a month and a half already, it’s easy to start missing home a little bit! My cheesy family and I always get together once a week for a “family dinner” where we all make something to contribute. These last couple weeks have been a lot of fun with everyone cooking up recipes that make them think of home!

Potato + Broccoli + Onions + Cheese = Yum!
When Tillatastic Ash is missing her hometown of Walla Walla, WA she whips up a perfect recipe to make her feel at home again! Her cheesy, baked Idaho potato, broccoli, and Walla Walla sweet onion dish is quick to make and leaves the belly feeling happy!

Cheese and Crackers
If you’re wondering how I spend my Friday nights at home, it’s usually sitting around a table with friends playing games and snacking on cheese and crackers! My favorite combination is with an array of crackers to choose from and the 3 Year Aged Vintage White Extra Sharp Cheddar. The cheese is so decadently delicious, I usually just end up using the crackers as a vehicle for the cheese to get in my mouth!

Gluten-Free Pasta
Although ShellBe Sharp can’t have gluten anymore, that hasn’t stopped her from making delicious gluten-free meals that even gluten lovers like PepperJack Matt enjoy! Her favorite dish to make when away from home includes gluten-free brown rice pasta, a little of this, a little of that, and of course some Tillamook Cheese! Her cheese of choice is usually the Vintage White Extra Sharp Cheddar! To ShellBe Sharp this colorful dish reminds her of Fall in Portland, OR when the leaves are changing colors and the weather starts to get a little cooler.

Grilled Salmon with Butter, Rosemary, and Garlic
One of the perks of spending my Spring in Texas has been the 70+ degree weather on a regular basis! If I were at home this time of the year, I know I would not be uncovering my BBQ for at least another couple months! During one of our “family dinners” we grilled up some salmon with Tillamook Salted Butter, a little salt and pepper, garlic, and some rosemary! It was juicy and scrumptious and reminded me of warm and sunny summers in the NW!

Waffles
Food carts have really come into their own over the past few years in the NW, specifically in Portland. One of my favorite food carts to visit is Flavour Spot. They have several cheesy waffles featuring our very own Tillamook Cheese, but one of my favorites is their Sausage and Maple combination! To help me recreate this tastiness on the road I usually add Tillamook Unsalted Butter, maple syrup, and sausage on top of my Texas shaped waffles! While my version is a little different from Flavour Spot’s, it still helps me reminisce of all the wonderful food carts in my hometown!

Now that I’ve shared some of my favorite NW dishes, what are some of your favorites? Share with me on Twitter or Facebook!
Twitter: @AprilFoCheezy
Facebook: April FoCheezy

By Tillamook

Going camping? Need camping food ideas? Well Tillamook Cheese Lover, let me introduce you to a few delicious ideas and the most important piece of camping equipment you will ever own…the Pudgy Pie.

The Pudgy Pie cooking iron just might be the greatest contraption ever invented. Here we’ve put ours to the test, the Grilled Cheese Pudgy Pie Test. After a lovely camping trip to the base of Washington’s Mt. Rainier, we now have a new appreciation for cooking outside. A hike through Summerland

– an alpine meadow at 6000ft – left us ravenous. So we headed back to camp to try our hand at three different Pudgy Pie grilled cheese experiments.

Step 1: Channel your inner boy/girl scout and build a fire. Let the coals get HOT!

Step 2: Stick an empty Pudgy Pie into the coals to get it nice and hot.

Step 3: Grab hold of a stick of butter and slather the hot Pudgy Pie until well coated. The butter may run off so do it over a newspaper or something that can be disposed of so you leave no trace.

Step 4: Lay out two slices of bread on a flat surface. Pick your bread wisely as it really makes a difference in flavor and texture. We chose a freshly baked, sliced sourdough.

Step 5: Have fun with different combos of ingredients with melty, gooey cheese as the staple!

Tip: try to pile as much of the ingredients into the middle of the bread to prevent it from spilling over the sides of the Pudgy Pie.

Step 6: Press sandwich into Pudgy Pie, clamp shut, remove bread from around the edge, and stick directly into hot fire.

Step 7: Let sit for 3-5 minutes per side, depending on the heat of the fire. This part takes some estimating, so play it by ear and enjoy any 'mess-ups'!

Step 8: Let the fire burn off. Clean up any remaining food on the Pudgy Pie.

To kick things off, we started with a classic, fire-kissed avocado, tomato, and Tillamook Medium Cheddar grilled cheese.

This sandwich was incredibly fresh for a grilled cheese! Obviously, bacon would be a great addition for those of us who are meat lovers. This was a delicious way to begin dinner, and it created lots of tasty leftovers for a veggie breakfast scramble in the morning.

Tip: this was the first one we made so the Pudgy Pie cast iron could have been hotter and we could have left it in the fire longer to make sure it was really roasty-toasty.

Following that was a fancy-schmancy, fire-roasted sautéed onions, prosciutto, and Tillamook Smoked Medium Cheddar grilled cheese.

OMG, yum.  This was hands down our favorite. The smokiness of the cheese with the saltiness of the prosciutto with the sweetness of the onions…perfect flavor combo, perfect texture, perfect!

Tip: the onions can be prepared at home before leaving or set to sauté on low on a camp stove. Warning: The smell might attract neighboring campers!

And for dessert? A decadent, fire-toasted fig, green apple, dark chocolate, and Tillamook Special Reserve Extra Sharp Cheddar grilled cheese.

This was the perfect way to watch a dying fire under the stars. The fruit keeps this treat light, while the chocolate makes sure you get dessert. The cheese actually acts more as texture and paves the way for all the other great flavors to combine. The fig was a last-minute addition as we “harvested” the first three figs from our new baby tree in the backyard! I think any fruit you have handy would work.

Tip: A Vintage White Medium Cheddar might have been even better for aesthetics and a more authentic taste.

I don’t know if I’ve ever eaten so gourmet on a camping trip! And it was all thanks to the Pudgy Pie and a few tasty camping food ideas.

What would you put in your Pudgy Pie pocket of gooey deliciousness?

By Gillian

"The Reggie"

Droooool! Fried chicken, bacon, Tillamook Cheese, and gravy on a fresh buttermilk biscuit… It’s time to plan a brunch date at Pine State Biscuits!

Thanks for sharing this delicious photo in our Tillamook Cheese fans group on Flickr, BreadnBadger!

By Gillian