What's for Dinner?

There are two kinds of food that make me drool.....sandwiches and anything fried. I think I will eat anything if it's fried, so why not a sandwich? My original inspiration comes from a deep fried Monte Cristo sandwich I had at a restaurant several years ago, but recently I find my thoughts dreaming about that deep fried sandwich. 

Working in restaurants has given me an insight to many great recipes, one of them just so happens to be the inspiration for my favorite sandwich. My family calls it my sandwich, because I am the one who introduced them to the wonderful joy that this sandwich brings. I call it my Southwest Turkey Panini. It has all my favorite sandwich components: turkey, green chile, bacon, tomatoes, red onion and cheddar cheese all tucked in on two thin slices of sourdough bread. And when I say green chile I don't mean pablano or jalapeno peppers, for those of you from New Mexico you know exactly what I'm talking about. 

Now this sandwich is amazing as is, but trust me when I say deep frying it took it to a whole new level making it out.of.this.world!

I know many of you might wonder how the sandwich didn't fall apart during frying and the only thing I can tell is that it is due to how long you keep the sandwich in the panini press because I did have one fall apart on me, and trust me it wasn't pretty. Once I made all my panini's I made my batter. For this I cheated, I just used a basic pancake batter that I watered down so that it could easily coat the sandwich, then I placed in vegetable oil that I preheated to 350 degrees and let it cook to a nice golden brown. Due to the incredible amount of oil I immediately placed them on paper towels, blotting until I couldn't feel oil anymore.

Keeping with the theme of the Southwest serve a jalapeno lime ranch dressing on the side for dipping. Now that is the New Cristo! Now wipe that drool off the corner of your mouth and go create something awesome in the kitchen!! :)