One of our favorite places to eat is a little pub in Chicago called O’Donovans. Their $2 burgers are absolutely delicious, and when piled high with BBQ, bacon and bleu cheese it’s a little bit of heaven.

This dish was totally inspired by an episode of Top Chef. I decided to reinvent my favorite burger! It was a little bit silly, but it was so much fun! I found some bleu cheese burgers at the grocery store that were the other half of the inspiration. I grilled those up in my Mario Batali grillpan. While I did that I roasted a red pepper in the oven and caramelized some onions and portabella mushrooms, and I fried up some prosciutto. I topped it with some goat cheese crumbles (would’ve been bleu if I’d had it in the fridge) and some Sweet Baby Ray’s, serving it up open-faced on some high-fiber wheat bread.

Simple? Sure, but it was delicious and felt really, really fancy. It was so good!

CONFESSION: I just can’t keep anything simple. Even something as basic as sloppy joes I have to play around with, find a way to make it more interesting, usually by adding more vegetables and some herbs to a prepared sauce.

That said, I also make the best sloppy joes on the planet. My secrets?

• Sauté an onion, a red pepper and a green pepper in some olive oil and set aside. Add it in when everything else is done cooking for the strongest vegetable flavor
• Penzey’s Northwoods Fire seasoning blend adds a great smokiness
• Gouda cheese. I buy mine at Aldi and keep it handy for shredding on random things, but for some reason Gouda+Sloppy Joe is like magic!
• I always serve it up with Milwaukee Midget Dill Pickles, hands down the best pickles in the galaxy. Seriously, there’s nothing better, and I’ve tried many to compare. Buy them online from the Willy Street Co-Op in Madison. and try them yourself!

CONFESSION: I’m extremely picky about tuna salad. Extreeeemely picky. So much so that I’m terrified to try it anywhere else, even though tuna melts are a big favorite of mine.

There are three secrets to my tuna salad:

• Miracle whip, never mayo
• Dill pickles or dill pickle relish
• Onions are only for cold, crisp tuna salad. Salad for tuna melts shall have no onions.

That’s really it. I grill it up with swiss cheese on my Mario Batali panini press (one of my favorite things!) and it’s a little bit of heaven. Simple, but it always feels like a huge treat.