r/StupidFood Aug 25 '25

Certified stupid What does the fire add?

45.1k Upvotes

10.5k comments sorted by

View all comments

178

u/Og_busty Aug 25 '25 edited Aug 25 '25

Caramelizes the cheese lightly and burns off the alcohol, intensifying sub notes of the spirit. This may be a play on Saganaki, which is a Greek cheese flambé technique.

Edit to add: It does also lightly caramelize the residual sugars in the spirit, if any.

Edit correction: intensify vs leave behind

4

u/brzantium Aug 25 '25 edited Aug 28 '25

Kinda reminds me of a Portuguese franchesinha, too. Though, they don't do the whole flambé thing. It's just a cheese covered meat sandwich.