Dairy Queen Oshkosh - Murdock

Upon prompting from one of my favorite readers I decided to give Dairy Queen's curds a try.

So I ordered 2 orders of cheese curds from Dairy Queen Wednesday night as it had been a while since my last blog post.

Fast food curds generally are almost in a different class as I don't expect much out of them, but for the purposes of this blog, I will rate all cheese curds by the same criteria.

These curds had a nice golden color to the breading and were cooked fairly well. They could use a bit more crunch in the breading, but were not soggy by any means. These curds had a nice saltiness to them, but I felt it might have been forced, like they just dumped a bunch of salt on them after they came out of the fryer. The cheese was very good for a fast food place. When I get up the courage to go to Culver's for cheese curds you'll read a good rant about how bad things can get. So Dairy Queen does well on the quality of cheese by fast food standards and even fairly well overall. My grading on these curds is a 6.5 out of 10. If there was a separate scale for fast food curds it would be higher.

On a side note I jokingly called myself a food blogger for the first time last night. While technically true, it was just a joke.

How I grade Mozzarella Sticks

So as part of this blog I will be testing and evaluating my perceived quality of mozzarella sticks, but if you are interested, I'll walk you through how I judge them. If you feel that I'm wrong or I'm missing something feel free to comment.

The most important part of a mozzarella stick is the quality of the cheese. There is no way to sugar coat this, if a mozzarella stick is made with sub-par cheese there is nothing you can do to make it excellent. A high quality cheese will be flavorful, a bit salty and when cooked correctly it will be stringy and have a slightly chewy consistency. For example a lot of chain restaurants tend to provide a mozzarella stick that "looks" like good cheese. By that I mean they will be stringy, but they will lack the flavor and texture.

The second thing I look at is the breading. Good mozzarella stick breading will provide substantial flavor to the appetizer (unlike cheese curds which shouldn't get too much flavor from the breading) however the flavor needs to compliment the cheese, and not mask it nor try to hide flaws in the cheese. The breading needs to add to the texture of the mozzarella stick again it needs to compliment the cheese by providing a slightly crunch counterpoint to the stretchy chewiness of the cheese. Breading also should not be too thick there isn't much worse than eating a doughy mozzarella stick it pretty much guarantees a bad result.

The third thing I look for is the quality of the cooking. While often appetizers are overlooked for quality, it is something I take a lot of notice of. If you nail the cheese and the breading you can still ruin a mozzarella stick by over or under cooking. A well cooked mozzarella stick should be cooked to a golden brown (color depends on the type of breading of course), but it should not be left undercooked and certainly shouldn't be burned. The breading should be crunchy and not soggy after cooking. Finally the cheese should be thoroughly and evenly melted.

Finally I want a good marinara sauce for dipping. This is really a whole separate conversation as to what makes a good sauce, and I will let somebody else discuss that. All that I look for is that the sauce compliment the stick and not fight it, hide it or ruin it. This comes in last, because I feel that a good mozzarella stick should be able to stand on its own and can only be enhanced by marinara. Also, you can find pre-made marinara that doesn't suck, so if you have bad marinara there really isn't an excuse. Great marinara is a different story, but again not my expertise.

So that's it that's what I look for in a Mozzarella Stick.

Stay Cheesy,

-Matt

Red Robin Mozzarella Sticks (Single Order)

Stringy cheese, but as with most things at large chains it's rather bland. The sticks were cooked nicely breading was browned well and the cheese was melted thoroughly. The breading was too thick and kind of bland. Overall rating 6 out of 10. They did a great job of cooking a bland product. Portion size was also very decent for the single order.

Players Pizza Oshkosh

To start off, I'm hitting the places in Oshkosh that have cheese curds on the menu.

First up is Players Pizza. http://www.playerspizzaoshkosh.com/

Players offers white cheese curds (which are usually my favorite). These curds clearly use very good cheese as they were salty and stretchy. There is a good portion size and the curds were browned quite nicely. At best they could have been just a touch darker, but that's just being picky. They offered a selection of dipping sauces, I tried them with some ranch dressing and they were quite delicious.

Overall, I give these curds a very strong 8 out of 10 and say they are some of the best cheese curds in Oshkosh.

Oh and I need a sign off. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Stay cheesy,
Keep squeakin,
And that's the way of curds,
Yours in fried deliciousness, etc.

-Matt

The Way of Curds

This is going to be a blog about my quest for the best fried cheese curds in Wisconsin.

I'll also be tracking fresh cheese curds as well fried mozzarella sticks and other cheese appetizers.

All the opinions and ratings are my opinion only and though I consider myself a fried cheese connoisseur, everyone differs on what makes a great cheese curd, so if you don't like what I have to say feel free to post replies on it (but try not to call names).

Also if you want me to try the cheese curds you think are the best feel free to post that too.

Thanks for reading,

-Matt