Headliners Bar and Grill (Neenah, WI)

This was my first trip to Headliners so I didn't know what to expect.  I have to say I was pleasantly surprised.

Headliners had an unique idea of serving both white and yellow curds in one order. I have never heard of that being done anywhere so Kudos for trying something new. Oddly, the white and yellow curds seem to have been cooked separately as the white curds were more well done than the yellow curds.

Both types are battered which scores points in my book.  The batter was light and crisp, with a light saltiness and no noticeable seasoning.  It's a very clean tasting recipe.

There was no sauces provided with the curds, which was just fine because these curds can stand on their own.  I tried them with some ranch dressing I asked for.  The white curds were not improved by the sauce and are probably best left solo.  The yellow curds on the other hand blended well with the Ranch, though it's not needed.

The cooking is a tough one with these as the yellow curds were cooked to perfection, but the white curds were just a little too well cooked.  The white curds would have probably taken my rating of these way up if they didn't have just the slightest bit of burnt flavor to drag them down.  This however leaves these curds with some serious potential.  The other note on the cooking was the stretchiness of the white curds.  They were phenomenally stretchy, it may have been the quality of the cheese, but the pictures don't do justice to it.

I am ranking the entire order as one ranking so the strengths and weaknesses of the two almost cancel each other out.  These are an excellent order of curds and if you wanted to test in one shot the difference between white and yellow curds this is definitely one to try.  With a current score of 7 / 10 I will definitely be coming back to try these again and hopefully next time the white curds are not overdone.  With the combo of yellow and white curds with a clean, crisp batter and excellent cheese, there is potential for these to be some of the very best curds around.

-Matt

Website: http://www.headlinersbar.com/

The Beehive Inn take 2

So this was my second time getting curds at the Beehive.  The first time the curds were a little under done and were kind of soggy.  Today, was much improved.  The batter was cooked to a perfect golden brown.  The cheese was flavorful.  The batter was a little bland, but not bad.  The cheese did not have a very good stretchy-ness to it, which I count against it, though it gave the curd kind of a chewy texture similar to what you get in a fresh curd.
 These are some of the best curds I've found in the Neenah area I'm giving them 6.5 out of 10.

Tom's Drive In

I ordered a large order of cheese curds at Tom's Drive In on CB in Neenah.  This is more along the lines of what I expect from a fast food restaurant, as in bland.

I'll start with the good:
The portion size was very good.  I ordered the large which was a bit more expensive I got quite a big load of curds.  The breading was cooked well, nice color and crunchiness.  The cheese was almost well melted, just a bit short.

Now the bad:
This is one of the first times I've ever had an order of fried cheese curds that I didn't want to finish.  The breading was overpoweringly bland.  Not just a taste of nothing bland, but a bland that sucks the flavor out of your mouth.  The cheese while having a decent texture lacked flavor as well.  When I peeled the breading off of a couple curds to get a gauge of what the actual curd tasted like I was still disappointed. This cheese doesn't provide much of a base.  I also tried the breading by itself, it tasted like flour and hot frying oil ( this is not a compliment).

Overall Score: 3 out of 10

I can't even imagine a dipping sauce that would save these.

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.

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