The building of the Manwich

"It's not the man that makes the manwich, it's the manwich that makes the man!"

Please be patient for the images to load, they're about 60-70Kb each and 20 in all.

Preparation is the key to the successful building of a manwich - Have all your ingredients readily to hand and prepared so you can build them in exactly when required!

Of course, prior to handling ANY preparation of foodstuffs please observe some basic hygiene and WASH YOUR HANDS! - Also, ensure your work/preparation surfaces have been cleaned!

Step: 1 - Cheese! Mmm grate!

The orangey-coloured cheese is Double Gloucester and the lighter one is some nice, tasty strong Cheddar.

(Note: That's a dinner plate there).

Step:2 - Bread!

Take your loaf of FRESH bread (that's a whole 'Bloomer' loaf right there) and slice it LENGTHwise.

Step: 3 - Let battle commence!

I only coated the lower layer of the loaf because it's the first time I'd bought this brand of chilli sauce and

didn't want to overdo it (also, too much sauce would make the filling more difficult to control!).

Step:4 - Jumping Jalapenos! - It's chilli time! (Yeah!)

For a nice piquant zing and to add texture and crunch for your manwich, take the jalapeno chillies and apply them liberally (to taste)

to the lower level of the manwich

Step: 5 - Cheese it!

Ok, remember that yummy cheese back in pic 1?, this is where to start piling it on, thickly!

How you do it is entirely up to you (you may like to mix it up if you want), but for me, I decided

to keep things segregated for two distinctive taste experiences.

You may also note, that some fresh ground black pepper was added to the buttered upper layer here.

Ok, for the moment, we're done with this level of the manwich, now me move up a floor :)

Step: 6 - More chilli (but a different one)

This is Blue Dragon sweet chilli dipping sauce (that's excellent with spring rolls btw..)

This is drizzled liberally over the base of the 2nd floor of the manwich to taste.

Ok, now to add some more texture and a nice splash of colour to your manwich, we add some

salad (I know you don't win friends with it, but it also helps to ease my conscience about building

such a large unhealthy-type snack...) and so:

Frankly I can't be arsed to go into the buying and washing etc. of salad, so I get mine ready

washed and mixed and besides I have more important things to do with my time.. :)

As you can see, this makes the manwich nice and colourful (as well as adding some nice 'crunch-factor').

Ok, that's the 2nd floor done for the moment, now we'll return to the ground floor and gets to cooking!

Step: 7 - Cooking!

Because the eggs wont take very long at all to cook, we'll do those after the steaks. I used 3 eggs

for my manwich, but depending on how hungry you are (or how many people you're feeding) you

can add/subtract as necessary :)

Some freshly-ground black pepper was added to the eggs at this point.

Heat up your frying pan until it is SMOKEY hot (I added some ground black peppercorns into the pan before adding the steaks).

Then, when it's starting to smoke, add in the steaks (and hear them all sizzle nicely!) this will assist sealing in the flavour.

Note: at first I didn't add any oil to the pan as the fat from the steaks will cook them, though about half way through cooking I did add

a little oil (about 1-2 tablespoons) to help prevent excessive sticking. After a while turn down the heat on the pan and cook your steaks

through or to taste if you like them rare etc...

Ok! so far so good! :)

Whilst the steaks are cooking away nicely in the pan, you can garnish the 2nd level of your manwich with some more of the cheese you

grated earlier and some of the jalapeno peppers that you should have left, like so:

Colourful and crunchy! :)

Ok! - By the time you've done this, your steaks should be amply cooked! so we need to retrieve them from the frying pan and allow them to

'rest' for a moment, like so:

At this point, quickly whisk the eggs into an omelette mixture with a fork and add them to the frying pan.

Note: You may like to add a little more cooking oil into the pan at this point:

Now because of the shape of the manwich (ie, loaf shaped), I tilted the pan back and forth so as to

'elongate' the omelette rather than keeping it circular (though I guess you could do that and fold the

edges in after :) ).

Whilst the omelette is cooking away nicely, you can trim all the fatty rind off of the steaks that are resting.

You need to take care as the steaks will still be rather hot!

Once you've done that - Insert some of the steaks (sliced into manageable bite-size slabs) into the foundation layer of the manwich

like so (this will start to melt the cheese nicely):

By the time you've trimmed the fat off the steaks, sliced them and inserted them into your manwich, your omelette should be

done, so now, add that to the ground floor layer as well:

With the heat still on the frying pan, add in your pack of salami, like so (this wont take long and shouldn't need

any additional oil):

We're on the home straight now!

Whilst these are cooking, take the remaining cooked steaks, sliced and insert those into the 2nd floor of the manwich, then

once the salami has had a minute or two each side, stuff them all into the 3rd floor/top layer of your manwich (and use the remaining

grated cheese to coat the floor of the 3rd layer also, if you like, chuck in a little more of the salad here too:

At this point, I opted to slice some really lovely cheese called "Montery Jack" and add that on top of the fried salami.

And we're done!

Now all you need to do is get a beverage of choice, kick back with a good movie or TV and enjoy your creation!