Los Angeles Center Studios
1201 W. 5th Street.
Los Angeles, CA 90017
Public Transportation
Red Line/Light Rail
The 7th & Metro Station is the most convenient to the GCI. The GCI is just a few blocks away.
(NOTE: There is no pedestrian access across the 110 on either 6th or 5th, so please use Wilshire Blvd.
Use the address of the Studio to find the Metro route most convenient to you.
DRIVING – Be sure to carpool to the event!
Parking Lots
There are several pay lots run by Athena Parking that are convenient to the GCI.
MAIN LOT IS AT 6TH & BEAUDRY
Street Parking
Most street parking immediately around Los Angeles Center Studios will be unavailable by the time the event opens, so if you are looking to park on the street, start looking for parking a few blocks away from the studio.
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As with all noble mortal pursuits, a champion Grilled Cheese must first begin with Love.
This is a competitor’s opportunity to show their grilling abilities in creating best, most classic grilled cheese sandwich. Fancy cheeses or bells and whistles won’t help you here. You need to be master griller in order to stand out in this category.
The Categories for competition breakdown as following:
Love, American Style – White bread, butter, orange cheese (American or Cheddar). NOTHING ELSE.
The Missionary Position – Any type of bread, butter and cheese. NO ADDITIONAL INGREDIENTS.
The Kama Sutra – A sandwich of the savory nature, with any type of bread, butter and cheese PLUS additional ingredients, and the interior ingredients must be at least 60% cheese.
The Honey Pot – Any kind of bread, any kind of butter, and any kind of cheese, and the interior ingredients of the sammich must be at least 60% cheese, PLUS additional ingredients, and with an overall flavor that is sweet and would best be served as dessert.
For more information and expanded rules stuff, go to the rules page.
]]>The 2nd 8th Annual Grilled Cheese Invitational will take place on April 23, 2011 at Los Angeles Center Studios in downtown Los Angeles, CA.
We are wrapping up the programing on the new registration process and hope to open registration for competitors later today.
Once the registration system is ready, we will open for ticket sales as well.
Check back here or follow us on Twitter @grilldcheez!
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We would love to hear your thoughts as to how to make the next GCI better!
]]>This event is put on entirely with volunteer effort and a whole lot of sweat equity. While we’ve spent a lot of time trying to make the event as best as it can be, there is always room for improvement and we’d love to hear your thoughts as to how and where we go from here.
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Just because we’ve closed the registration for competing and judging, doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty to do!
Samples!
The gorgeous people at Tillamook cheese have stepped up as the exclusive cheese sponsor and will be offering samples of their award winning cheeses and mountains of grilled cheese samples throughout the day! We’ve also gotten the support of Boulder Canyon Potato Chips, Pacific Natural Foods, Steas! and Izze Sparkling beverages. Enjoy their compliementary samples throughout the day and be sure to thank them for supporting the event!
People’s Choice Judging
You can vote on the best grilled Cheese being offered by our vendors. All vendors selling grilled cheese are selling samples in the $2 – $5 range ($5 for the really, really gourmet ones!). When you stop by a vendor booth, you’ll get a ballot for the People’s Choice. Be sure to hand that ballot into one of our roving Ballot collectors if that was the best grilled cheese sample you tried that day!
Entertainment
On our stage we will have plenty of fun stuff throughout the day. Even you can get involved. Stand-up comedy, cooking demos, and poetry, costume and cheese calling contests. You can sign up at the stage to compete in the poetry, costume and cheese calling contests! There’s prizes!
Raffle-age!
Citysearch.com will be kicking down some serious raffle-age, yo! Be sure to fill out the raffle ticket in the event guide and drop it off at their booth to win a whole host of stuff including tickets to an upcoming movie premiere.
Beer Garden
The event has a charity beer garden benefiting Black Rock Solar, a non-profit solar power organization here in California. Beers are sold at a donation price and all proceeds go to the non-profit. Special thanks to the people at New Belgium Brewing, Stone Brewing and Lagunitas for donating all the beer for this fundraising event for Black Rock Solar!
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Heidi Gibson: Three-Time Grilled Cheese Champion claiming her trophy at the 2nd Annual NorCal Regional.
Linda Williamson & Kasey McMahon celebrate their sweet vindication!
People often ask us here at the GCI what makes a champion sammich.
There are many things that go into a perfect Grilled Cheese — some of them are secret and stay that way. Here are some great things you can do to win a trophy. They may work, they may not. Just read ’em and get wise.
The best way you can make the best Grilled Cheese is to cook them all the time and to eat them all the time. Take notes. Photographs. See what brand of butter works the best. Note how old the bread was. Graph your information. Be scientific. Wear protective goggles. All that.
Physical Preparation
The week before competition, try to do some physical exercises. Step out of your apartment or house and begin running. Be sure to breathe. Do not stop running until the bleeding from your ears stops. Once the bleeding stops, hail a cab and take it to the nearest FOSTER FREEZE (a Dairy Queen would also work) and get the largest amount of ice cream you can possibly hold with two hands. Eat it all. Once completed, run back to your home and call your mother. Do not trust the mailman.
As it gets closer to game day, enlist a partner to throw medicine balls or rocks of various weights at you while you practice the grilling of cheese. This may seem dangerous and unnecessary, but trust us, it’ll help you stay alert and ready for any full contact cheese grilling that may come your way.
Mental Preparation
On game day, try to find a nice quite place for some meditation, an abandoned mine, for example. Sit in complete stillness and try to focus on the grill, the cheese, and the butter. Let all aspirations and hopes and desires for victory escape you. Think back, long and hard, to the point in your childhood where your dad dressed up as a clown and beat you with a grilled cheese sammich to make you cry. Wonder about who would play you in the “ABC Family Movie of the Week” about your winning of the Grilled Cheese Invitational. Imagine the process of milk turning into cheese and then melting back into a liquid. Awesome, isn’t it?
When you have completed this exercise, stand up and immediately smoke at least four or five cigars in quick succession. You are now ready to be a champion!
SUGGESTIONS THAT MIGHT ACTUALLY HELP YOU WIN A TROPHY
But seriously:
1) Bring Your Own Pan – Even though we will be providing Olympic Cooking Surfaces
, you’ve got a better chance at cooking a better sammich if you’re working with a frying pan you know. So bring your best fry pan and use it. Just make sure it’s clean and sanitized. You don’t have to let anyone else use it, just you. This way, you’re comfortable with the pan and the cheese can grill just like you like it.
2) Practice – We can’t stress this enough. Before you even show up at the competition, you should have cooked one or two at your house and tasted them to make sure that the ingredients go together well and everything works. Some people often host tasting parties for their friends to help refine their recipes. Throw some variables in there. Change up the amount of butter. See what’s better and what’s not.
3) Prep Ahead – Try to prepare your materials before hand. Slice your cheese, choose your bread, fry your bacon, etc. There is always a bottleneck during the competition, with people waiting to slice cheese and what not, and that’s dumb. We’re not here to see ham sizzle; we’re here to watch cheese grill! Plus, you’ve only got 45 minutes to grill up all your samples. You don’t want to be spending that time waiting for cheese to slice.
4) Innovate – Don’t be afraid to try new things here. The grilled cheese sammich represents the collection some of the most primal of mankind’s favorite tastes. Go ahead and play around and come up with something that works just for you.
5) Slow Down! – Many people scorch their sammiches because they are nervous and cooking too fast. Slow down! Just because the grill goes up to 11 doesn’t mean it HAS to. Adjust the heat on the grill and take your time. Focus. Just be sure to grill all your sammiches in the time alotted.
6) Grease’ll Getcha – Be careful when adding meats to your sammich. As we all know meats is greasy bitches! Bacon is very, very greasy. If you are using meats, choose wisely and don’t bog the sammich down in meat grease. You think you’ll win with that? Yeah right! Bacon is fine to use, just drain it. For the love of all that’s good and holy, don’t you realize that bread is like a sponge? Sheesh!
7) Burns – This is an event involving a grill. Grills get hot. So does whatever you put on it, including the frying pan. If you’re the type who is clumsy, bring yer own damn mitts and protect your damn hands and arms! It’s not my fault you burned your own dumb ass. Be safe. Also, don’t burn other people.
8) Dress for success – Try to wear something that says, “I’m a f#@%ing Grilled Cheese Champion!” Just be sure to make it flame proof. See number 7.
9) Don’t sweat it! – If you don’t win, don’t sweat it, it’s only a Grilled Cheese Invitational.
10) Don’t steal! – Don’t just follow someone else’s recipe, be it published or not. Go ahead and CREATE your own and modify it to your personal tastes.
Remember, you have it in you to BE A CHAMPION. Not everyone in this life can be a chef, but anyone can be a Grilled Cheese Champion!
Holly Rose Larson collects her trophy for "Lick It," her Spaz winning sammich.
Now go on out there and knock ’em dead, tiger!
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