Berkeley has a great philosophy program and everything, with well-respected faculty, and what seems to be a nice student community. But my presence here could be construed as somewhat overdetermined. Good quality avocados, while not necessary to my happiness (I coped without them for the better part of five years) are damn near sufficient for it.
My mother often served them for dinner, one half per person, the center where the pit had been filled with balsamic vinaigrette. For a long time that was virtually the only way I ate them, until Katherine showed me that they can be delicious with just a sprinkling of salt, if balsamic vinaigrette seems like too much of an effort. I discovered the avocado and cheese sandwich at some point in college; it seemed like it couldn't get much better than the subtle spectrum of textures of the creamy avocado, firm cheese, and toasted bread.
But the other day I found I was able to improve on this classic recipe, using another ingredient far more commonplace in California than other places I've lived: Tapatio hot sauce. It's quite potent stuff, and just a few dashes to stain a piece of whole wheat toast where enough to provide a good amount of heat. The sweet-and-sour spice brought out the fruitiness of the avocado, and reminded me again of some of the many reasons I'm happy to be here.
I encourage everyone to get their hands on a ripe avocado today, and try it out. I usually use a mild cheddar, swiss, or fontina, but it would be interesting to experiment with sharper cheeses. I don't melt the cheese because I like how the different types of firmness of the cheese and avocado compliment each other, but I toast the bread, usually a regular sandwich bread with a fine crumb, so that it adds a bit of crunch. This time I drizzled it with Tapatio, but mustard also works well. I layer the cheese on first, then slices of avocado, and often a sprinkling of course-ground black pepper.
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