The restaurant of restaurants for grilled cheese lovers is now open on Cantrell Road in west Little Rock.
The Main Cheese opened its doors for business last month and ever since, customers have been devouring the savory meals.
Recently, one of The Main Cheese’s owners, Mary Jensen, sat down with Little Rock Soirée for a Q&A. She was also kind enough to share the recipe to one of the restaurant’s best sellers!
If you want to check out the restaurant yourself, it’s open from 11 a.m. – 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 11 a.m. – 9:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and is located at 14524 Cantrell Road, #110. Click here for the full menu, and here for the website.
Little Rock Soirée: With the first few weeks under your belt, how is the restaurant business treating you guys? How has business been?
Mary Jensen: We have been very busy since our opening on Feb. 25. The community has been incredibly supportive of The Main Cheese and embraced our concept of offering gourmet grilled cheese and more in a friendly atmosphere. We love meeting so many new people, seeing them enjoying themselves as they socialize at our tables and hearing their comments about their experience as they leave. We feel very blessed by the positive response we are receiving from both our customers, the media and bloggers in Little Rock.
LRS: Tell us about the makeup of your staff.
MJ: Our employees are the greatest. Most of them come from the restaurant industry, but we have quite a mix of experience among them. Our general manager, Adam Kaelin, has 12 years in the restaurant industry and our kitchen manager, Juan Luevano also has significant experience within restaurants located right here in Little Rock. We have a lot of fun in our kitchen as everyone seems to really enjoy bringing such a unique menu to life. We are already getting suggestions from our staff about new menu items we should create so everyone seems to want to get in on the fun of making the next great sandwich, appetizer or dessert.
Our wait staff is a mix of very experienced individuals and some who are new to the industry. We enjoy seeing those with significant years of experience coaching and helping those who are doing this for the first time. I think the fact that we are a family-run restaurant has helped create the wonderful team environment we are experiencing within all of our staff.
LRS: How did the idea of opening a restaurant, and The Main Cheese, come about?
MJ: Over a year ago, my husband Rich began exploring the possibility of bringing a unique restaurant to Little Rock. He loves dining out and was always looking for interesting places with good food at a good value. However, it seemed many of the choices were much the same.
As we started researching various options to bring something new to Central Arkansas, it became apparent the franchise route was not the way we wanted to go. We started looking for something that was unique and would re-ignite memories of our childhoods. But we wanted to do it in a way that adults would want to share the experience together. The key was to bring good food and a great shared dining experience in a fun and unique atmosphere. We wanted to give Little Rock a place to build warm memories with friends over good food and drink.
To confirm that we were on the right track, we hosted a few “dinner parties” for friends in our home without telling them they were actually a focus group for trying out our recipes. When we received many unsolicited, favorable comments from them about the food, we knew we had a winning concept. One of our guests actually said, “This is so good–you ought to open a restaurant,” and The Main Cheese was born.
The key was finding the right partners since Rich and I had no restaurant experience. So we approached our good friends, Randall and Cyndi Van Den Berghe, and asked if they wanted to join us on this grand adventure. Randall has over 20 years experience in the restaurant industry and Cyndi is a fabulous chef. Thus, we were thrilled when they agreed to partner with us.
Then it was just a matter of finding the right location and creating the menu. We spent several nights each week with Randall and Cyndi creating and taste testing a new sandwich idea, soup, appetizer or dessert. Not a good way to stay on a diet.
LRS: A lot of items on the menu have some interesting names. What’s the inspiration behind them?
MJ: We had a lot of fun coming up with the names of our sandwiches. We wanted our menu to reflect that we are a locally-owned restaurant. Our desire was to invoke a feeling of community, a sense that in some way, The Main Cheese is Arkansas’ own, by using names that bring to mind landmarks or places that our customers know and love.
Hence, names like The Pinnacle (a chicken sandwich with cashews), Ouachibella (a portabella mushroom sandwich), Two Rivers (we love the new pedestrian bridge), The Pig Trail, Float’n the Buffalo, and more.
One evening, we had a brain-storming session with a handful of friends who are young professionals in their 20s and 30s and came up with our menu names and captions. The night went quite late and we got a little punchy by the end, so some of the names and captions that seemed humorous at 1 a.m. never made it to the menu. However, guests do comment on how much they enjoy the amusing names on our menu.
LRS: What are some of the early customer favorites on the menu?
MJ: Gut shot, Farmers Market, Ham and Brie in Harmony, and Two Rivers.
The Farmers Market Sandwich recipe:
“My father was a produce clerk and we ate lots of vegetables when I was growing up,” Mary Jensen saind. “The idea of creating a veggie sandwich came from my own love for fresh vegetables, especially avocados. So we came up with the Farmers Market. We start with Arkansas Fresh Bakery’s multi-grain bread.”
The ingredients:
•2 slices Arkansas Fresh multi-grain bread
•1 slice sharp cheddar cheese
•1 slice Muenster
•2 rounded tablespoons spinach aioli
•2 rounded tablespoons avocado mix (fresh avocado, Spike seasoning & lemon juice)
•4-5 grape tomatoes, sliced in half
•1/2 oz. arugula
•Parmesan cheese, grated
•Fresh lemon
•Coconut oil
The process:
Brush the outside of the slices of bread with coconut oil, dust with Parmesan and lay on griddle. Lay slice of cheddar cheese on one side and Muenster on the other side of the bread slices.
While cheese is melting, place 1 generous TBSP of spinach aioli on each side of bread.
When cheese is melted and bread is golden, remove from griddle. Add the avocado mix and top with several tomato halves. Add the arugula and squeeze some fresh lemon juice over it and place other slice over the top to serve.