Remember when your Mom used to make you a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup when you needed a lift? Turns out that a generation of kids raised on grilled American cheese and Wonder bread is taking the simple sandwich to new bites with such combos as banana bread and ricotta and grilled cheese enchilada style. Yum. Grilled cheese has even spawned its own festival: the Grilled Cheese Invitational, held recently in Los Angeles.

At the festival, 221 pro and amateur chefs prepared sandwiches for "spectator judges," members of the public who paid to attend, and "executive judges," who included food critics, restaurant owners and cheese connoisseurs, according to the Wall Street Journal. First prize went to a husband-and-wife team who combined grilled cheese and marshmallow Peeps. (Peeps!?) Another award went to Guillermo Macias, who melted pepper jack, cheddar and crumbled Mexican cheese with chives, olives and enchilada sauce between slices of potato bread. He told the newspaper that the essential ingredients were "bread, butter, cheese and loooove.”

The trick to grilling the perfect cheese sandwich is to melt the cheese before the bread burns. So if you’re using a range or cooktop you’ll want one with good low-temperature control. That’s something we test in our Ratings of ranges and cooktops. Then there’s the pan itself—if you want a sandwich that’s crispy and brown you should avoid non-stick pans, which don’t brown as well as other types of cookware.

Microwaves and toaster ovens offer other cooking options. In our microwave ratings, the mid-sized Cuisinart CMW-200 ($250) gave us a good grilled-cheese sandwich and was also a good at other tasks. You can also try broiling a cheese sandwich in a toaster oven—check our ratings to see which performed best. And don’t forget your outdoor grill. John Macchia, Consumer Reports on-site chef, recommends starting the sandwich in a sauté pan placed directly on the grates and then moving it to the open grates just before serving to get good sear marks. It’s like a cheese burger without the burger.