Croque Madame

I'm not quite sure how a croque madame is different from a croque monsieur, except that the monsieur has tomato. Is that the only difference? And croque madame has an egg on top?

Ingredients

• 2.5 tbsp butter
• 1.5 tbsp flour
• 1 cup whole milk (or as much as you can. We ran out and had to use 3/4 cup whole and 1/4 cup skim, which turned out just fine)
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp pepper
• 1/8 tsp nutmeg
• 1/2 cup grated monterey jack cheese
• 4 slices white bread (we used sweet Hawaiian bread, which was awesome)
• however much mustard you want to put on your sandwich
• 2 large slices of prosciutto (1 slice/person)
  
• 2 large eggs

To make the sauce:

Melt butter in a saucepan over moderately low heat, then whisk in the flour and cook, whisking constantly, for 3 minutes. Whisk in the milk and bring to a boil. When it boils, reduce the heat to a simmer and cook for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Add the salt, pepper, nutmeg, and 1/6 cup of the cheese. Cook until the cheese melts. Remove heat and cover with a sheet of wax paper (so a skin doesn't form on the roux)

To make the sandwiches:

While the roux is cooking, spread mustard on 2 of the slices of bread, and put the prosciutto on top.
When the roux is done, spread some of it over the other 2 slices of bread, then sprinkle with the remaining cheese.
Put the pieces of bread together so that they form a sandwich. Durrrr.
Heat a skillet or griddle and spray with nonstick cooking spray or olive oil. Once it's hot, place the sandwiches on it. Cook them for 3-4 minutes total, turning them once halfway. They should get nice and brown. Remove from heat.
If you'd like, you can cook the eggs at the same time. Our griddle is big enough to cook like, 10,000 things simultaneously, so we just did it at the same time as we did the sandwiches. Cook the eggs over easy such that the whites are set and the yolks are runny. You know how this works.
Prepare the broiler.
Top each grilled sandwich with the remaining sauce, spreading evenly. Cook under the broiler for 2-3 minutes, until the topping is bubbling. You might want to check periodically to make sure you aren't burning the sandwiches. There is nothing worse than a burnt croque madame, let me tell you.
Take the sandwiches out and top each one with a fried egg. Eat.

Thoughts: OH MY GOD THESE WERE ABSOLUTELY TRANSCENDENT. SERIOUSLY. THIS IS THE BEST THING WE'VE MADE IN A WHILE. SWEET JESUS THIS WAS GOOD. THE ORIGINAL RECIPE CALLED FROM GRUYERE BUT I THINK USING PEPPER JACK WAS A GOOD IDEA. OMG. I CANNOT RAVE ABOUT THIS ENOUGH. CAN WE GIVE IT A NEGATIVE RATING? Dan suggests using a firmer bread next time (the kind we used was more spongy than most). I don't think we need a firmer bread. But you know. We can try it. We will definitely be experimenting with other fillings and cheeses and whatnot. There's a version that uses smoked salmon as well, but Dan doesn't seem excited about that. Hmph.

Disaster Index: -5/10