> Of course, I am still of the mind that Cheese is the singular most important topping on a cheeseburger, without which it ceases to be a cheeseburger.
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> Oh, and in regard to the original Reader Poll by Sam, my point back then was that he never included cheese as a possible topping to select from. What if I want EXTRA cheese on my cheeseburger? Like Monterrey and Cheddar? Would it be considered a topping then? Or how about two slices of swiss? Is the first slice not a topping and the second one a topping?
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I'm among those who say that the cheese is not a topping. First off, it must be noted that in common usage for such things as burgers and pizzas, at least in my experience, "topping" is *not* meant in either of the literal positional senses of (1) being the top part of something which contains it or (2) being on top of something which does not contain it, although those *are* two of the word's possible meanings. [See Dave's wonderful example of a frisbee on a roof -- more on topic, I don't count a random fly landing on my pizza a topping.] No, in the case of burgers and pizzas, those meanings are superceded by the meaning of being food stuff that is put on top of the basic order that you pay for (*not* literally, but in the same sense as when you say "On top of all my homework, I had to study for an exam!" -- note that you don't usually mean that you had to study for your exam while physically sitting or lying on your homework). Some toppings may be free, and others may require you to pay more money. For some foods, as with pizzas, you may have an allotment of toppings to keep the total price lower than a certain value.

In this sense, we would say that the basic components of a cheeseburger would be the two buns, the burger patty, and the amount of cheese that normally comes with it. Anything else, no matter whether it's physically on top of any of the aforementioned during either preparation, consumption, or digestion, would be a topping.

So, for the part of your post I am addressing, extra cheese would in fact be a topping on either a cheeseburger or a pizza (witness that extra cheese *is* counted as a pizza topping when you're figuring out the cost). However, note that in this case only the *additional* cheese is a topping. The original amount of cheese is not a topping. If the extra cheese is the same kind as the original and it mixes in, well, so be it. Half of the cheese is then a topping, whether you could physically extricate it or not. If the basic order for a cheeseburger doesn't specify what kind of cheese comes with it, and you get two different kinds of cheese, exactly one of them is a topping, though it is not specified which one it is, and it doesn't matter anyway.

> What if I was to put bacon in-between the two slices? Is the bacon a topping and the cheese not-a-topping? Or have I now placed the bacon INSIDE the cheeseburger proper with the cheese being not-a-topping?
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The hard part is out of the way. Easily enough, the bacon and second piece of cheese are the two and only toppings. (Even if you flip the cheeseburger upside-down, something which should tie all you cheese-is-a-topping people in knots!)