Family Favorite Comfort Food Sandwiches: Beefy Cheesy Melts

Recently one of my adult kids asked about a family favorite sandwich recipe that's been lovingly known as the "Beefy Cheesy Melt".

Essentially her question was along the lines of "where the heck did that even come from?!"  😁 

I'm not sure which one of my kids came up with that name as they were growing up, but it stuck almost immediately, and they've been called this for at least a couple of decades now.  

The fun thing about this super simple recipe is that it was originally inspired by a fun, cultural trend while I was growing up, in the mid 1970's. 

At our local K-mart there was a kiosk style deli right near the check-out lines, called the K-Mart Grill (that literally wasn't a grill at all)  that sold sandwiches, cold salads and a wide variety of items.  This was long before all the chain sub sandwich shops, so this was the closest we had to deli style sandwiches. Our family favorite was the honey ham and cheese on a toasted bun. It was SO good!

Fast forward a couple of decades (with a houseful of little people myself), I decided to make my own homemade version of these simple sandwiches for a fraction of the cost but also to snazz it up a little bit. (Spoiler alert, it worked brilliantly). Everyone loved them, and they instantly became a family favorite and are still requested to be added to the weekly dinner menu!

Without further delay here is the recipe:

BEEFY CHEESY MELT SANDWICHES (makes 6 sandwiches)

Pre-heat oven to 400.

6 Toasted Onion Buns*

Mustard spread (any style, hot, honey, etc.)

2 Lbs. Deli Thin Sliced Roast Beef - any style 

6 slices sharp cheddar cheese (or Pepper Jack, or any favorite cheese)

6 Foil squares (12"x12" foil for wrapping sandwiches)

DIRECTIONS:

*If you cannot find onion buns at your local bakery, shame on them, but also: use any favorite sandwich buns and loads of carmelized or crispy onions. 

Split each sandwich bun in half.  Apply mustard spread on each side.

Split roast beef slices 6 ways & layer onto buns. Top with cheese, onions (if using) then the top bun. 

Wrap tightly in foil - set aside on baking sheet.

Bake for 20 minutes, flipping wrapped sandwiches at the 10 minute mark.

Serve with Baked Beans, Coleslaw, Baked French Fries or any side you prefer. 

EASY DIY Christmas Basket Add-Ins: Dried Fruit and Spice Simmer Pot Pouches

One of the easiest DIY add-ins to any Christmas basket is a fun and festive Christmas Simmer Pot filled with dried fruit and spice.

Here's the recipe I used to make mine this year that has all the same ingredients I use in my Hot Wassail that simmers in the crockpot all day on Christmas eve.

3 orange slices, dried

6 apple slices, dried

6 whole cloves

2 cinnamon sticks

1 T cranberries, chopped & dried

1 sprig dried pine or rosemary (optional)

Pour the entire contents into a small pot with 3 cups of hot water. Let simmer over low heat. Add more water as needed.

This recipe is kitchen tested, and it works really well for a 6+ hour stove top simmer.  You can also remove from heat at the end of a day's use, let cool and use the next day.  2 days is the longest recommended use for optimum scent infusion. 

Garden Update #8: End of The Outdoor Season 2025

My garden updates are a fun little way for me to keep visual track of what's working for me (and what failed miserably! Because that's all a part of the gardening journey as well.) in the garden.  I share these publicly and just hope they bless you as much as they help me.

I haven't been very regular in my garden updates this year. This one is 8 weeks after the last one, and that was 8 weeks after the one before that. 😁 I've just been busy in the garden and haven't really set much time aside to update my garden journal minus a few scribbled notes here and there. 

One of the biggest learning curves this year was, cucumbers and heat. 

I've planted cucumber seeds indoors on heat mats & under grow lights, for years. They always work out.  Until they don't. That was this year. We had an unseasonably cold spring.  What I learned this year was, no matter what may have worked before, wait until June 1st at least, before planting out the cucumbers. I planted all of mine out in early May (with all of my tomatoes and peppers, like I always do) and all but one died. I then re-planted several more in mid-May from local nurseries and they all died as well. Between trips to local farmer's markets and local grower's farms I'd spoken to a good number of gardeners who were all having the same problem. Refusing to give up (because we're a HUGE pickle eating family!) I bought a third round of seedlings from a local grower at the end of May, and planted those out at the first of June.

The growing conditions were finally optimum and all of those plants thrived for the entirety of June, July and August. I was able to can multiple batches of pickles for our family's pantry for the winter. My plan for next year is to keep it the same as this year:  if you're in zone 6a (or colder), WAIT and plant out your cucumbers no earlier than June 1st. You'll save yourself a load of headaches and the cost of replacing all your plants. 

2025 is my  first year with Elderberries. I have two plants, and both produced about the same amount of berry clusters seen here on this one. They've all been harvested and are currently sitting in a brown paper bag in the freezer.  I have just enough to make 1 recipe of Elderberry syrup for a fully natural way of fighting off winter colds & viruses. 

A brand new challenge to me this year was... propagation. 

I've tried this many times before and never had much success with it minus one small Basil plant. This year, that finally changed with 2 small plants (Trumpet Vine & Strawberries) that I was able to facilitate into multiple brand new plants!

Both plants did really well over the summer and fall so we'll just wait & see how they do over winter, and into next spring. I'm hoping for great things for them both!

This winter sown sunflower grew to about 16 feet tall. 

Both my winter sown sunflowers and chamomile plants did remarklably well.  I may do this again over winter to see how more plants do. 

2025's batch of pasta sauce from (mostly) home grown tomatoes. I need about 30 pounds of tomatoes for my homemade ketchup, and another 30 pounds for my pasta sauce for an entire year of product of each. I'm currently only getting about half of that from my garden, so I supplement with the incredible produce from my local farmer's market, for both products for my family pantry. 

My goal for the 2026 garden is to double my tomato plants, and hope I can grow enough to cover all the ketchup and all the pasta sauce for an entire year. I've been working on this for several years now and each year the garden produces a wee bit more than the previous year so I'm happy it's increasing each year. 

DAMAGE CONTROL: This was the first raised bed I ever built of this size, and looking back it's easy to see everything I did wrong. In 2021 I built 2 of these 8'x4'x10" raised beds and just used deck screws to attach the end cap 4' (untreated) boards. 

What I didn't know then and what I know now is, I should have used outdoor treated wood (perfectly safe for edible plants) and maybe even these Oldcastle Planter Blocks I originally bought to construct a simple "tool free" sand box for all my little people.  I had 4 of these on hand from an old sandbox and when I saw the joints giving way to far too much soil/water pressure I did this simple repair. 

My plan going forward for spring 2026 is to replace all corners with these blocks (that I already have) and with 6 inch width pressure treated lumber for each side & end. I'll be losing 4" of overall height but that's okay since this is my pepper bed and they don't need that much depth anyway so it really all works out. I've since learned to raise the bed for those with mobility issues, you can easily double up the planter blocks to a 12 inch depth, drive a stake of rebar in to secure them in place and use 12" tall side & end cap lumber for 1 foot deep beds. I really love how easily this building style is so versatile depending on personal needs and mobility. 

Aside from what I've learned with each plant this year, I've also learned much more about fertilization & soil amendments. Both of which I've unintentionally neglected for a few years so another big improvement for spring 2026 will be the much needed soil amendments of some nutrient rich compost as well as some liquid fish fertilizer. I've used both randomly but never intentionally, so spring 2026 will be a much more intentional gardening plan with richer soil than ever before. 

Thanks for stopping by.  I hope you're encouraged by what you've read here, and if you have any thoughts or suggestions or questions please feel welcome to leave a comment. 😊

08.15.95 Grandpa says "Bye Doll, We'll See Ya"

August 15th is the anniversary of the day I became a cancer widow, at the age of 30. At that time we had 4 kids between 5 and 12. From time to time over the years I feel compelled to open up about that time, in the hope that it might help others who might be going through the same thing I did. This is one of those years. 

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The last few days have felt really "off", and I've known why, even though I've tried to ignore it. They've felt off because 30 years ago at 7:22am in August of 1995, I entered into a brand new phase of life that quite literally changed my entire life, from that point on. 

For a super quick backstory: Christmas of 1990 I noticed my husband Ben had a considerable large lump on his neck. He'd known it was there for a while but had ignored it (and also hid it from me, because he knew I'd make a thing of it). Once I saw it I insisted he see the doctor. He agreed, saw the doc, had a biopsy and by Valentine's Day (our 5th wedding anniversary) we got a call. The news was quite grim. It was metastatic melanoma, and it was stage 5. He was given 2 weeks at best. He was also offered a place in a clinical trial at the University of Washington Medical Center  reserved only for those with a terminal diagnosis, and so that's what we decided in that moment. He went through 2 rounds of that trial (incredibly miserable but successfully - and was the first patient to ever do that), had multiple surgeries, including brain surgery - twice - and lived another 4+ years after that first 2 week prognosis. Most importantly of all, in that time, we were both eventually called to Christ, both of us saved by God's grace in 1994 and found new, eternal hope in Him.

Between his initial diagnosis in 1990 and our coming to Christ in 1994, we'd quite literally jumped all over the place mentally, spiritually and physically. For a short time in 1991 we moved our little family from WA to his grandma & grandpa's place in the desert of southern California because they were the closest family he had & he desperately needed that. All his oncology care was transferred from the UofW to the Loma Linda University oncology dept. - the closest center to us out in the desert.  For a time, he did really well with that treatment protocol. Then things rapidly changed & we switched care back to the UofWa, moved back and tried our best to just resume "normal life" back in our hometown in the Pacific northwest. 

From the time we moved home in 1992 to his passing was another 3+ years. We both did our best to make our home as loving and peaceful and "normal" as possible for our kids except, we quite literally  had no idea what we were doing. In the spring of 1994 Ben's step-uncle Danny invited us both to a local church. Ben accepted the invitation first, and then me a few weeks later and  and as they say... the rest was history. Our new pastor and associate pastor made themselves available to us 24/7, and that made a monumental difference in our lives. 

For those who know me well, this is all "old news". Every once in a while though, I think to myself "bye doll, we'll see ya!" and hear it in gpa Earnie's voice 💖.  In the short time we lived with Ben's grandparents (and his sister on the same property), there was a sweet, unwritten rule that all the grandkids had to pop in to the main house after dressing for bed & brushing their teeth,  to say goodnight to gma & gpa. And every night, it was the same exact ritual. Gma would hug the stuffing out of all of them,  and gpa would say "goodnight doll, we'll see ya in the mornin'".  Every grandbaby was "doll" and every night, no matter what he was doing, he'd set aside his projects or chores or whatever he was doing,  to say goodnight to the grandkids and every single night without fail,  he'd say the same thing. 

Fast forward to August 15, 1995. Back in WA, Ben had been in palliative care for a month and his dad called me at 7am that day. "Come now, right now". Was the message. He'd been with him all night, praying. Not only him, but also his brother, Ben's uncle Daniel, sitting vigil through the night, praying for him.  His dad was a Christian (that we'd both ran away from in years past, ironically), and he'd often spend his entire night awake at the hospital, praying for him. On that night, uncle Danny was there too. 

When we moved back home we intentionally looked for a house close to the hospital and blessedly found one that was just under a 4 minute drive.  When I got the call that morning I was up, dressed & out the door in record time. I arrived, walked into the room, saw Ben's dad and uncle in the room at the window, praying and I  sat down & held Ben's hand. I knew he was leaving, and I couldn't think of anything to say to comfort him so I leaned in and whispered in his ear "bye doll, we'll see ya". Only because I knew his heart would be comforted because he knew gpa always said the same thing.  

And then... he was gone & the 5 years of "terminal cancer diagnosis" was over. In the worst way ever. 

No one ever tells you how to handle the last moments someone's life. Especially when it's someone you're building a life and a family with.  Or how you'll feel. Or what they'll look like once they've drawn their last breath (spoiler alert, they look fake, and gray, and not real, and it doesn't make any sense). Or how hard you'll deeply weep, or what kind of weird, rabid animal that sort of sounds like. You never really "get it" until you're there, and your heart is broken into a zillion pieces. It's a most brutal process. 

I drove home that morning after saying goodbye to my husband, and then speaking to my associate pastor, brother, and a few men from my church. They all agreed they'd be at my house by the time I got home, and they all were there to help me relay the news to our kids. I pulled into the driveway, walked into the back yard, sat down in the grass next to the concrete pond Ben built for me and just wept in a way I never even knew was possible. 

August 15th will always be a heartache date for me in this world, but a most ridiculously exciting date for me in the spiritual sense. Because this is the day my Ben entered into his Heavenly rest, greeted Christ face to face, and began his eternity with Him. 

End of the day... I think a lot about how he must have felt when he saw Jesus "in person" or however that works on the eternal side, for the first time. 💖 and really, I couldn't be happier for him. No matter how much it broke me on this side of eternity.