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I’ve mashed up the Kentucky hot brown with the Virginia ham biscuit and made these deliciously simple Hot Brown Ham Sliders.

 

When I was 7, I remember it distinctly, we moved from Kentucky to Virginia. Dad was working for a county office and applied to a position with the Federal government. He was hired; cause he’s awesome!

 

So, this family of country bumpkins (and I mean COUNTRY with accents a MILE long) moved to the big city. Think Beverly Hillbillies but on a smaller scale and not quite so back woods.  It was a mile to our neighbor, but we didn’t have to hunt for dinner, unless you count the fridge.

 

 

How do I remember distinctly?

 

It was my birthday. And, if memory serves, it had to be postponed slightly due to the move. I also distinctly remember getting a Crayola carousel for my birthday that year. I LOVED that thing. It was awesome! Crayons, markers, colored pencils, paint; I could make anything I wanted with that handy tool.

 

 

We’ve lived in Virginia ever since. There has never been discussion of moving anywhere else. I gotta say, having a Federal job is a pretty solid job with excellent benefits and retirement. I’m not sure why anyone would look for another job unless they just hated what they did. I LOVE what I do and plan to be around for a while.

 

 

Anyway.

 

I have tons of pride in being from Kentucky. I maintain those roots, bleed true blue, watch the Kentucky Derby religiously, and love bourbon.  Even though we drink scotch. I love country ham, biscuits and gravy (who doesn’t?), and miss the GOOD Cracker Barrels that are there. The rolling hills and horse farms there always make my heart swell whenever I visit. I love my home town.

 

Even though we’ve lived here longer than there, I don’t call Virginia home. But, I do appreciate growing up here. My life would have turned out completely different had we stayed in Kentucky. Where we chose to settle is in an excellent part of Virginia, they have the top schools for the area, and is a cultural melting pot. Just a short train ride into the city and you can visit tons of museums for free! You can see art, paintings, photographs, sculptures, plays, musicals, you name it! The president even!

 

 

Since both of these states have sandwiches as their popular foodie fare, I couldn’t have had an easier time figuring out planning a sandwich recipe incorporating both of them. It was just a matter of how I was going to mash these two tasty sammies together.

 

First, there’s no bacon on the list (which usually tops my hot browns). That’s because the Virginia ham has plenty of that salty goodness itself. For those that don’t know, Virginia ham is a country style ham. Meaning, Virginia hams are traditionally salt cured. Depending on how you prepare the ham, it could taste really salty or just slightly salty.

 

Ours was always just slightly salty. I remember Dad boiling the ham and then setting the pot in the dining room and wrapping about 3 or 4 blankets around it to slow cook overnight. Man, that was good ham!!

 

 

Of course, this is WAY before you could purchase smaller packets of prepared country ham. Now, you can easily find a blister pack of ham in the meat or deli section already prepared for you to nosh on. Granted, it’s slightly saltier than Dad’s ham, but it’s good in a pinch.

 

See? It’s all laid out there for you; turkey, ham, and cheese. There’s a tomato somewhere on that sandwich, but you can’t see it there. Now, you can top the sandwich with the cheese sauce, which makes for a messy sandwich. You could dip the sammy in the cheese sauce, which I’ve done here. OR you can do both, which I did later as I was scarfing these delicious things down for lunch that day. Oh yes. They reheated perfectly for lunch!!

 

 

I initially thought of doing an open faced type sandwich for this, then I was going to make a biscuit with the cheese sauce over top like gravy, but then it hit me! Wandering through Pinterest (what else is new, I know) it hit me; it’s like a dip sandwich. The cheese sauce is in a bowl and you dip your slider into the bowl! So, that left biscuits out because they’re not sturdy enough to do a dip like that. This led me to smaller sandwiches like a slider instead of a regular sandwich. The pieces came together perfectly! And aren’t you glad they did?

 

 

This truly is a leftovers dinner. Actually, I had to buy the turkey, because we are almost all our ours from Thanksgiving, but the ham AND the rolls are left over from dinner with Dad.

 

We had Christmas with them this past weekend and he had ham; too much ham for the two of them. And they bought us regular dinner rolls. Dad’s doing no/low carb, but purchased regular rolls for us for dinner. He couldn’t keep them and the rest of the bag, so they came home with us. Voila! Leftovers repurposed into a new and delicious meal.

 

 

And just look at how delicious this sandwich is! The turkey, ham, soft roll, and sharp cheddar cheese meld perfectly into a delicious and quick meal. If you don’t want to reheat your meat, then all you have to do is wait for the cheese sauce to cook and dinner’s on the table! I’m getting hungry just looking at it! I wonder if there’s any leftover ham around….