Ina Garten's Go-To Comfort Sandwich Is A Certified Classic

You know how there are certain celebs you'd never dream of having anything in common with? For me, Ina Garten is one of those people. After all, she's built her career on endorsing recipes made with "good" ingredients, while I'm all about cooking on a shoestring budget (a frayed shoestring, at that). What do you know, though? It turns out that we have a favorite sandwich in common — we're both big fans of the tuna melt.

The tuna melt isn't Garten's only favorite sandwich, since she's claimed that a grilled cheese sandwich made with ham and gruyère ranks high on her list. She's also published numerous other sandwich recipes, which she's presumably quite fond of. Garten gives the classic chicken salad a twist with curry powder and mango. And, her secret to a great burger is to add raw eggs and either breadcrumbs or butter to the ground meat. Still, tuna melts are what she calls "one of my favorite comfort foods," according to one of her 2022 Instagram posts. She insists that if you make one according to her recipe, "I promise you'll feel better immediately!"

Where Ina Garten and I beg to differ once again is in how a tuna melt should be made. I prefer a diner-style sandwich made with cheddar, but she fangirls over her own Ultimate Tuna Melt recipe smothered with Swiss cheese. Garten's tuna salad has a key ingredient as it's base — imported tuna. It also includes "good" mayonnaise, celery, green onions, and fresh dill. She might even stir in a little anchovy paste to make it extra fishy, and of course, she garnishes it with microgreens, since they're not only trendy, but photogenic.

This tuna melt isn't Garten's only tuna salad recipe, though. She has an Asian-inspired creation that features avocado and zesty wasabi. She has yet another that's more sandwichable, again made with imported tuna, mayonnaise, and celery, but also includes onions, cornichons, and dijon mustard. She likes to serve it on sourdough, which seems pretty standard, but then she gives it a twist that makes it anything but: a topping of sliced radishes and homemade hummus. Perhaps not as comforting as a classic tuna melt, but definitely on-brand in the world of celebrity chefs where innovation is the name of the game.