Tea Sandwiches 3 Ways
March 1, 2019 by Nicole Collins
Pinky’s up, everyone!
Break out your fancy hats and your best china, because we’re having a tea party today!
I love a good tea party. Pretty teacups. Finger Sandwiches. Lots of pastries. Fun colors, patterns, and designs. Tea parties are the perfect mix of fun and elegance, in my opinion.
The funny thing is is that I never used to like hot tea. I used to be an iced tea drinker to the core, but I wanted nothing to do with hot tea. But, the bestie is a hot tea addict, and she finally convinced be to step over to the bright side a few years ago.
And, now I’m obsessed.
I’m sure I’ve told you guys before that I have a little bit of a problem spending all of my money on kitchen things. I have kitchenware in almost every room in my house, including the laundry room. So, I truly don’t need any more excuses at all to buy more kitchen related items. But, since I’ve hopped on the tea obsession bandwagon, I’ve become quite the collector of teacups. And, I’ve got some really gorgeous ones!
I’ve gotten the majority of my teacups at the thrift store. Walking through the kitchenware section of Goodwill opens up a whole other can of worms for me. But you know, thrift stores are the PERFECT place to find good china (cups, plates, full sets); because so many families donate full sets after they clean out the house of a loved one. My generation doesn’t have nearly the same appreciation for good dinnerware as the generations before us, and I don’t mind. Because, that means more for me! In fact, I found a beautiful, 96 piece, 6 person setting bohemian china set for only $45. That’s an easy few hundred dollars’ worth of china right there. And, I just picked up some random antique pieces to build a beautiful dessert stand. But, I digress…
As much as I love the décor associated with a tea party, let’s be honest…it’s not even about the tea. It’s about the food! And, boy are we making some good looking and some good tasting food today!
Today, we’re making Tea Sandwiches 3 Ways!
As a general rule of thumb, you should be prepared to serve 3-4 finger sandwiches, 1-2 scones, and 1-2 pastries per person, at least. Some restaurants will also offer a soup course and a fruit course with their high tea. But today, I’ve got you covered on the sammies!
Our first sandwich is a simple Egg Salad Tea Sandwich. Most high teas include some kind of a mayo based salad like tuna, shrimp, ham, or egg salad. I love them all…maybe not the ham salad. But, egg salad is easy, inexpensive, luxurious, and totally delicious! Just like with my deviled eggs, I’m a Simple Sally when it comes to egg salad. I don’t like a lot of bells and whistles in my egg salad. Just mayo, lots of paprika, and lots of black pepper. I use so much paprika, my egg salad gets a pink tint to it!
We’re going to make these egg salad sammies “eggstra” special (😉) by stacking them in little round triple decker sandwiches. Using a small biscuit or cookie cutter to cut rounds out of a slice of sandwich bread really makes this humble sandwich look super fancy. Then, a decorated cocktail pick inserted in the center to hold it all in place really completes the look. Gorgeous!
Our next sandwich is a Cucumber Mosaic Tea Sandwich. Cucumber sandwiches are classic at high tea, but I’ve decided to jazz ours up a bit today. This is going to be an open faced sandwich. We start by making an herby cream cheese spread to act as the glue in our sandwich by mixing some fresh dill and chives with some whipped cream cheese. I love using whipped cream cheese, because it’s always in a softened state. This allows us the opportunity to make our spread in advance without having it give the cream cheese time to soften again before we assemble our sammies. So, it’ll stay nice and cold while still spreading easily on our bread!
Before we schmear our herbed cream cheese on the bread, we’re going to remove the crusts. I’m a total crust lover, but tea sammies are typically served crust free. So, I’ve got to suck it up on this one and cut those babies off. On top of our cream cheese, we layer some thinly sliced cucumber and radishes in an overlapping pattern, then cut it down the center to make 2 finger sandwiches. This is such a refreshing sandwich, taking the classic cucumber sandwich and making it some next level stuff!
For our final tea sandwich, we’re making a Turkey Green Goddess Tea Sandwich. This is my favorite sandwich of them all, I think. Green Goddess dressing is traditionally a mix of chervil, chives, tarragon, lemon, anchovies, and oil/mayo. But, I made our mayo spread today using some similar but more accessible ingredients like parsley (chervil’s cousin, if you will), basil, chives, lemon, and worcestershire sauce. Everything gets processed in a food processor until the mayo is nice and smooth, and then it’s ready to spread on our sammie!
To build the sandwich, we need some deli turkey, some Havarti cheese, and some sprouts. You could substitute white cheddar for the Havarti and some microgreens for the sprouts, as well, if you can’t find either in your grocery store. But I’m telling you, this sandwich is life changing either way. The oniony spread combined with the earthy sprouts, the salty meat/cheese, and the soft fluffy bread is everything. I’ve been eating the same sammie for a week straight! After the sandwich is assembled, cut off the crusts, slice the sandwich on the diagonal, and our third sammie is complete!
What’s great about this combo of sandwiches is that they cover all the bases: veggie based, mayo based, and deli meat based. Plus, these sandwiches aren’t just delicious in mini finger sandwich form. These sandwiches can be regular fan favorites with a simple change of keeping the crusts and leaving them whole! And since they’re so easy to make, you can feel fancy eating these any time!
Alright guys! I’ve got you covered on the tea sandwiches today. But, wait until you see the dessert idea I have coming up next weekend. OMG! I can’t stop thinking about this recipe I’ve got for you.
Until then, cheerio! And, let’s eat!
Tea Sandwiches 3 Ways
Serves: 12 Print
Ingredients:
For the Turkey Green Goddess Tea Sandwich:
½ cup parsley, chopped
2 tbsp chives, chopped
1 tbsp basil, chopped
½ tsp worcestershire sauce
½ tbsp lemon juice
½ cup mayonnaise
pinch of pepper
20 slices sandwich bread (I used wheat)
20 slices deli black forest turkey
10 slices deli havarti cheese (or white cheddar)
2 ½ cups sprouts (I used alfalfa sprouts)
For the Egg Salad Tea Sandwich:
4 eggs
1/3 cup mayonnaise
½ tsp paprika
½ tsp pepper
10 slices sandwich bread (I used whole wheat)
For the Cucumber Mosaic Tea Sandwich:
½ cup whipped cream cheese
1 ½ tbsp chives, minced
2 tbsp dill, minced
¼ tsp salt
¼ tsp pepper
8 slices sandwich bread (I used white)
2 English cucumbers, thinly sliced
4-5 radishes, thinly sliced
Directions:
Make the Turkey Green Goddess Tea Sandwiches: In a food processor, add parsley, chives, basil, worcestershire, lemon juice, and pepper. Process for a few seconds until broken down. Add mayonnaise. Process until combined and smooth.
Take 2 slices of sandwich bread. On one slice layer 1 slice cheese, 2 slices turkey, and ¼ cup sprouts. Spread about 1 tbsp mayo mix on the other slice of bread, and close the sandwich. Cut the crusts off the sandwich, and cut the remaining sandwich on the diagonal to form two sandwiches. Repeat with remaining ingredients.
Make the Egg Salad Tea Sandwiches: Place eggs in a small saucepan. Cover with cold water. Bring to a boil over high heat. As soon as the water starts to simmer, set a timer for 10 mins. After 10 mins, remove from heat, drain the water, and run the eggs still in the pot under cold water. Drain the water, and replace with more cold water. Allow the eggs to sit in the cold water for 2-3 mins. Peel the shells off of the eggs. Dice the eggs, and transfer to a mixing bowl. To the diced eggs, add mayonnaise, paprika, and pepper. Stir well to combine.
Take one slice of bread and use a 1 ½ inch biscuit cutter to cut 3 small circles out of the bread. Take one circle, top with about 1 ½ tsp egg salad. Top with another circle and another 1 ½ tsp egg salad. Then, top with a third bread circle and secure the sandwich with a cocktail skewer. Repeat with remaining ingredients.
Make the Cucumber Mosaic Tea Sandwiches: In a mixing bowl, combine whipped cream cheese, chives, dill, salt, and pepper.
Cut the crusts off of one slice of sandwich bread. Spread 1 tbsp cream cheese mix on the bread. Top with a row of cucumbers, a row of radishes, and a row of cucumbers, overlapping slightly to fit on the bread. Cut in half lengthwise. Repeat with remaining ingredients.
Recipe notes:
*The standard tea party serving suggestions are roughly 3-4 finger sandwiches, 1-2 scones, 1 big pastry, and one small pastry, per guest.
*These sandwiches are best served fresh. BUT, you can make the mayo mix, the cream cheese mix, and the egg salad a day in advance. Just assemble the sandwiches when you're ready to serve. In fact, prepping the spreads in advance gives more time for the flavors to blend, so I actually recommend that.
*You could substitute microgreens in place of the sprouts in the Turkey Green Goddess Sammies, if you'd like. You could also swap out white cheddar for the havarti in the same sandwich.
*You can find the best antique china plates and teacups for just a few dollars at your local thrift store. I highly recommend that be your first stop before any tea party!
*If you don't trust your knife skills, use a mandoline to thinly and evenly slice your cucumbers and radishes.
*I love this biscuit cutter set, because it has lots of sizes and comes with both straight and scalloped options!
*I find using a bench scraper is an easy way to cut the crusts off the sandwiches and cut the prepared sandwiches in half in one even motion. The sawing motion of a knife makes the contents of the sandwich start moving around, which we don't want.
*These are the cocktail skewers I used for the egg salad sandwiches.
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