tea time

Braed and I are in charge of the dances at the Nauvoo YSA Conference this fall. It's funny because this is the conference where we first started to hang out last year but wouldn't be going to this year except for this responsibility. We have a tight budget so we decided to go under budget with a movie night theme for the first night (popcorn and soda for refreshments, move posters on the walls, movie trivia games, etc) and combine the left over funds with those for the second night to have an Alice and Wonderland theme with giant and tiny cookies, lemonade with "Drink Me" signs and, of course, tea sandwiches as a nod to the Mad Hatter.

We had never made (or eaten) tea sandwiches before, so we had a trial run last night with some recipes we found online to see what we liked. Our friends Jared and Alyssa came over to help us make the hard decisions of what to keep and what to nix. We ended up with two sweet sandwiches and two savory and we are rather excited about making them for the actual event.

The tea sandwiches! We used the lovely glass pedestals given to us from the Blonders for our wedding and they were perfect! We're going to try and make some cheap display stands by gluing plates to upside down cups to imitate these for the actual event.

Carrot cake tea sandwiches!

My favorite sweet tea sandwiches were the carrot cake ones. They are on raisin bread which was a little out of our price range for the event, but we liked them so much that we're going to just put them on plain bread but mix in raisins and cinnamon for the spread to compensate. And, for those of you who would like to try this at home, here is the supa easy recipe for your enjoyment:

• 1 pkg cream cheese
• 1/2 container of cream cheese frosting
• 1/2 c. shredded carrots
• 1/2 c. chopped walnuts
• cinnamon raisin bread (or just add raisins and cinnamon and put on regular bread)

Take the cream cheese out of the fridge to let it soften so it is easier to mix. Put in a medium sized bowl and mix in other ingredients. If you're going to eat your sandwiches right away, sandwhich your spread between the bread of your choice, cut off the crusts, cut diagonally and eat up! If they're going to sit a little before consumption put a thin spread of butter on the bread first to prevent the filling from making the bread soggy. Make as many sandwiches as you want, then put the extra filling in a Tupperware and keep in the fridge for later. It should save for at least a week.

Tomato tea sandwiches.

Our other group favorite was the tomato tea sandwiches. They were super easy and delicious and I will also give you the recipe. Right. Now.

• 3T Dijon Mustard
• 1.5 c. mayonnaise
• 8 slices of bacon
• 1 or 2 tomatoes
• bread

Mix together the mustard and mayonnaise until blended. Cut up the bacon into little pieces and add to the mixture. Spread the mixture onto a piece of bread, then cut the tomatoes into thin slices and put on top. Use four slices of tomato per slice of bread. Cut off the crusts, cut the open-faced sandwich into squares and enjoy! (This filling should also last for about a week in the fridge so you can save some for later.)

I hope you enjoy these recipes as much as we have. I ate so many of the carrot cake ones that I felt a little sick after but it was totally worth it. So have a few friends over, brew up some herbal tea that you can drink hot or iced and treat yourselves to some afternoon tea: you'll be glad you did.