High Tea with Cucumber Sandwiches

This is as English as it gets. High Tea is typically served between 4pm and 6pm, and it's a nice way to snack before dinner and also get a light caffeine kick. Usually it's served with cake or pastries, but I like my high tea with another English staple; the cucumber sandwich. It might sound simple, which it is, but it's very delicate, filling, and the perfect accompaniment to tea. Yesterday I stopped by my favorite patisserie in Palo Alto, called La Baguette (I think they recently opened one in Glendale) and got a loaf of white sandwich bread. It's unbelievably fresh, baked with delicate hands minutes before its sold, it's absolutely perfect for the sandwich. 

The sandwich: 

It's probably the easiest thing you'll ever make. Really the most important component is the bread. If you're all about gluten free, flax seed nonsense, you're never EVER going to make a proper cucumber sandwich. It has to be country-style white bread. Period. Not even sourdough will suffice. Crusts on, and stick it in the toaster. IMPORTANT: Do not toast all the way, it should still be soft with just a touch of crunch around the edges. You are not making morning toast. Next, butter each piece until fully coated, again, if watching the calories you don't have to slather it on there, a light layer will do. Slice the cucumbers not into perfectly round slices but into diagonal slices so they are easier to eat in between the bread. Lightly salt with coast sea salt and put on about two layers, then again take a few leaves of parsley, not too many and cover with the other piece of bread. Cut diagonally (although the traditional English way would be to cut straight down the middle but that's how I prefer it) and enjoy! 

The English Tea:

I don't know why people are so scared by making a proper cup of English tea, they are very intimidated about it, because it has to be served and prepared a certain way but the truth being it's actually a very simple process. I lived in the UK for a year, and there's only one way to serve tea. They do not have an array of different teas to choose from at the store like we do over here, there's only one kind of tea and that's what they sell. To them, it's called 'tea' to us, it typically goes by the label 'English Breakfast'. It's basically light black tea. It's not bold, it's very mellow, but very good tasting. I brewed some Yorkshire Harrogate which I picked up while in the UK but honestly some Tazo 'Awake' or any brand of 'English Breakfast' will suffice. Let it sit, do not at sugar. 

The proper way to drink tea is how you take it once it's brewed. It's important to take tea with milk, not half and half, not heavy cream, and not skim...Milk and only milk. So have that at the ready, then a couple of sugar cubes, depending how much you prefer, you can always decline the sugar, but never the milk. Usually you would drink the tea out of a very small and delicate tea cup so watch it with how much sugar you put in so that it's not Southern Style Sweet Tea. Mix gently and enjoy. If you really want to get into character, pinky's out, tea spoon resting on the tea coaster, and nibble on, don't chew your sandwich. 

Bon Appetite!

Sweet Iced Tea with Peaches

Growing up in Texas I was first introduced to the concept of Sweet Tea. As someone who came from Russian, tea was basically a beverage to have with every meal, and the way you took it was in a small tea cup with loose leaf Arabic black tea that was very rich and bold in flavor with absolutely no sweetener or milk. It was designed to put some hair on your back. My mother to this day will drink it just like that with a piece of Russian candy on the side to act as a sweetening agent. So when we moved to Texas, I was relieved to be able to drink tea not only over ice, because iced tea is a staple in the south due to the insanely hot summer temperatures that wold reach triple digits by March, but also with a hefty amount of sugar that basically killed the tea flavor all together, so what I decided to do was combine the two things that I love about this concoction and allow for all the flavors to stand out whilst adding my own personal touch to it.

I am a big fan of loose leaf tea, I rarely use tea in a bag, unless it's one that I have to buy to go. With loose leaf tea, they use the larger dried leaves of the tea that contain the most flavor. Your best bet is to buy the tin canisters of tea from Peet's Coffee and Tea, they are (though a chain) very true to tea horticulture and history. One new one that I really enjoy is called Russian Caravan. Anyone who knows anything about Russian culture knows that Russians drink a lot of tea, probably more than the British, but the only difference is that they don't have any tea that is indigenous to them, most of their tea is imported from countries in the middle east. They only have one flavor that they enjoy; that is deep, dark and smokey black tea cultivated in the regions near India, they used to be taken by caravan by traveling salesmen and gypsies to Russia and sold in bulk in the outdoor markets by the shovel full. It's as authentic of a flavor that you're likely to find in the states unless there is an Arab market near your place that sells loose leaf black tea. 

There is an art to brewing. in a tea pot measure about 5 spoon fulls of the dried leaves to put into  a tea pot and fill to the brim with boiling water. The mixture must brew for at least 20 minutes until the leaves are completely moist.

Meanwhile in a large caraf cut up one peach or use a can of peaches already sliced. Sometimes it's better to use canned peaches because they're already soft and they have that wonderful sweet juice that they are swimming in to help the flavor of the fruit shine. I'm a bit of a purist so I prefer a fresh peice, which will basically be slowly cooked by the hot water. 

After the initial brewing of the tea ad at least twice the amount of sugar to the hot mixture. If you used 5 tablespoons of tea, use 10 tablespoons of sugar. If you're watching your calories feel free to use Spenda or honey even. Once the mixture has brewed for 20 minutes and the sugar has completely dissolved, pour the mixture over the peach and juice mixture (the juice should be about 1/4 of a cup if anything). This will cook and soften the peaches and mix with the tea flavor. Allow to stand for about 20 minutes until the mixture has cooled. 

Once the mixture is cool, and only after it is, is it ok to start adding ice, if it's not cool the ice will melt immediately and water down the beverage. The carafe should be half full at this point with the rest of the space saved for the ice so that the ratio is perfect. Pour into a glass and enjoy by the pool. It has the right amount of sugar and caffeine and natural fructose to give you a bit of a kick without being painful to drink.

Enjoy and Bon Appetite!