My mom, sister and I have an annual tradition: we and the women from another family go out for tea (and this year, we invited our sisters-in-law to come). It’s a great opportunity to catch up, relax, and giggle uncontrollably. Without fail, “You can dress them up, but you can’t take them out” is said about my friend Kristin and I. There was the time Kristin and I tasted rose petals that were meant for a garnish, the time Kristin ate carnations, and the regular occurrence of Kristin and I adding about ten sugar cubes to our tea for the sake of watching them dissolve. Obviously, Kristin and I aren’t quite ready for a prim and proper tea.
We’ve tried a few tea places, but the one that we most recently visited was called the Wenham Tea House. It’s a quaint restaurant and shop, where they sell things like these decorated sugar cubes!
We each got our own different flavor of tea, which we were allowed to smell and choose before we were seated. Actually, I’ve never liked tea, so I got coffee. I enjoyed it a lot more than the other times when I’ve had to chug tea, so it worked for me!
After we got our pots of tea/coffee, we were served sandwiches, scones, and desserts on a little tiered plate.
We also got our own teeny jelly jars! The jelly was super yummy, and we even had a jar of orange marmalade left over, so I got to bring it to work and give it to one of the residents at the nursing home (as a side note, he loved the marmalade and now uses the jar to hold his cribbage pins!) I thought that was pretty awesome!
Now I’ve had the “normal” tea sandwiches before, like cucumber & cream cheese, chicken salad, and tuna & dill. At this place, I had a sandwich that surprised me and delighted me at the same time. It was… peanut butter and bacon! Of all the combinations I had never thought of, that was a definite contender for strangest concept. But it worked. It was smoky, sweet, salty, savory, crunchy, smooth… everything rolled into one little bite. And the thin wheat bread it was served on added just enough chew and doughiness to balance out the strong peanut flavor and fattiness of the bacon. It was great!
Naturally, I didn’t stop eating after that sandwich. It’s a known fact that when faced with sweets and pastries, I can’t help myself. After my sister, my friend Kristin, and I shared our three tiers, this was the result:
And after several cups of coffee, I thought I was going to explode. That’s why it’s also a tradition that on tea day, we don’t eat supper! Instead, we all just hang out together and continue giggling.
We love going out for tea together! Cheers to family, friends, and trading being prim and proper for just being ourselves.
