The Duck Decides to Become Posh

I’ve been trying a lot of new recipes lately, and after staring avariciously at those trays of tiny sandwiches and pastries you see people eating at tea time on shows where people seem far more posh than I am, I decided I was going to try my own hand at being posh and have my own afternoon tea.  And even though I am, mournfully, not a big fan of tea (or any warm beverage, so at least I’m consistent), I was going to have tea, darn it, because people have sent me tea from other countries in the past, and I’ve had boxes of the stuff just lying around, feeling quite neglected indeed.

But first, the solid part of my tea was needed.  I first looked up tiny sandwiches, and I ended up finding two appealing recipes, crab, egg, and cheese (it was, in fact, really just a crab sandwich I found on the mighty Internet, which I made changes to based on a recipe my mom had) and chicken salad.  Again, the latter sandwich underwent many changes because I didn’t want anything involved in the recipe (Cranberries, celery, and nuts?  I think not.) but the chicken and the mayo, which didn’t seem posh enough.  So I added taco cheese.  Which really doesn’t make tons of sense for a British tea, but I’ll get to why that was such a good choice soon enough.  For dessert, I decided on a Victorian sponge.

I first began toiling upon the cake, which was pretty difficult, because the measurements were in grams, and I am far more familiar with good old cups.  I found a site that translated all those silly grams into cups, and then I was well on my way to tasty goodness.  While the cake baked, or the bake caked, I forget which, I made the sandwiches, which were quite simple, and I ended up with a few spare hard boiled eggs, which I made into stuffed eggs for a nice, little side.  Probably not accurate, but I can never pass up stuffed eggs.  After that came the frosting and jam (raspberry) innards of my now completed cake, and I must say, that frosting recipe was the most delicious thing I had ever tasted.  But alas, I had yet to actually indulge in my tea, so this most scrumptious of frostings would have to wait.

Despite the absence of chocolate, this still looks pretty nummy.

Well, my favorite sandwich ended up being the chicken.  While the crab was good, that taco cheese really made the chicken quite delicious, even if it in no way related to the true ingredients involved in chicken salad.  The tea was a variety from Ireland, whose golden color pretty much matched that advertised on the box.  Four scoops of sugar seemed to be the right amount, and it all turned out to be a lovely, little meal indeed.

Yummy sammiches.

And then, the most important part of all came, the dessert.  All I really need to say is…it was delicious.  I never used to be a jam kind of person, but it really helped to tone down the sweetness of the frosting, while the frosting helped to sweeten the cake, whose batter tasted and smelled more like butter than anything.  And so, if you have never tried such deliciousness, I ask that you do.  Or else you’re sorely missing out.  I never expected being posh to be so fun.

Thanks for reading. Have some cake.

A Posh Duck