Oh, those look yummy! I love a reason to make tea sandwiches. My favorites would be chicken salad and ham salad stuffed into small rolls, pimento cheese, and curried egg salad - 2 hard boiled eggs, 1/2 cup mayonnaise or less, and 1/2 t. curry powder, salt and pepper. I also have made cucumber on basil butter, cucumber with cream cheese flavored with ranch seasoning, and sliced cheddar with chutney on buttered bread.

Teresa

What a nice picnic lunch.

Ann

I agree, that IS a lovely picnic lunch. Especially the cookies. (grin)

The sandwiches are very nice, I'll bet The Princess would love that as a picnic.

Annie

Delicious looking lunch. Got all food groups and in good portions. Funny how it reminds me of little man's lunch box. :-)

Al

It looks wonderful - all of it. I'd love your entire picnic from soup to cookies and tea. I haven't had tea sandwiches in decades; I don't think it's much of a southwestern thing except at the better traditional hotels.

Lee

I like avocado mixed with chopped green pepper and baco bits (being veggie that's what I use but you could use chopped bacon) with thin sliced tomato on top.

Smoked salmon mixed with cream cheese is also a favorite, or even smoked mackerel or kippers.

Being an aglophile, I love teas, tea sandwiches, and picnics and YOUR GROOVY PHOTO!
Thanks for sharing Ruthanna!

What a lovely picnic lunch Ruthanna, sounds romantic.

I love thinly sliced cucumber with cream cheese, smoked salmon, cream cheese and thinly sliced red onion and egg salad.

Great picnic lunch everything sounds really good!

That just looks so good and what a nice way to spend Saturday evening.

Oh Ruthanna, how I envy you right now. I want to reach into that photo and nibble on each and every item!

My favs are cucumber sandwiches and chicken salad with toasted pecans. Tuna salad & egg salad aren't bad either.

What I envy most is the fact that you shared it with your DH! =)

Yummy-- looks like the perfect picnic !

I like butter & thin sliced radish on thin, thin white bread; liverwurst & very thin sliced onion with dijon on dark rye: tuna salad on seeded rye; cream cheese ,bit of orange juice, chopped dates & chopped walnuts on canned brown bread.

Ruthanna, that's just lovely! It's almost too pretty to eat. Love the different cutouts. But what a great idea.

Craftyrn, that cream cheese with orange juice, dates and walnuts sounds like a winner. It's been ages since I had the counterpart of cream cheese on a datenut bread.

Beth

Sandwiches on soft white bread with the crusts cut off. Takes me right back to tea-time as a child. Cucumber or ham with a little mustard.

What a great idea for the next time my husband and I go for a road trip! I like to pack a lunch because when we travel anywhere, we like to stay off the freeways and go small, back highways, and finding a nice, scenic area to stop for lunch is part of the fun.

We love cream cheese with minced dry salami & black olives. Tuna salad with my sweet pickle relish. Liverwurst or deviled ham with my crunchy sauerkraut. Cheddar cheese with roasted red bell pepper tapenade. Mmmmm, don't forget peanie bunkle (peanut butter) with really good jam. Egg salad with sweet&hot mustard. If I've any leftover broiled fish, like salmon or halibut, I like that minced, with fresh dill sour cream and maybe some green onions.

Ruthanna, I love your idea of taking good tea as well. I used often to take a thermos of tea on road trips when I lived in the Bay Area, but I guess I'd got out of the habit living here in the Valley, where quite often it is too hot to consider a hot beverage...but this time of year, I should remember!

Ruthanna, what a lovely picnic! It's been way too many years since I've done something like that.
My mind is thinking about, tortilla pinwheel slices, spring rolls, smoked whitefish and crackers and brownies.
There's a sandwich filling I used to make that was, canned corned beef mixed with cream cheese, mayo, mustard and grated onion.
Something I have made recently... ground ring bologna with sweet relish and mayo. I love it as a sandwich filling or with crackers.

Nancy

Thanks for all the filling ideas and comments. I'll be sure to try some of them on my next batch.

I have always loved tea sandwiches since my first tea lunch at John Wanamaker's dept. store in Philadelphia when I was about five or six years old. I still visit tea rooms whenever I can. Last year, my friend and I took a bus trip to Maryland to visit two tea rooms in one day.

I used to pack DD a lunch that looked much like the photo but fewer varieties and cut out with animal shapes. Those and Jell-O jigglers were usually my contribution to Girl Scout, church youth groups, etc. potlucks. The bread scraps from cutting would go into breakfast casseroles or bread pudding.

Since DH and I hit our goal weights last year, we've been exploring different dining options instead of going to one of our favorite restaurants for a fat and calorie-laden meal. This wasn't exactly what I'd call a diet dinner but it was if compared to the alternative we used to do on a Sturday night. It's been a lot of fun.

Very attractive and appetizing. It's like an American bento box.

Jim

Here is a link that might be useful: Bento

Ruthanna, your sandwiches are picture perfect & I just want to grab one!

Every year I have a tea for about 25 people following a Christmas house tour but my sandwiches aren't as elaborate as yours. Making a 100+ sandwiches, I stick to squares, rectangles, & triangles! Some of my favorite fillings are:

Thin roast beef & a sour cream/horseradish spread with field or water cress;

Hummus w/thinly sliced green onion tops;

Cream cheese, olive, & pecan spread;

Turkey w/whole cranberry sauce;

I do something with bacon - but I don't remember what, LOL; I'll have to check my 'tea' book & see what I've forgotten.

I forgot - My roast beef sandwich spread of sourcream & horseradish also includes Feta cheese - actually that's the main ingredient! Duh!!!!!