I enjoy inviting my friends over for an English Tea a few times a year. Some tea sandwiches rotate in and out, but two seem to always make it on the menu—this sandwich and my Chicken Curry Sandwiches.

Tea sandwiches should be small, easily contained and easily eaten in a few bites—so, no big hunking American style sandwiches, think small! The sandwiches may be small, but there’s usually a wide variety of them 🙂 You might eat five different sandwiches at tea, followed by a scone with cream and jam.

Then, there are, perhaps, three or four little desserts. I love it!

The original recipe for this Smoked Chicken Almond sandwich came from Epicurious.com, but I fixed it, of course 🙂 The Epicurious.com recipe says to cut the sandwiches with a circle cutter, butter the circular edge and then roll in chopped almonds. NAH! Way too fussy. Enjoy it my way!

The Smoked Chicken Almond Sandwich is at the top of the plate. The Curry Chicken Sandwich is to the left, and to the right is a Meatball on Toast, ugly, but tasty, and soon to be added to the website.

The recipe has instructions for poaching the chicken, but if you already have some cooked chicken on hand or plan to pick up a rotisserie chicken from Costco, skip that part and use what you have.

Smoked Chicken Almond Sandwiches

Smoked Chicken and Almond Sandwich on mini croissants

INGREDIENTS

• 3 cups chicken broth or water, plus 1½ lbs boneless chicken breasts OR
  • 2 cups chopped cooked chicken, BBQ’d is especially good!
• ½ cup mayonnaise—original recipe called for 1 cup, but I thought that was too much—add more mayo if you’d like.
• 1/3 cup minced shallot OR minced green onion OR minced red onion soaked in ice water for 10 minutes and drained before adding to the chicken mixture
• ½ teaspoon dried tarragon
• Salt and pepper, to taste—and you will need some
• ½ cup finely chopped smokehouse almonds, about half of a 6 oz can—chop the nuts, then measure out ½ cup
• The best bread you can find

DIRECTIONS

1. If you need to cook the chicken:
   • In a large skillet bring the water or the chicken broth to a boil.
   • Add the chicken breasts in one layer.
   • Reduce heat and poach chicken at a mere simmer for about 7 minutes.
   • Turn the chicken over halfway through the cooking time.
   • Remove pan from heat and let chicken cool in the broth for 20 minutes.
   • Drain the chicken from the stock (SAVE the stock! Refrigerate or freeze it to use in another recipe).
   • Discard any skin, and dice the chicken.
2. In a medium bowl stir together the cooled and diced chicken, mayonnaise, shallot OR onion, tarragon, and diced almonds.
3. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
4. Spread onto that good bread you just picked up from the bakery—recently I have seen mini croissants in the bakery; those would be fun, too.
   • Spread the filling over the full sized slices of bread. Then cut the crusts off, then slice each American style sandwich into 3 or 4 FINGER sandwiches. I like to cut the sandwich into 3 slices, vertically. Others like to cut the sandwich into 4 squares. Others like to use those new mini croissants available at many bakeries.
5. Leftover filling can be covered and stored in the refrigerator for about 3 days.

Makes four or five American sized sandwiches (you will cut each into three or four FINGER sandwiches). However, the yield is totally dependent on the size of the bread and how much filling you put in each.

Thanks for stopping by my English Tea Garden today!