A Proper English Tea-time

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Since @Jabo was so kind as to invite us all to tea in her garden and one of the polite and traditional things to do is to bring a plate of something to share, I have brought one of the staples of an English tea-time - the simple egg and cress sandwich made in the way my mother taught me to do it. Most people hard boil the eggs, mash them roughly and then mix in the mayonnaise. The following method is my own and is by far the best way of getting a consistent sandwich filling. You will need: 3 fresh, free-range eggs 250ml (1 cup) of good quality mayonnaise (NOT salad cream!) 1 tsp Dijon mustard salt and pepper (to taste) a generous handful of cress. The trendy name for this is ‘micro greens’ but it is just good old-fashioned cress seed sprouted on a piece of blotting paper or kitchen towel until the adult leaves are just beginning to appear. It is then ‘harvested’ with scissors. 12 slices of brown bread from a sandwich loaf. I much prefer brown bread but it is quite acceptable to use white and, often, the plate will contain both white and brown versions Butter Most people, as I say, would boil the eggs for 10 or 12 minutes, refresh them in cold water and then shell and mash them. This tends to leave you with hard and slippery pieces of white and, sometimes, rather gritty yolks mixed in with the mayonnaise. My method is radically different. Break the eggs into a pan and stir them gently over a medium heat, exactly as you would make scrambled egg. Take it to the stage where it is just beginning to solidify and the whites are curdled but still somewhat soft. At this point, take it off the heat and add the mayonnaise and the mustard, mixing well to incorporate. Taste and add salt and pepper as desired. Put into the refrigerator to cool while you prepare the bread. Butter the slices of bread thinly. It is best if the butter is at room temperature so that it spreads easily and thinly. Once the egg/mayonnaise mixture has cooled, lightly mix in the cress and spread the mixture fairly generously on half of the bread slices. Cover each with another slice and, holding them down very lightly, trim off the crusts with a very sharp knife and cut each bread diagonally into two (or four) triangles, depending on the politeness and hunger of the company. A sharp knife is critical here, because you don’t want the filling to be squeezed out! Arrange the triangles on a plate, traditionally with a paper doily underneath and garnish with a few more cress stems.