High Tea with Classic Scones | Dinner DeeAs

I'm Jeff Philbin, and this is Dinner DeeAs. We're here every day with ways to solve the eternal puzzle of what's for dinner today. It's time for tea. High tea. That is, as we make three tiers of tasty treats from fancy finger sandwiches to a classic scowl. Get your pinky in position as we partake in the perfect Tea Party. I'm Jeff Philbert and this is Dinner Ideas. Joining me to take us through a traditional tea is chef Mark Levy. He's cooked everywhere from Paris to upstate New York and is curr

ently masterminding the menu at a running restaurant called the Whitman Part of the Ball Harbor Shops pop up that's currently in Sarasota through April 28th. Thanks for coming to the dinner. This kitchen, my friend. Roger, Thanks. For being here. Now the Whitman is offering their high tea every Tuesday afternoon. And today Chef Mark is sharing some ideas for how to have your own high tea, starting with some very special sandwiches. Which one are we starting with first? So we're going to start ri

ght here, Jeff, with good old fashioned egg mayonnaise. But this one, we're going to make real decadent, right? You're going to add some caviar to it as well, just to finish it off. And do you have an egg peeling tip? Yeah. So bow to order, the eggs go in 10 minutes. Okay? Since they come off a bunch of ice in there and cold water and let them sit for another 10 minutes, so call them in ice for as long as you, as you cook them. Then the peeling so that you can see what I'm doing here is just a

little tap and then a roll. Yeah, you can hear a little crackle. It kind of looks only slight. The whole thing is cracked. And then I like to keep a bowl of water. And one is to make sure that we keep all the shell off of the egg. Okay. And we can just keep different box. I know what it is. It's like a little bit of the water goes under the under the skin. They just might help separate a little bit more. Okay. Yeah. You know, and you can have, you know, more kinds of trouble with, you know, with

eggs. You know, the shell will stick to them. But this generally seems to work. Okay. For me over the years. That's what I'm going to do. So now we're just going to turn these turn these eggs into a little bit of egg mayonnaise. Okay. just on a simple bulk, straight up, Real simple. Just push that through. you can put this in the food processor if you want. The you know, I think it's better for the box scratch gives me more size. I like that for. Very nice. About four there. Yeah. Okay. but as

you can see, one of the things there is I you know, by doing this process with the egg as well, you never get any of the black circle anyhow. So which can discolor your egg salad. Yeah. And that's just down to the most important part, which is cooling down your eggs quickly enough. So what we're done here is just a mayonnaise. And now the salt. Pepper and the chives. And what you want to do is you don't want to make it overly soft because only one. Hold it, Shut it. Okay. So what we're going to

do, we're going to cut to these little guys here. that's what we use. Brioche. I just cut them out and then toasted them in the oven. So it's like a nice bite sized piece and then, you know, we are Bahama cool, so we're going to make this a little fancy. I love it to have a high tea for your dinner. So I grabbed the recipes for everything we're making today over at dinner ideas dot com. The easiest way to get there is to scan the QR code. It's that square down there on your screen, grab your pho

ne, open the camera app as if you're about to take a photo. And when you point at it, a link to us will pop up. So we're just going to add a little glorious layer here. So this is some Kaluga caviar, my favorite, nice and buttery. And we're just going to Now if you're on a budget, could you get away without having the caviar? Yeah. So it's just as delicious without yeah, yeah. So here we go with that finish with a little chives, Our high tea tower is filling up nicely, And when we come back, cuc

umber sandwiches, but with a twist and how to make a smoked salmon spread. You're ready for any VIP visits ahead on dinner days? Welcome back to Dinner Ideas. We're we're taking tea today with our special guest, chef Mark Leavy, who's been part of the Ball Harbor pop up shop experience, currently on site in Sarasota. And with this traveling restaurant, the Whitman, who serve an afternoon tea every Tuesday through the end of April, he's been showing you how to make your own take on this tradition

al treat by sharing inspiration for some super sandwiches. Before the break, we made a classic egg mayonnaise with a perfectly peeled egg, which we grated and mixed with mayo, chives, salt and pepper, then made it into open faced sandwiches with a little cheeky caviar chaser. Now it's time to fill our next tier with our unique spin on a cucumber sandwich. Right. A real classic one is the cucumber sandwich, which, you know, is just normally done with softened butter and cucumber white bread crust

. So it can be wheat bread as well. Okay. But this one, we decided to add another layer to it. So we're going to make some pea hummus. So we have some some chickpeas here just going in. And these this. One such is going in. You actually taking the time to have a team member actually. Peel Yeah. We like to, you know, somewhat like everything, you know, when we're in a nice restaurant, like we would like to elevate it for sure. So we just peel those skins off the outside from the can, you know, wh

en you take them out from now. And it definitely ends up giving you a much smoother finished product. So just got some English piece which has some chopped mint with them as well. Okay, I'm not going to need all this garlic, just a little garlic here. And then of course, I always think this is a great thing with tahini, you know, by the best that you can. This is an organic tahini. And I just really find that that Sesame flavor is prevalent in the hummus. I think that's important. You know, some

people don't put enough in there. Sure, sure. Put enough in there and let it have that nuttiness to it. So we're just going to put the lid on and we will get it going and we'll slowly drizzle in the oil. grab Chef Mark's recipes for everything is making over at our website Dinner ideas dot com. We have all the ingredients, amounts and directions ready for you to print. Scan that QR code on the screen to find your way to us. All right. not too thin, not too thick. A perfect number in the middle

. Perfect. We're just going to take this over here. We're going to get the sandwich made. Okay. So. So, yeah, so we'll just spread that on there so it's a nice. This is almost like your mayonnaise or the glue for the sandwich like we spoke of before. So that's a reach across and got to me the cucumbers that are great So then we just basically revert back to the classic sandwich. You're going to add the cucumber, you know, in a slightly scaled form all over. So you got to make sure when you make

the sandwiches and you serve and you get a little bit of everything in each and each bite with the of the sandwich that you have. And so we put that on there and then a bit of the micro in that we used the micro mix is a bit more delicate and not so harsh on the palate. So you taste a mint, but you know it's not. Yeah, you know, drink it, Anahita. You know, so with that, just a little bit of salt in there as well, then very simply, we just put the two together right here. So and then, of cours

e, this is a British tea sandwich. So we're going to take the cross off. All right. You guys don't like your crusts. So that's like every sandwich, like here, like in America, it might be the PB and J for the kids, but even for adults, it's like we're taking the crust off of that, too. So then, yeah, so we'll look at it and I'll say, okay, that's a portion that we do in a restaurant. But you know, basically at that large finger size, you know, okay, I should go there and you can just see a beaut

iful, balanced, nice light sandwich All right, what's next? If you want to have me that this time I can I can hand these put these on here, add it to a egg mayonnaise. So that's you have a nice thing. It's got a totally different color and we'll put it in a different design on the plate. You for that one. we just a just a smoked salmon one to make. Okay, so what we're going to do here in the process is just add some smoked salmon and we have some cream cheese an outside. Now why are you blending

it up? So what we're trying to do, Jeff, is just try and put together gel for the bread to stick it together. And I just think it adds another dimension to record a lot of flavors. So we've got some freshly chopped dill here, we've got some lemon zest as well. We've got a few capers. Try a pepper. Smoked salmon always goes black pepper. Absolutely. add a little bit of mayonnaise to it. So we're going to get the spoon in All right. There we have it. So it's like this guy up and move down the wa

y now. So we're just going to take it from here. And you can see it's good. That nice smooth patty consistency in there. It's nice and amalgamated, you know, emulsify these. So we're just kind of put some of this on the bread to start with Looks about right I'm back on. Love it. And like I say with the last one not too much not too little. You want to be able to taste it, but you don't want to squeeze out the sides when you make the sandwiches. You know. You always add more, but you're just goi

ng to get that nice thin layer all over. Okay, Got it. Okay. All right. So then we're going to go you know, like I said, I wanted to make sure that we got nice smoked salmon flesh, which beautiful smoked salmon. Here we got that one slice, which was perfect. It was made for that was. A big sandwich. It was ready for. A white mare. So we're going to finish this one off. You know, people love watercress in a lovely little product called Red Watercress, and it's just got that nice, you know, red hu

ge red, nice and peppery. Okay. Just so regular watercress is looks a bit prettier. So lovely. That's really nice. And then just over here, Jeff, we just got some pickled shallots and we do these in the kitchen. Okay? You know, you do them overnight and they take on that lovely red hue of the the natural color of the shallot. So I'm going to put a few in there. So here again with the sandwich you put the lid on. So now we've got a nice Joe again, just a gentle push down now, which there needs to

be Sophocles. Well to keep that flow going with the, the high tea vibe. Okay these guys as for the stuff afterwards you see and then Yeah. Again into their finger sandwich. So like, you know, whatever bread it is that you use, you know, you can use holy bread, white bread, whatever it is, you know, as long as it even gives you four pieces per life, you should be good. You know, you can, you can make more. Now, these guys, we're going to set up just a little bit differently. We're going to do tw

o by two. Two by two. Right. So each one of these are different. So then, you know, the guest can identify him and then so can I stuff when they're describing to you what the sandwich is for. Later on, you and I could just play a game of Jenga, that's all which way we want to go for because. She was. See. Exactly. Because our high tea tower of treats is looking lovelier and lovelier. And when we come back, some deliciously dainty desserts. We'll be joining the party as we get baking. And chef Ma

rk shares his recipes for classic scones ahead on dinner ideas. Welcome back to Dinner Days. Yes, it's tea time. Today's idea for dinner is an idea for tea. High tea specifically, which we're taking with Chef Mark Levy. He's the menu maestro at the Ball Harbor Pop up in Sarasota, their Whitman restaurant, where you can take high tea every Tuesday through the end of April. Before the break, we made Chef Mark's special spin on cucumber sandwich blending chickpeas, peas, garlic, tahini, olive oil,

salt and pepper, and spreading it on brioche bread and then adding cucumber. Then we made a smoked salmon sandwich with a base of blended smoked salmon, cream cheese, lemon juice and zest, capers, dill and a little bit of mayo, and adding a touch of pickled shallots. Now it's dessert time. Okay, so this is our recipe for the classics, covered so what do we have on inside our mixing bowl right now? Okay, so we have flour, butter, baking powder, and you really kind of want to take it to like a gol

den creamy base. And thank you for the sugar. Now we're going to. Screen out right. Sugar. Here we go. So what s roll? And we'll get that in now. Okay, So that's all of our dry ingredients. That's it. And what we have here is some buttermilk. So you can use heavy cream, you use buttermilk, can use milk, was a whole egg. Okay. And some vanilla paste. As you can see, we have a nice dough here and it's not too dry So we're just kind of on the board here. We're going to dust liberally with flour and

just pulled out together a little bit So just. A gentle rolling. How thick do we want to go with this side? Anything These two half an inch I think is best. You know, I like them big and tall. Really? Sure You can get kind of get more on it. But, you know, we try to make these a little more dainty pretty so we're going to go for. Yeah. So I just got like a, you know, a small fluted cutter. You can use a plain cover, whatever you want to do, and you can actually see any see the butter flexes. An

d then so we've accomplished what we were looking for. once you cut them, always turn them over before. You bake them. Why is that. So? Like, when you push down, you're pushing the mixture down at the side. Okay. Right. So but then when it comes out, if you flip it over, you know that that side is on the other side and that'll raise up rather than just from the middle. So which hopefully you will see in the finished product. I love it because to make this tower of treats for your dinner and yes,

you're allowed to skip the sandwiches and just make the scones if you really want, grab Chef Mark's recipe over dinner deals dot com. We have the ingredients, the amounts and the directions already. PIP just scan the QR code and those just went into the oven. Yep, that's right. That's right. 375 three 5375. Okay. 7 to 12 minutes. All depends on your oven and your fan. Something over bake. Don't over bake them. We won't let that happen because while our scones bake, we're taking a last break. An

d when we come back, tea time and tasting time ahead on dinner ideas. Welcome back to dinner. Ideas or treats for tea time. Since today, we're making high tea with chef Mark Levy, who's cooked all over the world but is currently running the roaming Whitman restaurant, which is part of the traveling ball Harbor. Shops pop up, which is in Sarasota through the end of April, where every Tuesday they serve. Well, this this is a high tea, which Chef Mark has been sharing some of the secrets from. If y

ou missed any of it, watch the rest of the episode at dinner. Dear WSJ.com. How do we get started? Where do we go first? Well, I mean, classically, you know, you start with the sandwiches and work your way up to these little sweet treats at the end. So you're not the first thing? No. Yeah. Don't make yourself a cup of tea. What's the proper way to make a cup of tea? Well, you know, you can go from loosely full bag to so many good tea products on these days, but you know what it is 197 degrees is

what they say. But somewhere near there, you know, let the tea steep in there for, you know, it depends how you like I like around four or 5 minutes personally, but you can go up to seven or eight depending strongly. Okay. Okay. So, you know, just pour one. So you just pour away. Now, is it controversial if you don't have milk or cream to it there, do you need it? Well, in the old days, of course, it was the create the milk or the cream was added to the cup. To stop the china from cracking was

a China was okay. But these days, yeah I mean this is very normal that you, you know, your milk or your honey or sugar or cream, whatever you'd like. You know, you go and milk. How to touch your milk from the. Get go with a little touch of muscle, pass it on your side there. And then what do we have here. Just a little bit of honey. Yeah. Yeah. All right. I'm going with just that little drop of some honey and good. And this is the English breakfast tea that we serve. So it's a black tea traditi

onal blend. And then where does the pinky go? Like, what is the proper way? Like, how do we do that part? I got to tell you, it. You know, that's. Do you get a real fancy with that? Okay, we got a fancy. It should be at the back there. Okay. You can choose if you want. I'm sure that when you choose that, you should Cherry. Cheerio, My good. It's nice what I tell you that. yes. Now look at this marveling tower that we've literally had so much fun working with. Now you're saying work from the bott

om. sure. Where you go first? What a great thing is witty is that, you know, you start with the of like you dinner, you know so you start with so every side you know I'm a big caveat guy so I. Always go for that one too. I even like intrigued with all of this egg mayo so I got to go right in for it. And we made that egg mayo from scratch. Is such a simple. Yeah. You know, good ingredients and, you know, the caviar just for a touch of decadence. That caviar is that little pop of decadence there t

hat is. This is bursting with flavors, which was also catching my eye was our smoked salmon here. So go for it. Now that we were talking before about the jacket. So I'm just going to actually just you know, I'm going straight in for that one there. you survived. I so. I survive. I, I survived and live for another bite to, you know, so appreciate about this. Is that layer in consideration like. Yes, sure. You could have added just a smear of mayonnaise to it there. And yes, you would have had the

flavor of that. But no, you went one step farther and added in so many incredible in walk me through these flavors again for what was on that spreadsheet. Yeah. We have the smoked salmon mousse. I tell you whatever you want to call it on the bottom. This is smoked salmon, cream cheese, mayonnaise and deal. That dill really comes through it. Absolutely beautiful. And then just a regular smoked salmon sheet on top of this. So you get, you know. Which is accentuating all those flavors coming toget

her so beautifully. And then the pickled shallots and the red watercress. So really classic things that should be whipped. Smoked salmon are all sandwiched between brioche. All right. And one more classic piece of it. Let's go with this, the cucumber sandwich here, because. This is one that always surprises people they really like. This is simple, you know, sort to vegetarian sandwich, but this guy's good. yeah? A little bit earthy for the beat over the mink. I'm sure that's some refreshment. Bu

t all that nuttiness with the tahini. Yeah, right. It's absolutely fantastic. It's beautiful. All right, so now I'm seeing over here, like, this whole, like, little fight with the scones, so I mean, you going with the one with the raisins? You go with the ones without the raisin. It's like I'm following your lead for where you're going to put me down this pathway. I like. I like classic song and classics. All right, So if it's not broken, don't fix it. Right? Exactly. Right. So then you kids wou

ld these, you know, you slice them in half. You slice them in half. So it gives you two bases right there. And then, you know, there's a whole big discussion in England where you put the cream first or the cream second. Okay. Yeah, it's like a whole thing. So it depends on which side of the street you grew up on. Yeah. And then you put the jam. all. Right, All right. So. But you know what? I like the jam than the cream. So you're going to have to do your job around. I want the jam on the cream,

so I got to go this way, then. All right, fine. So you're going to cream and jam, and then we can battle it out. Okay. There we go. Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. Take a little about this cream. And this is the classic, you know, this is you got down to the West Coast in England. You know, you get your afternoons, cream, teas. And stuff, and then you go straight on top, like, and you just make a little, little sandwich work. No, no, you have to to I just put your Oreo and also you have to. Tha

t's right. Kind of two. Treats. I like that. what a delight was perfect. yeah. So next time when you have a half, you can try the other way round. Which one. Which is your favorite part on this entire tower. Like which one are you like going back for 4 seconds. All right, immediately. You know, I like this. Going for the tea. That's got to be. But I'm a savory guy, so. gosh. Sandwiches and scones. And then, you know, a little scattering up here. I love the macaroons. These are the key lime pies.

And they were fabulous, too. So your favorite is everything is what you're telling me? Sure. As it was for me. What an absolute delight and a treat this has been. Thanks again to my guests, Chef Mark Levy Whitman is in Sarasota through April 28th, serving high tea. Every Tuesday a link is at dinner Diaz dot com along with all the recipes from today's show and if you make any of them, send us a photo. I'm Jeff Philbin. See you next time with more dinner days. Cheers to that. Right. Just think.