Valentine’s Tea Party Sandwiches

You will also need a medium-sized (the right size to get one from each slice of bread) heart-shaped cookie cutter.

1. A couple of hours before making your tea sandwiches, you’ll want to take your cherries out of the freezer to thaw out. If you are a poor planner (like me), you can always defrost them in the microwave. Once thawed, drain the juice off of the cherries, chop and set aside. With 1 cup of frozen cherries you’ll end up with 1/3 cup of thawed and chopped cherries.

2. In a small mixing bowl, using a hand mixer, mix together your cream cheese, sugar, lemon juice, almond extract, and salt.

3. Stir your chopped cherries and sliced almonds into the cream cheese mixture.

4. Now is a good time to include little ones to help make the sandwiches for their tea party. Using a heart shaped cookie cutter, cut out 20 heart shaped pieces of bread. I got my heart shaped cookie cutter from Amazon.

5. To make the sandwiches, spread some cherry almond creamed cheese on one slice of heart-shaped bread, and then top it with another piece of heart shaped bread. If your kids are helping, be sure to provide them with a dull knife. Repeat until all the sandwiches are assembled.