Roasted Vegetable Tea Sandwich Filling

For our most recent Facebook Live event, we focused on savories - primarily fillings for tea sandwiches. I demonstrated how to make choux pastry for puffs. Most people think of these puffs as a sweet - filled with pastry creams and sometimes topped with chocolate or a sprinkling of powdered sugar. But they make a great sandwich base for richly flavored fillings like curried chicken salad or the delightful roasted vegetable-cream cheese filling featured in this post. 

The color of this filling is amazing. And the flavor is wonderful - the roasting brings out the sweetness of the carrots and peppers with the addition of the deep purple red onion. The binder is cream cheese and the sharp creamy cheese with the roasted vegetables is divine. Spread it on a nice wheat bread or pipe it into choux puffs, as we demonstrated, and you have a tasty treat for your tea time guests.

Carrots, red & orange bell peppers, and red onion prepped for mixing with olive oil and Italian seasoning before roasting in the oven.

The key to the best flavor is roasting at high heat - no less than 425F. This allows the vegetables to caramelize, which brings out the sweetness of their flavors. 

Left: Veggies on the pan before they are roasted. Right: Veggies after roasting. Yum!

After roasting, let the veggies cool completely and then rough chop them so that they are almost a mince size. This will make the cream cheese spread less chunky, but still give a nice bite of vegetables in the sandwich.

This recipe below is adapted from TeaTime Magazine's version.

Roasted Vegetable Tea Sandwich Filling

Makes about 1.5 Cups filling

1 Cup carrots, 1/4" slices

1 Cup each red and orange or yellow bell peppers, small diced

1 Cup 1/4" sliced red onion

1-2 Tbsp olive (or avocado) oil

1-2 tsp Italian seasoning

1/2" tsp Kosher salt

8 oz cream cheese, softened

Preheat oven to 425F. Mix all ingredients (except the cream cheese) in a bowl, ensuring that everything is coated in the oil and seasonings. Spread out in a thin layer on a baking sheet. Roast in the oven for at least 30 minutes or until the carrots are all soft. Allow to cool completely.

Once vegetables are cooled, rough chop until almost a minced size. Add vegetables and cream cheese into a bowl and mix well by hand. 

Use a knife to spread on sliced bread or to fill in choux puffs. Leftover spread will keep for a week in the refrigerator.

Note: This would work well as a spread for crackers or on a charcuterie board, too!