England is well known for many great things: the monarchy, festivals in the mud, great accents and, everyone’s favourite, afternoon tea! Naturally, I had to have afternoon tea while I was living in London, and my favourite visit was in early March of 2013. Why so specific? Why so special? Because we took our afternoon tea in the Thames Foyer of the Savoy, darling.
My lovely co-worker Mel suggested we do something nice together before I left my job, and faced my don’t-have-a-work-visa-anymore deportation. Rather than our usual chicken soup Tuesday lunch at Pret a Manger (as good as that is), we settled on afternoon tea, in the afternoon on a workday, at one of London’s most famous hotels, the Savoy.
If you ever get a chance to spend an afternoon like Mel and I did, I highly recommend you do. If you’re visiting London for the first time, make sure this is at the top of your list, and that you book a great place in advance. This is a quintessentially English thing to do, and I think every visitor should jump at the opportunity.
We chose the Traditional Afternoon Tea option, which includes finger sandwiches, scones, pastries, and a slice of one of their signature cakes. It was so much food! The sandwiches and scones were unlimited, as was the tea, but you have to pace yourself because the pastries and the cake are to die for!
How does a raspberry and lime macaroon sound? Or the lavender éclair and royal chocolate cake? Exactly. And those are just the individual pastries! It’s when the cake comes that you think they must be joking. They’re not, and it’s heavenly.
By the end, I was terribly full. It was almost too much food. I’ve heard that the trick is to avoid drinking a lot of tea at the start, because it fills you up! Regardless, you still need to try a bit of everything.
On top of our fantastic, girly afternoon in the most posh of English settings, we were one table away from America’s own fresh prince, Will Smith.
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