I went with Lucy and Samantha for afternoon tea one day at the Urban Tea Merchant on Alberni Street. I had heard about their delicious afternoon tea options recently and really wanted to give them a try. There are several different tea options available and for the most part, not everyone needs to order the same option but we all decided to have the Petite Afternoon Tea service.

There is quite an extensive tea menu so it took us a while to figure out what we wanted. Lucy was undecided between a couple of fruity tea options so our server brought the leaves out for her to smell to help her decide which one she’d prefer. I ended up going classic with the Early Grey tea that day.

First came a small mango sorbet amuse bouche. The mango flavour was quite strong and the sorbet was a refreshing way to start our afternoon tea service.

Unlike most other afternoon tea places I’ve been to, we each had our own tower of treats. I suppose it makes it easier for tables where everyone orders something different.

As usual, I worked my way from the bottom up. I ate the watercress and cucumber sandwich because it is usually my least favourite of the afternoon tea sandwiches. This one was no different. I always find it to be too bland for my taste. I couldn’t really taste the tea in the tea-infused curried egg salad sandwich but I still enjoyed it nonetheless. The curry flavoured the egg nicely and the creamy filling went well with the nutty whole wheat bread. My favourite of the trio of sandwiches was the smoky tea-infused chicken cone. Perhaps because it was smoked, I could taste the tea flavour more whereas the curry overwhelmed the tea flavour in the egg sandwich. The creamy chicken filling here went nicely with the crunch of the diced onions and the ice cream cone-like shell that the chicken was served in.

The plain scone was crispy on the outside and had a relatively moist centre. It wasn’t the best scone I’ve had but it was still tasty and served as an excellent vessel for the strawberry jelly and my favourite, Devonshire cream.

The dessert tier consisted of three options and I decided to start with the chocolate-covered strawberry first. The strawberry was pretty good but there wasn’t really anything that stood out. Next, I had the chai-infused pastry creme cone. This was basically like a mini ice cream cone except the creme wasn’t frozen. The chai flavour was really strong and if you are a chai fan, you’ll like this quite a bit. My favourite of the desserts was also the last one I had, the tea macaron. The macaron was actually slightly too chewy but the dark chocolate cookie held up really well to the tea-infused filling. It is quite sweet but went really well with my strong cup of Earl Grey tea.

The three of us had a great time at the Urban Tea Merchant. The tea service area is at the back of the store so it is pretty quiet and secluded from the retail section of the store. Service was very attentive and our tea pots were always replenished quickly. I definitely want to come back to try some of their other tea services. Note that there is also another location at Park Royal Centre in West Vancouver.

Details:
1070 West Georgia Street, Vancouver
Tel: 604-692-0071

Summary:
Food: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Service: 4 out of 5 stars
Details: $$

Another guest review from Cat! I had actually heard about Faubourg a few weeks ago from another reader, Wesley. He recommended that I try their pastries but I wasn’t aware that there was afternoon tea as well. I’m trying to start going to afternoon tea a little more regularly so perhaps I will include Faubourg on my circuit.

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Last Friday afternoon, my friends and I went to Faubourg in Kerrisdale for afternoon tea.  Once I stepped into Faubourg, I noticed its elegant decor and the long line up behind the counter.

For the afternoon tea menu, there were 2 choices to choose from: the pink afternoon tea and the purple afternoon tea.

Having not eaten much for lunch, I decided to opt for the pink afternoon tea while both of my friends chose the purple afternoon tea option.

For the pink afternoon tea ($25.50), it was supposed to include 3 types of sandwiches: salmon, chicken and beef.  Because we were there at 4pm, the server said we could only have chicken and beef sandwiches.  So I ended up having 2 chicken sandwiches and a beef sandwich. The chicken sandwiches (with apple and country ranch dressing) were, in my view, a bit bland.  Similarly, I thought the beef sandwiches did not really meet my expectations.

The purple afternoon tea also came with a scone and a variety of pastries.  The scone was ok and the pastries included: the Fruit Souffle, Mini Lemon Tart, Mini Opera, Chocolate Mousse and a Parfait.  Of the pastries, I highly recommended the black currant souffle.  It was very flavourful and the souffle wasn’t too soggy.  That was definitely the highlight of the afternoon tea experience.

Overall, I thought the experience was mediocre.

Details:
2156 W 41st Avenue, Vancouver
Tel: 604-266-2156

Summary:
Food: 3 out of 5 stars
Service: 3 out of 5 stars
Price: $$

Snoopy and I are both big fans of afternoon tea. When I saw that there was a Groupon for 2 for 1 afternoon tea at Hotel Vancouver, I knew we should pounce and take advantage of the deal. It took us a while to figure out which date worked the best for us to meet up and somehow, our families ended up tagging along with us. No problem though…we snagged a nice table in the corner with couches and made a nice afternoon of it. It took us a while to figure out where afternoon tea is held at Hotel Vancouver but it is in the rear section of 900 West, where there are regular tables rather than low lounge tables.

What we didn’t realize was that our Groupons also provided us with two free glasses of sparkling wine. Snoopy and I were quite pleased about this and sipped on it while we waited for our tea to arrive. I decided on the lavender Earl Gray while Snoopy had the Maple Maple. Since we were a large group, we ordered almost all the teas we wanted to try amongst all of us.

Finally, our tea arrived and so did our towers of goodies. I’m pretty methodical when it comes to afternoon tea so I started with the bottom tier. The mini ham and cheese croissant sandwiches were pretty tasty with the croissants still retaining a bit of crispiness. Although there was nothing special about the smoked salmon on rye, there was an ample amount of smoked salmon so I really enjoyed this mini sandwich.

I wasn’t sure how I’d like the curry chicken salad sandwiches but the mild curry flavour went really well with the creamy chicken. This turned out to be one of my favourite sandwiches that day.

Cucumber and watercress sandwiches are an afternoon tea stand-by so it wasn’t surprising to see these present in our tower. As with most cucumber sandwiches, I found this a bit bland and flavourless. I should also note that Snoopy’s mom is a vegetarian and instead of the assorted mix our sandwiches, they just gave her all cucumber sandwiches instead. We were a bit disappointed with this, especially when you consider the price we paid for afternoon tea.

I forgot to take a pictures of the scones on their own but the scones were light and fluffy. Along with the generous helping of Devonshire cream and jam that I spread on the scones, this was another item that I thoroughly enjoyed that day. I may be a bit biased though because I feel that a healthy amount of Devonshire cream can make any scone taste good…not that these scones were bad or anything.

As always is the case for me and afternoon tea, by the time I got to the sweets, I was quite full. I still wanted to try everything though so I ended up splitting some of the desserts with Jenkins. I have to say that the dessert portion of tea was the most disappointing that day. The lemon sponge cake was exactly just that and even though I usually like lemon desserts, I found it kind of bland. The fruit tarts had a nice blend of fresh fruit but since I’m not usually a fan of these, I wasn’t too impressed with the tarts. The chocolate cake was probably the best of the three, but again, it was your typical chocolate cake and nothing spectacular.

Overall, we quite enjoyed our afternoon tea. It was nice to take an afternoon out to relax and also to introduce our family to the joys of going for tea. At $36, I feel that it is quite expensive and the quality that one can find at a place such as Secret Garden is probably better. Service was also a bit spotty and for a nice establishment such as 900 West, we were surprised to see that there were only two servers serving an almost full seating.

Details:
900 West Georgia Street, Vancouver
Tel: 604-662-1900 (reservations recommended)
Served daily from 2-4:30PM

Summary:
Food: 3 out of 5 stars
Service: 2.5 out of 5 stars
Price: $$$

My friend Cat got married about a month ago and just prior to the wedding, I attended her bridal shower. Luckily for me, it was afternoon tea and even luckier for me, it was at the Secret Garden Tea Company in Kerrisdale. The last time I was at Secret Garden, it was actually for my own bridal shower and I remembered the food being extremely tasty.

The arrangements for afternoon tea was organized by one of Cat’s bridesmaids so I wasn’t privy to all the details. However, upon perusing Secret Garden’s online menu, it looks like the option our group had was the High Tea, which was also advertised as their “premiere tea service”.

I neglected to take a picture of my tea, but I chose the Creamy Earl Grey, which is one of Secret Garden’s most popular teas. The normal Earl Grey tea blend had bergamot and vanilla added, which gave the tea a wonderful creamy flavour without the cream. It is definitely one of my favourite tea blends and I think I will purchase some to take home the next time I’m in the area.

As is with most high teas, the food came organized in the recommended order that you should eat the items. We started first with the bottom tier, which had a variety of dainty little sandwiches. My favourites were the mini croissant sandwiches with salami and cheese. The croissants were buttery and crispy and went well with the saltiness of the salami. I also liked the little multigrain toasts with mushrooms and caramelized onions. I think mushrooms and onions are one of the ultimate combos and the little toasts added a sufficient amount of crunch. I wasn’t too crazy about the egg salad pinwheels though, which I felt were too mushy and did not have much flavour.

The middle tier had a selection of baked goods. My favourite from this tier was the mini scones, onto which I slathered quite a bit of Devonshire cream and raspberry jam. Probably not the healthiest but I thought the Devonshire cream and jam went so well together and the scones had a slight crust on the outside while the inside was nice and soft. I found the banana loaf to be ok but I definitely preferred the scones more.

The top tier had all the desserts. By this time, I was starting to get pretty full but how could I stop when I was getting to the best part? The mini lemon tarts were perfectly made with a buttery shortbread crust and a slightly tart lemon curd that was packed with flavour. I also liked the little pistachio cream cakes but I would have preferred there to be more pistachio flavour. The mini chocolate mousse cakes were very chocolaty and rich with the little fan of baked filo on top providing a slight crispiness. I enjoyed all the sweet desserts but I liked the lemon tarts the most.

I really enjoyed our afternoon tea at Secret Garden. One good thing about Secret Garden is that they have a sitting at 12:15PM so you can have these goodies for lunch rather than having a fairly large “snack” in the middle of the afternoon. At $25.95 per person, it is about the typical price you pay for most nicer afternoon tea places and for the quality of food you get and the selection of teas, I think it is very reasonable.

Details:
5559 West Boulevard, Vancouver
Tel: 604-261-3070

Summary:
Food: 4 out of 5 stars
Service: 3 out of 5 stars
Price: $$ and a half

What bachelorette party would not be complete without a stop for afternoon tea? As I’ve mentioned previously, I’m a big fan of afternoon tea and luckily for me, so were my fellow bachelorette partiers. I did some research on what type of tea options were available in Whistler and the place of choice for most seemed to be the Mallard Lounge at the Fairmont Hotel.

The Mallard Lounge has quite an extensive selection of teas to choose from. There were quite a few blends that I had never tried before and after checking with the others to ensure we had a good selection of teas, I decided on the ice wine tea. The ice wine tea was a black tea with a slightly sweet grape flavour, which was pretty interesting. One of my friends had the maple tea, which was a bit too sweet but the ice wine had a good amount of sweetness for me and did not require any additional sugar.

Before our tower of afternoon tea treats were brought out, we were presented with a small bowl of fresh berries. The fruits were sweet enough that they did not need any additional marination although some people remarked it would have been nice if they were lightly dressed.

Finally, our tower of tea treats were brought out. We were instructed to start with the top layer and work our way downwards.

The scones were actually one of my favourite tea items that day. They were quite large and had a sugary crispy outside which gave way to a flaky, warm inside. The scones went very well with the strawberry compote and Devonshire cream. I had a great time slathering copious amounts of Devonshire cream and strawberries to my scone.

The finger sandwiches all sounded very tasty in the menu, but we all agreed that they sounded and looked much better than they tasted. The smoked salmon and dill cream cheese pinwheel was probably the best of the bunch but not very original. The other sandwiches, especially the cucumber watercress sandwich and the roasted red pepper sandwich was a bit tasteless in my opinion.

After the disappointing sandwich layer, I hoped that the tea treats could be redeemed by the sweet bottom layer. Both the chocolate éclairs and chocolate dipped strawberries were well done and a nice, sweet way to end our meal. Surprisingly, the dipped strawberry was sweet enough to stand up to the chocolate.  I enjoyed the lemon curd in the mini tarts although I felt that the pastry crust fell apart too easily in my fingers. What can I say, I’m a bit picky when it comes to lemon desserts.

For the most part, we all quite enjoyed our afternoon tea with the exception of the sandwiches. As can be expected at any Fairmont establishment, the service was attentive and prompt. At $20 for afternoon tea, it is also a few dollars cheaper than most tea places in the Lower Mainland.

Details:
4599 Chateau Boulevard, Whistler, BC
Tel: 604-938-8000
Available daily from 12-2pm

Summary:
Food: 3 out of 5 stars
Service: 4 out of 5 stars
Price: $$

Victoria, Lucy, Samantha, and I met up one afternoon for some tea at the Bacchus Lounge in the Wedgewood Hotel. We had been meaning to go for afternoon tea for quite a while and there are quite a few places that offer this throughout Vancouver. Similar to most places, afternoon tea at Bacchus is available from 2:00-4:00. Although I love going for tea, I find that it always puts me in a difficult situation because I don’t know if I should eat an early lunch or a late dinner to make up for this filling meal in the middle of my afternoon.

The snacks during tea are pretty much set so all we had to pick was our choice of tea. I decided to go with the Thunderbolt Darjeeling. It had a strong flavour to it and I think it went particularly well with the sweeter desserts towards the end of our tea.

There was also a small dish of coloured sugar and cream that you could add to your tea if you so pleased.

When our tray of goodies arrived, our server advised us to start at the bottom and work our way upwards towards dessert. That sounded like as good of an idea as any and we quickly dug in after our server walked away. The finger sandwiches were all quite tasty but the cucumber and egg salad sandwiches (pictured below) were pretty regular tasting.

The shrimp salad sandwich was quite good (pictured in the background below) and I also enjoyed the chicken salad sandwich. As you can see, there was quite a bit of mayo but for some reason, it seemed to work with these sandwiches. I suspect the mayo was not too overwhelming because we only ate the equivalent of one quarter of a whole sandwich for each flavour.

The smoked salmon pinwheels were simply made with just a little bit of mayo and dill, which enhanced the smokey flavour of the salmon.

I had never tried bakewell tarts before, but they looked like little muffins with a jam filling inside. They turned out to be quite good and the almonds provided an extra crunch.

The fresh strawberry kiwi tarts were very tasty. The strawberries brought their own sweetness and the tart shell was buttery and crumbly.

None of us are big fans of fruitcake so we only nibbled on it a bit before leaving the majority of it on the plate. We were actually quite surprised to see fruitcake included in Bacchus’ afternoon tea offering because it doesn’t seem to be a popular item with most people. I had high hopes for the lemon cake and although it did not knock my socks off, I still enjoyed the light layers of lemony cake with white chocolate ganache. I think I would have enjoyed this even more if the cake had more lemon flavour but it was a bit overpowered by the white chocolate.

The fruit scone had a great crunchy and sugary crust to it that gave way to a flaky and buttery inside. I thoroughly enjoyed spreading a generous layer of Devonshire cream and jam on each bite of my scone. The chocolate eclairs were actually quite light and a nice way to finish up our afternoon tea.

The service during our tea was great and our friendly server made sure that our tea pots were regularly filled and also advised us on which goodies we should make sure to save room for. We all quite enjoyed our afternoon tea at Bacchus but still felt that the offering at Secret Garden in Kerrisdale still comes out on top. Afternoon tea at Bacchus is available on Saturdays and Sundays from 2:00 to 4:00 and is $29 per person.

Details:
845 Hornby Street, Vancouver
Tel: 604-608-5319

Summary:
Food: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Service: 4 out of 5 stars
Price: $$$