Cost – £18.95 (Dec 2017)
Background – We were booked to visit Waddesden Manor to see the house decorated for Christmas and to have their Festive Afternoon Tea for 2017. However, there was a surprisingly heavy early fall of snow overnight which closed the manor for the day. As a result we were suddenly faced with rearranging our day. There wasn’t a lot of snow where we are, so we decided to see if we could find a replacement Festive Afternoon Tea that was available without booking ahead.
Luckily the Felix Hotel fulfilled the criteria. We rang ahead to check it would be ok to just turn up and off we went.
We arrived at the hotel to find a thin covering of snow
and a jolly snowman that had been built by the staff.
We were seated in the hotel’s conservatory area on comfortable sofas with a low table between them set ready for us.
The hotel was decorated for Christmas.
Contents – Three finger sandwiches each (turkey, cranberry sauce and rocket, egg mayonnaise, smoked salmon with cream cheese), a small stilton and fig quiche and a small pork, sage and onion confit sausage roll. One large fruit scone, a dish of strawberry jam and a dish of clotted cream. A small finger of candied orange lamington, a cocoa and chestnut macaroon and a black shortbread sandwich filled with caramalised white chocolate with matcha tea bavarois. The tea was made with loose tea.
Comments – We were shown through to the conservatory area next to the bar and restaurant. It was very nicely decorated for Christmas
and we looked out onto an early snow fall, including a snowman in a top hat!
The low table was laid with chunky white china and white linen napkins.
The tea arrived quickly in a chunky white china teapot and milk jug.
The rest of the Tea arrived soon after on a three-tier cake stand with round white plates.
The savoury section included a couple of pastry items as well as sandwiches, which is something I like to see. The sandwiches were all well filled and tasty but the end ones were getting a little dry. There was a little too much rocket in the turkey sandwich in my opinion, which meant it overwhelmed the flavour of the turkey and cranberry. There was a mix of white and brown breads.
The mini quiche was quite tasty but the sausage roll was delicious. We both wished there had been more of it.
The large homemade scones were very tasty. There was a good amount of tasty jam and for once there was enough clotted cream as well.
All of the cakes were rather small. Unusually, the macaroon was actually the largest part and it was a normal sized macaroon! The finger of lamington was very nice and was quite moist. The macaroon tasted homemade but was sadly not at all chewy, which I particularly like. Finally, the shortbread sandwich was very unusual and very good. I just wish it had been a bit bigger!!
The tea was a little strong for us. However, the pot was refilled frequently and when requested it was made with less tea, resulting in a perfect strength tea for us.
The service was very good and very pleasant.
| Sandwiches | 1.5 |
| Scone | 1.5 |
| Jam | 2.0 |
| Cream | 1.5 |
| Cake (variety) | 1.0 |
| Cake (quality) | 1.5 |
| Tea | 1.5 |
| Presentation | 1.5 |
| Service | 1.5 |
| Value | 1.0 |
| Total | 14.5 |
Sarnies Scones and Cakes 