Festive Afternoon Tea at The Grosvenor Hotel, Victoria

This afternoon, I enjoyed festive afternoon tea at the Amba Hotel Grosvenor in Victoria with friends. The afternoon tea at the Grosvenor Hotel is located in the newly-refurbished Tea Lounge, located not far from Victoria station; it is a Victorian railway Grade II listed hotel. When we visited, the Tea Lounge was very quiet, and we were the only visitors for the majority of our 3.5 hour visit.

The Tea Lounge looks beautiful with hanging chandeliers and slate blue walls.

To start, I had a glass of champagne. I also chose the Darjeeling tea, which was served as a loose leaf tea.

We were then brought the sandwiches, scones, and pastries.

The sandwiches were egg mayonnaise, ham and mustard, salmon, and turkey. The sandwiches themselves were not great as the meat was reformed meat, which we were all disappointed with and thought that it was poor quality coming from such a fancy hotel in London.

Two scones were also given as part of the festive afternoon tea. The first was a savoury Douglas fir needle and mature cheddar scone. The second was a raisin scone. Clotted cream and blackberry jam was provided with the scones. (We were meant to receive a pot of strawberry jam but did not.)

Lastly, we had the pastries. The first one, and the one I liked least because I dislike cheesecake, was a lemon cheesecake. (The menu said that it was meant to be mince pie cheesecake, but this was not correct.) The second one, which I thought was really good, was a gingerbread man. The third was a boozey cherry and chocolate roulade. The sponge was a bit too dry for this. The fourth was a bottled passion fruit panna cotta. This panna cotta was more of a liquid instead of a jelly, so it could be drank with a straw.

My favourite was the gingerbread man, followed by the panna cotta. I did not care much for the chocolate and cherry boozey roulade or the cheesecake (because I dislike cheesecake).

Overall, we had a fun catching up, but this was by far the best afternoon tea that I have had in London. I think that the hotel should focus on good ingredients and making the afternoon tea a little more special, but they probably do not focus on afternoon tea because of a large selection of choice of afternoon teas in London. However, I think that they could make something of it during the holiday season when afternoon tea is popular.