This week, I would like to tell you about the best Afternoon Tea experience I have had so far this year, at The Drawing Rooms in The Ampersand hotel. I was accompanied by my husband-James as it was the anniversary of our engagement.

Venue and location:

The Drawing Rooms restaurant is located in a 5 star contemporary hotel-The Ampersand hotel. It is just situated a couple of minutes’ walk from South Kensington Station and a stone’s throw away from famous museums such as: The Victoria and Albert museum, The Science museum and The Natural History museum.

Times:

Afternoon Tea is served from 2:30 pm until 5:30 pm.

Atmosphere:

We reached The Ampersand Hotel at 2:30. The Afternoon Tea is served in the Drawing Rooms restaurant and it can be found just off the hotel lobby, located on the ground floor. As soon as we arrived, we were welcomed by a smiley waitress who kindly told us that we can choose one of 2 available tables. We choose a table in the corner of the restaurant.

The restaurant is very charming, contemporary and offers a romantic setting to its dinners. I loved its chic and modern décor. There was relaxing music playing in the background. We were served by a few different waiters who were all friendly and exceptionally attentive.

The menu:

Once we were seated, we started assessing our Afternoon Tea options. I was impressed by The Drawing Rooms menu as it offered a range of Afternoon Teas to choose from: Classic, Vegetarian, Gluten Free or Science. As we were in the museum’s district we decided to try their Chef’s special ‘Science Afternoon Tea’.

We started our Afternoon Tea with a glass of Moët Ice Impérial Champagne and ordered some Peppermint and Jasmin teas afterwards.

A few minutes after we finished sipping our delicious Champagne our stand of sweet and savoury treats arrived. I loved how the Head Pastry Chef Mi Kyung Jeong presented all our snacks and they were all extremely tasty.

As part of your experience, we received some additional treats in the research laboratory’s test tubes. They helped us to create our bespoke scones as we were encouraged to experiment and add some chocolate bites while we were creating them.

There was also a wooden box with a couple of hidden treats which we were able to dig out using a brush so we felt like experienced archaeologists.

Our sweet treats included:

• Warm selection of plain and white chocolate scones, served with Devonshire clotted cream and homemade strawberry preserve.
• Pastries: blood orange and passion fruit jelly on Petri dish;
• mint and chocolate planet mousse with space man;
• Milky Way macaroon and crescent fondant fancy.

Our savoury treats included:

• chicken Caesar salad in parmesan basket;
• cray fish, asparagus with some Mary rose sauce on focaccia bread;
• bonbon of Portland crab;
• goats cheese & sun-dried tomato quiche.

Dress code:

The dress code at The Drawing Rooms in The Ampersand hotel is smart casual. I decided to wear my silver dress with some Jones sandals.

Overall experience:

I loved every minute of our Science Afternoon Tea experience at The Drawing Rooms in The Ampersand hotel. It is an Afternoon Tea with a twist so if you are tired of traditional sandwiches, scones and pastries then you definitely need to experience it. It would be perfect for families with children as it encourages fun and you can talk about science and history to combine fun and education. The Science Afternoon Tea helped me to reconnect with my inner child and I would definitely try to take my nephews to experience it next time they are in London.

Price:

Science Afternoon Tea costs £32.50 per person or £45.50 with a glass of Moet Champagne. It was worth every penny!

Website:

https://www.ampersandhotel.com/eat-and-drink-at-the-ampersand-hotel/the-drawing-rooms

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Pauline