Mandarin Oriental

Gosh, it feels like it's been a while since i last went to high-tea. have to get back into the mode but the last few months seems to have been flying.

On Sunday Erica and I hit the Mandarin Oriental (the one on Connaught Rd), we accidentally got there a little early so spent some time at Oliver's doing some shopping, i made a mental shopping list to come back AFTER eating - considering how hot and humid it was, definitely not a good idea to be wandering around with raw meat without any cooler bags.

Back to the reason for this post, at 3pm we headed up to the lounge (reservations are recommended as it can get quite busy, it a 'quiet' way - not like the Peninsula which is a bit of a circus).

The menu. In terms of black tea, not much to choose from they have a wide selection of "asian" tea but given this is good old English afternoon tea, definitely should stick to 'english' tea - so i went for English Breakfast tea while Erica went for Earl Grey. Actually thinking about it, none of the places i've been to so far actually serve "afternoon tea" leaves - quite interesting..

Anyway the tea arrived in nice silver tea pots, the strainer wasn't fineenough to get all the tea leaves though but the tea was nice enough.

Well considering we were there for afternoon tea we hardly had to decide what we were going to order. the benefit of going with two or more people is that you don't have to choose what savouries/scones that you'd like - we had to wait quite a while for the set to arrive:

Tier number 1: the sandwiches: they were pretty nice, bread was a tiny little bit dry though
Tier number 2: The savouries. All were delicious (i was in a savour mood though)
Tier number 3: the dessert - i have to say, we didn't actually finish it off, it was too sweet...
The scones! Verry nice and i just realised i didn't get any photos of the jam and cream. The jam was very tasty it was strawberry but also had a hint of something else... neither Erica nor I could place it but it was like strawberry jam made with rosewater or something. the effect was quite pleasant and the scones were pretty good as well - I can't remember all the scones i've eaten so far but these rank on the top of the list.

Atmosphere: it was quite, conversations were kept soft but that could be because the tables are fairly well spaced. Seats were comfortable as well... unfortunately i'd have to say there is something about the Intercontinental - it's still on the top of my list. I will probably have to do Intercon another go, just in case i'm biased because it was the first one we hit on this High Tea of Hong Kong journey...

On a separate note, the problem with the Peninsula is that ... for such a 'high class' hotel, the lounge is too much of a zoo. It lacks the style associated with the name of the hotel - probably because it's now a tourist trap... I'd have to say that so far, the Mandarin Oriental has been the classiest hotel we've been to - probably because it's a little out of the way, it is really an enjoyable place to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Aside from the afternoon tea buffets, i think we've pretty much done all the afternoon teas on the Hong Kong side - we will start hitting the Kowloon ones next albeit a bit reluctantly since we both hate the crowds associated with the Kowloon side...