Willy Wonka Themed Afternoon Tea at Chesterfield Mayfair

I adore my bestie G.C but one thing we do not agree on is afternoon tea, it is just not her thing, at all. However curiosity must have got the better of her and she agreed to go with me just this once. The place we went to was Chesterfield Hotel in Mayfair, a 4-star luxury hotel. We were actually suppose to go before Christmas, when they had the Christmas-themed menu but alas both me and G.C were ill so we had to wait until now. The menu now is inspired by Charlie and the Chocolate factory, usually priced £34.50 per person but afternoontea.co.uk had a special discount for £26 per person for their January sales (ends 31st January 2015) which is even better. The hotel is a short walk away from Green Park station and fairly easy to find with their bright red canopies.

I was actually a tad late and G.C was already in the lobby waiting for me, when I first walked in the concierge greeted me and then escorted us round to the cloakroom where we were handed a small cute envelope with a ticket number for our coats. We were then escorted to Butlers restaurant and also told in advance where the powder room was, which is very helpful may I say.

The service throughout was absolutely impeccable, chairs pulled out, napkins opened for us, teas refilled in a timely manner and all done with a friendly attitude. Although we did go quite late as I had to work and I have found that afternoon tea in a dim man-made lighting is just a bit depressing. The tea list that Chesterfield has is very extensive which is both bad and good, good in that customers have a lot of choice but bad because there is just too much choice. What I would suggest to them is to cut down the descriptions of the teas and to just summarize the key-notes.

I opted for the 'Organic Dragon Well' green tea and G.C opted for the 'Yellow Gold' oolong tea which are both teas we are familiar with but I just could not summon the energy to go through the whole menu. Shortly after our tea arrived we were given two mini bottles with pink soda and popping candy inside. 

We also did not have to wait long for our traditional afternoon tea to arrive, which was expected as there was not a lot of customers eating at the time. The sandwiches were subpar, the bread was quite dry and I found a small piece of rock-hard cheese in my ham and cheddar cheese sandwich which I had to spit out. The only nice piece from the bottom plate was the small circle chicken sandwiches with almond flakes on the side. The scones on the second plate however were lovely! The clotted cream also was not too strong and even G.C approved. She did not know what scones were and attempted to cut the scone in half from the top before I stopped and showed her how to cut it properly. With the plate empty, we were offered refills but we did not want to stuff ourselves so much.

Before we got to our last plate on the top, from the corner of my eye as we were sitting near the entrance, I saw a big blob of purple in which I was reminded that this is a themed afternoon tea that we were at and sure enough a few seconds later 'Willy Wonka' himself came bounding in to greet each table personally. He chatted with everyone and then offered us a gob-stopper and a chance to pick the 'Golden Ticket' from his hat. Before he left he must have seen my camera on the table and offered to pose for a picture, me and G.C did not really want to pose but I asked if he was happy to be by himself in the picture and the result was below.

Back to the dessert plate, by this time the mood of the food was not great. G.C actually asked me if this was how it usually is at afternoon tea and that was quite embarrassing because I know there is a lot of places with good food but I have yet to find a good themed afternoon tea that does not let the quality slip just because they have a good theme going on. Back to the dessert plate the lemon sponge and cupcake were quite dry but the blueberry macaron and Willy Wonka bar (made at the hotel) were nice. The golden egg however was made entirely out of dark chocolate with some kind of jam inside and as I am not a fan of dark chocolate, the taste was just too overpowering for me.

I had to add in the bonus cam-whoring pictures in the bathroom. The hotel itself was absolutely lovely, it had that olden-day style to it however, and I do feel bad for saying this, but I would not recommend this afternoon tea to friends. There are other Charlie and the Chocolate Factory themed afternoon teas out there which I have yet to try but this one was not it and as you may have guessed G.C has not been converted to the world of afternoon tea.