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I think that Afternoon Tea is one of the lovliest of British Traditions so when we were invited to sample this delight at Patisserie Valerie in Fitzroy Street I jumped at the chance to do this review on behalf of Cambridge Foodies!

At the time of booking we mentioned that my dining partner and friend was allergic to cheese but was fine with all other dairy products. When we arrived we were greeted by a lovely smiley lady who showed us to our table and immediately mentioned that they were aware that we weren’t to have any cheese – it really pleases me that businesses take allergies seriously, this particular one isn’t life threatening like some but does have some unpleasant side effects. 

Once seated at our table for two the waiter brought over the menu and talked us through it, again mentioning that they wouldn’t be serving us cheese. My friend commented that they have earnt extra brownie points for being so aware! The choice of drinks to accompany our Afternoon Tea was vast  with coffees, hot chocolates, various teas and mainly unlimited refills. Sadly we are very boring and both settled for English Breakfast Tea. They use loose leaf tea, served in pots with an inbuilt strainer, which was a surprise – so many use Tea Bags nowadays even if they are posh ones!

Our hot drinks arrived promptly, on an individual board with its own teapot, cup, saucer, milk jug and sugar sachets. They were also able to cope with the request for one pot to come with skimmed milk without any fuss.

Then on to the main event and the arrival of our three tiered cake plate to share. The bottom tier had six finger sandwiches in a mix of brown and white bread and two small bread rolls, middle tier of a plain and fruit scone with two small jars of different jam, a pot of clotted cream and individual portions of butter, the top tier was a delight of cakes and macarons.

Our sandwich choices were: ham and grain mustard with just the right amount of mustard and those little grains pop in your mouth, smoked salmon which went down a treat and wonderful cucumber which we both loved. The little rolls were filled with egg mayonnaise, perfectly done so that they oozed as you bit in to them but didn’t spill out all over your lap!

We are well matched friends, when it came to scones I prefer plain and my friend fruit, I prefer raspberry jam and she preferred strawberry so the only potential argument was where the dividing line on the clotted cream was! The scones themselves were served warm which I wasn’t expecting, they were lovely and light and had just the right amount of crumbliness.

Our cake choices were a strawberry cake which was full of flavour, a chocolate cake which was very rich and then a complete surprise that I had to ask the waiter to find out what it was – a Carre Pomme Cassis which was absolutely delicious. By this point we were both starting to struggle and so I took one for the team and forced myself to eat the macarron. This was lovely and squidgy and at just a couple of mouthfuls didn’t push me too far over the edge!

The only thing to complain about, if I wanted to be picky, was that the table for two was a little full by the time we had tea board, plates, cutlery, water glasses, and the beautiful tea itself but we managed without anything ending up on the floor. There is a semi circular banquet with a circular table if there was a larger group of you.

On the whole this really did live up to our expectations and the staff were so attentive, checking in with us several times to make sure everything was OK. Nothing was too much trouble from special requests to questions quickly answered. We would both be happy to go again which is always a good recommendation, isn’t it?