Afternoon Tea at the Langham Hotel

Palm Court at the Langham Hotel

Last weekend we decided to go for afternoon tea at the Langham Hotel. It is one of the more expensive options in London, but not excessively so and it also gave us the chance to try some of Cherish Finden's baking. Considering how brutal her judging is on Bake Off Creme de la Creme, surely it must be good?

We spend a very pleasant three hours sitting in their afternoon tea room, listening to the piano being played and being well looked after. Pro tip, ask for a cushion to put behind your back as their seats are quite deep.

Selection of sandwiches

Rather than being given a tiered cake stand and letting you get on with it, you are each served a plate of sandwiches, followed by warm scones and then a plate of cakes. We were offered additional sandwiches and scones before our plates were cleared at the end of each 'course', but there was no way we could fit any extras in.

I'm only a very occasional tea drinker, but it appears they take their teas seriously with several exclusive blends. They brew the tea before bringing it to your table, which has the upside that you don't get an over stewed pot, but the downside that your tea can take quite a while to arrive.

Plain and fruit scones

From the sandwiches the classic ‘prawn cocktail’, iceberg, potato bun, tomato powder was my favourite. Becks isn't a big prawn fan so I got to have two.

For me the stand out cake was the Rikakaka - Crunchy sable, tonka and orange cream, fresh cherries (bottom centre in the photo below).

Cake selection