Monday 2 February 2015

Guiltless Afternoon Tea Intercontinental Hotel

Afternoon tea
As a foodie there is one thing that I constantly struggle with, balancing my love of food and an ever expanding waistline. Unless you can balance your love of food with equal measures of exercise then as a foodie you are in a constant battle. 

As you know I love afternoon teas but it is a calorific indulgence that I cannot do too often, that was until the Intercontinental Hotel, created a foodies perfect afternoon tea. Why I hear you ask? Well they have created a guiltless afternoon tea £40, free of refined sugar and carefully crafted with natural nutrients. For the gluten intolerant amongst us it is also totally gluten free. 

Afternoon tea is served in the Wellington lounge, at the Intercontinental Hotel, housed on the prestigious Park Lane. The interior of the hotel is beautiful. 
Luxury hotels London
Intercontinental Hotel
The hotel is perfectly suited for visiting Hyde Park, Wellington Arch and Buckingham Palace. I have had the pleasure of previously visiting the hotel and sampling their Wellington Afternoon tea £30, my profile picture is in fact from that very afternoon tea. 

One of the things that I love about blogging is that it has allowed me to meet lots of lovely new people and make friends. 

Afternoon tea is always a good excuse to catch up with some familiar faces, Angie from SilverSpoon, Suze from Luxury Columnist and Zoe from Love and Limoncello
London bloggers
Any good catch up begins with a lovely refreshing cocktail, cane rum, fennel, lime juice and agave syrup. As I have been poorly I gave this a miss but am reliably informed that it was nice but packs a punch with the rum. 
Afternoon tea
The restaurant has an extensive tea list so I opted for the hotels exclusive tea blend - Number one Park Lane. The tea has Madagascan Vanilla Pods and marigold flowers which gives it a wonderfully sweet yet full bodied flavour. It was lovely and refreshing and perfectly balanced. 
Afternoon tea
Whilst we were busily chatting away our friendly waiter presented us with an eye catching array of sandwiches and patisserie
Best afternoon tea
I am a great believer in that you eat a meal with your eyes and the Market Garden sandwiches certainly were a feast for the eyes. They celebrate the very best of English produce, using seasonal vegetables. 
Gluten free afternoon tea
All four sandwiches come on Columbian gluten free bread. The thyme roasted butternut squash with balsamic caviar and fresh dill was my personal favourite. As was the basil marinated Manouri cheese with cucumber and apple relish. 
Afternoon tea
The nettle marinated asparagus rolled in courgette ribbon for me had too much bread as opposed to topping. The topping was not inspiring enough for me it could have benefited from a glaze or vinaigrette. 

After two pots of tea and lots of nattering we are presented with freshly baked sultana and wholemeal scones. The scones came with home made berry compote which had a wonderful tartness and crème fraîche. Afternoon tea
If you had asked me before about crème fraîche being a good accompaniment with scones I would have turned my nose up and said scones are for eating with clotted cream. I am pleased to say that I was wrong, crème fraîche is a surprising treat that combines well with the tartness of the berry compote. 

All good afternoon teas come with wonderful cakes and the Wellington does not disappoint, how beautiful do these look. 
Afternoon tea
The eagled eyed amongst you might have spotted that there is only one red velvet cake ball. Don't worry there wasn't any foodie fisticuffs. The ball was wonderfully moist and had cream cheese as filling. The highlight had to be the flourless chocolate and mint cake. Yummy. 

I had a wonderful afternoon catching up with Angie, Suze and Zoe. The Intercontinental is a beautiful hotel with a wonderful selection of afternoon teas to cater for everyone's tastes.  My favourite is always going to be the guilty version though.

The Wellington has been honoured with the Award of Excellence from the UK Tea Guild and I can see why, it manages to create a contemporary afternoon tea with a new and refreshing twist. 

www.wellington-lounge.co.uk/

What is your favourite afternoon tea? 

Thank you very much to Intercontinental Hotel for a wonderful afternoon tea. Our tea was complimentary for the purposes of a review, but this is an honest and fair reflection of the Wellington lounge and our tea.

Square Meal Wellington Lounge on Urbanspoon

 photo foodieforce_32.jpg

27 comments:

  1. It was such a lovely day, I can't believe we were there for four hours, the time really flew past, it was so much fun! I hope you feel better and that we see each other again soon!
    Lots of love,
    Angie

    SilverSpoon London

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Time goes fast when you are having fun. Thank you so much for inviting me, I too hope I am feeling better soon too. Look forward to seeing you after your holiday Lucy x

      Delete
  2. This actually looks really quite lovely (you can see how I might be skeptical about a guiltless afternoon tea....)

    They certainly are filling a much needed niche - if only someone up here in Yorkshire would follow!

    Bethan, Audacity of Food

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It was actually surprisingly tasty the opposite to what you might imagine for gluten free and free from refined sugar Lucy x

      Delete
  3. What a stunning looking tea - all those beautiful colours! I'd be so interested to try something like this, hopefully someone will event a northern version soon so I can give it a go :)

    Chloe x
    newgirlintoon.co.uk

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Definitely a feast for the eyes the colours used are spectacular. I definitely think this could do well up north maybe you could be the lady to make it happen Lucy x

      Delete
  4. What fantastic photos Lucy! It was such a pleasure to see you, Angie and Zoe and virtually guilt free

    Suze | LuxuryColumnist

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Suze it was a lovely afternoon and really cheered me up Lucy x

      Delete
  5. This afternoon tea looks amazing, as does the location! I really like that they've made it suitable for a wider range of diets. Also, I'm pleased to hear you're getting better :)

    Style Sunrise ☀

    :)
    x

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It is great when afternoon teas are open to all dietary requirements. This tasted surprisingly nice for gluten free and the cakes were delicious Lucy x

      Delete
  6. Want want. That courgette thing looks mega awesome! I could have some fun with that if I ever managed to slice courgette so well. At first I thought it was cucumber haha.

    Corinne x
    www.skinnedcartree.com

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Courgette and asparagus is a great combination. If you want thin slices use a vegetable peeler it is the safest way to get them thin and safeguard the fingers Lucy x

      Delete
  7. WOWWWWWWWW LUCY!!! I am super glad that you had a good time and spent some time with the girls.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It was a lovely lunch and great to catch up Lucy x

      Delete
  8. This looks like a lovely selection, and I think it's great that it's all gluten free. Those cakes look amazing! xx

    Toasty

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Surprisingly tasty for gluten free Lucy x

      Delete
  9. This made me giggle. We need some sort of foodie's anonymous exercise club. Maybe we could run between amazing cake shops. (Actually, I think a friend of mine actually did develop a cycling tour around cake shops! ;))

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I love this idea I think you could be into something I definitely would join Lucy x

      Delete
  10. Oh I love afternoon tea! The little desserts and finger sandwiches are always so delicious :D The Intercontinental Hotel in DC is actually well known around the area for their afternoon tea, and a couple friends and I are planning to check it out very soon!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Great that you have one in DC if it is as good as the one on Park Lane you are in for a real treat Lucy x

      Delete
  11. Oh, it's going to be hard reading your blog this month, as I am on a strict detox diet for the month of Feb! Thankfully this was a healthy tea! Still, everything looks delish! Nice there is a healthy/light option for a nice tea!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh hec sorry, think how good you will feel though. A detox always makes me feel wonderful Lucy x

      Delete
  12. What a lovely group of bloggers! A guiltless afternoon tea sounds like it would be wonderful right about now. I love food too, and completely know the ever expanding waistline struggle. I still love food too much to ever go on a true "diet."

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We had a wonderful time great company and tea. I too love food too much to give it up, as you might have guessed Lucy x

      Delete
  13. Such a good idea to have a "guiltless" afternoon tea - I bet it's doing really well at the minute seeing as it's sort of diet time! Looks like you had a lovely afternoon :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It is very popular perfectly timed for when everyone is trying to behave ourselves. Well some of us anyway Lucy x

      Delete
  14. Oooh I love afternoon teas too! I must admit, I'm a sucker for Betty's. I'm soon heading to a place in Ripponden up North for an apparently fantastic afternoon tea! No doubt I'll do my best to blog about it!
    Marie x
    titchytombie.blogspot.co.uk

    ReplyDelete