London Baby! Fortnum & Mason and the best Black Forest Gateaux of my life .. so far.

Should I start with an apology for the lack of blogginess? Is blogginess even a word? This is a strange time of year for me. As a teacher my professional world goes BOOM with a pile of verification, marking and portfolios and everything else has to go on the back burner for a couple of weeks. There is always a light at the end of the tunnel though, lucky for me my birthday sits right in the middle of teaching panic at the end of May and we always try to do something that gets me totally away from that pile of folders. 

This year I wanted to go to London, mainly to visit Fortnum & Mason. As a tea-a-holic and a non alcohol drinker (but definitely eater for the sake of cake of course!!)  the thought of visiting the mecca of tea blenders has always been simmering at the back of my mind. I have visited London for business and pleasure SO many times but never managed to go. So it was with a mixture of excitement and trepidation I finally walked into that duck egg blue gilded palace of tea and excess. We didn't book for afternoon tea so just walked into the icecream parlour on the first floor. There was no queue and we were seated quickly and with the type of finesse you would expect from F&M in a lovely seat. I instantly squealed with delight at the WMF cutlery so shiny you could use it as a mirror and ordered the Afternoon tea and a piece of Black Forest Gateaux from the "Viennese" selection, I was also tempted by the studel but BFG is my most favourite cake ever (tacky but true ..) so it had to be that. There was an amazing choice of ice cream sundaes on offer, all hand made with really interesting flavours - the gin and tonic sorbet sounded delicious (although I chose not to drink alcohol I love the taste of it!!). 

Here I am with my tea .. how GORGEOUS is the teapot?? After going on and on about how gorgeous it was (the silver teapot is a trademark of F&M and you can even buy a loose tea with the namesake) my husband sneaked off to buy me one .. but came back with a forlorn look when he realised the price tag of the beautiful teapots was a good months shopping budget .. another day .. a teapot so famous will be available in the future. I did come away with a deco style tea strainer and £50 worth of loose tea though .. oops! The BFG was to die for, the cherries plump and packed full of rum, the chocolate mousse layer light as a feather and the cream unsweetened with a huge swirl of whipped double cream on the side (how I prefer it). I think that it is the best slice of BFG i've ever had - and i've eaten this cake in Vienna, Budapest & Prague - All in all it was absolutely delicious and well worth the £14 per head (yep, cake and a cuppa £14 .. but it was a treat!!). I now need to make a special trip to Germany to see if they can better it ... that gives me an idea for a holiday ...