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 ... 

Afternoon Tea at Hotel Du Vin Birmingham - Review

I love afternoon tea. What isn't there to love, an excuse to sit down with my favourite drink in the world and indulge in my favourite pass time .. eating cake and scones. 

Birmingham isn't the first place you think of when you think "afternoon tea" , if you are anything like me afternoon tea strikes up images of The Dorchester, The Savoy and my ultimate "one day" destination Claridges - all in London. When a colleague at work mentioned she had been for afternoon tea at Hotel Du Vin in BIRMINGHAM and that it was lovely I couldn't wait to investigate! In fact with in 24 hours I had booked, eaten and digested! 

Booking was easy through the website  or alternatively you can always take your chances and just turn up. Afternoon tea is served daily from 2pm - 5pm and is taken in the lovely surroundings of the lounge. The atmosphere is incredibly relaxed which I loved, you know you are in a lovely place but it doesn't feel stuffy or intimidating. We were seated around a lovely crisp, white table cloth set with beautiful linen napkins and silver cutlery, the seats themselves are really comfortable - overstuffed lounging chairs and a big soft sofa. The whole place has a real vintage "shabby chic" vibe - right up my street. 

So on to the main event! The waitress came with a menu and there are several choices, the standard afternoon tea for a very reasonable £11.00 (prices correct of May 2013), a traditional cream tea for £7.50 or for a long lazy afternoon with girlfriends the "G'n'T with a gin and tonic served in a teacup for £19.50.  As I don't drink alcohol the choice was easy for me - traditional afternoon tea it was. I went for a loose leaf afternoon tea and my companion went for Earl Grey. The tea arrived quickly in a lovely blue and white porcelain tea pot accompanied by sugar lumps and a jug of milk. My companion likes to drink her Earl Grey with honey and lemon and they could not have been more accommodating finding some out for her.  The teas were delicious, mine in particular was a very fresh, light afternoon tea perfect with a splash of milk. For anybody that is unsure about which tea to choose there is a tea sommelier on hand to help you with your choice. My favourite touch was a large pot of hot water for top ups - as a tea drinker extraordinaire this was certainly needed! 

After another short wait the waiter brought us our food. A lovely touch was going through everything on the platter explaining the contents. There were several traditional tiered afternoon platters piled up with delicate finger sandwiches (salmon on brown bread, cucumber, chicken and egg mayonaise), the sandwiches were lovely on fresh bread and buttered with real butter (this for me is really important!).  After the sandwiches we tucked into light Devon scones, clotted cream and strawberry jam. The scones were good but dare I say mine are better, you needed to knife to cut into them and I always think the sign on an excellent scone is the ability to tear it open with my fingers. The clotted cream was plentiful and delicious, the jam although tasty was definitely not home made and a little too sweet for my tastes. I prefer a tangy jam!

The finale was the top layer of petit fours, macarons, carrot cake, madalines and chocolate brownies. The stand out petit four for me was the madaline, really light and refreshing with just enough lemon to cleanse the pallet, perfect after a rich clotted cream scone. The carrot cake was moist with a nice sharp frosting, the brownie I am afraid I didn't get chance to try as my companions dove in before I had chance to taste (I hear they were delicious)! The only negative for me was the macaron, the texture was right with a crisp outside and a chewy centre but the taste was just non descript, I couldn't describe it as anything other than very, very sweet and they were so blue they stained my teeth - for several hours afterwards. I really don't like anything that contains that much food colouring, and dare I say blue is rarely recreated by nature as a food source so I generally shy away from blue food. I prefer a macaron coloured with natural colours from a raspberry or blackcurrant - with a taste to match. I guess I am just fussy about macarons! 

All in all it was a lovely, delicious experience. Most importantly for me there was a sense of occasion,of doing something that didn't happen every day and for £11.00 per person I think that is a bit of an afternoon tea bargain for such high quality. The service was excellent, efficient but not overbearing and we were made to feel as if we were welcome to sit in those comfy chairs all afternoon if we had the time with unlimited tea top ups, the problem is with tea top ups most people know when to stop .. I do not, I can drink more tea than most people would believe physically possible so it was a good job for Hotel Du Vin I was on a schedule otherwise I would have drank the caddie dry. 

My recommendation is to go and try it, you will enjoy it - but skip the macarons unless you want blue teeth for the rest of the day (not a good look), and boy if you have had teeth whitening or veneers steer WELL clear!  

I still want to go to Claridges for Afternoon Tea but at least now I know there is a high quality local option and I can guarantee I will go again soon! If you know of anywhere else in Brum to indulge in my favourite afternoon pass time please let me know and I will pop along soon.

The full menu can be found here 


*This review contains my own views, I paid full price for the afternoon tea and the hotel are not aware I was planning to write a review for a blog* 

The 15th of April was circled on my calendar for all the wrong reasons. Back to work after the long lie ins and freedom to do whatever I want of the Easter Holidays. Without starting a debate about teachers holidays they are well needed, and for some reason I never get done what I need to, I tend to fall into an abyss of staring into space and recharging my batteries. I always have so much baking I want to do but never quiet get round to it. For some reason when I am back at work, frazzled after a day teaching a lovely (but demanding) group of young'uns with learning disabilities I get the urge to bake with urgency again, I think it is simply how I relax and unwind. 

 

 

So, without further a do here is my round up of "first week of term" baking. All from Paul Hollywoods "How to Bake" .. which I purchased DURING the holidays and just flicked through salivating sporadically while fixed to Bargain Hunt *Can't.move.until.after.Doctors*, oh, I did leave the house to buy a banneton but didn't use it until after the holidays :) 

I have made,White Sourdough (blob did good), Croissants, Pain Aux Raisins - which involved my first ever attempt at crem pat, it was ace, didn't lump up and made such a quantity there is half in the freezer and finally Milk Bread.  Obviously I can't give details of the recipes here - I will leave you to rush out and buy the book for that, I can assure you it is very good, the recipes and pictures are very clear. I come at this from the angle of a home baker that knows "quiet a bit already" , BUT friends who are new to baking also claim they have had great success.  Everything tasted great and was wolfed down by the gannets at home and work but out of everything I fell in love with the milk bread. Ohhh milk bread, my new obsession. Fluffy, creamy, soft, tasty ... ohhh milk bread, I salute you, especially with eggs, bacon and a good old pork and leek sausage. 

Cue the pictures ... and if you want the recipes, you can buy the book here (saves you Googleing it hey! :

Milk Loaf - creamy, fluffy, DELICIOUS 

Pain Aux Raisin, lasted 10 seconds when I took them to work for breakfast! 

First ever white sourdough from my new culture and fresh croissants