Afternoon Tea at The Botanist

Time Out listed The Botanist as one of the top places to go for Afternoon tea in London, so we headed there with high expectations. A glass of champagne accompanied a delicious selection of hand cut, tiny sandwiches - cucumber, egg and smoked salmon. Two gorgeous melt in the mouth scones and a Victoria sponge cupcake each - break into the centre and jam oozes out.

If you are looking for a classic afternoon tea - then head to The Botanist.


However, if you are looking for good service - give it a miss! Having had the most fantastic service at Bob Bob Ricard the same week - I was expecting roughly the same at The Botanist - but received nothing like it.




We arrived ten minutes early for afternoon tea and were told we would have to wait before placing our order. Making us feel stupid, just sitting there without a menu. We then ordered our afternoon tea with a waiter, asking him to make sure that there were no nuts in the cakes. He came back ten minutes later telling us that as they didn't mill their flour on site, this couldn't be guaranteed - Please, Mr Waiter, point us to a restaurant which does mill it's own flour - as that is something I want to see. Finally he accepted our order!

45 minutes after placing the order, I asked another waiter where our afternoon tea was - he took our order again. Turns out the other waiter had gone on a break without passing on our order. So roughly 3 hours later, we had finally finished our tea.

Check out The Botanist at www.thebotanistsloanesquare.com

Venue: Lovely, traditional setting 4 stars
Food: Amazingly delicious 5 stars
Service: minus 1 - Explained above