Botanical Afternoon Tea - Pont St, Belgravia - A Review -

The Chelsea flower show 2016 has ended but the floral fever lives on. Chelsea restaurant, Pont st in Pont st. Somehow I managed to find this confusing but that's me offers the best of botanical afternoon tea. Once you know that it takes place in the Belgraves' restaurant in Belgravia, all should become clear.


Pont St. botanical afternoon tea is made up of fresh garden flavours and perfumed floral scents. As our greeter,  Poala Paolillo, one of the hotel manageresses and a master of Havana cigars, told us with a warm smile  "are you ready for a flowery experience because there is a lot of flower flavours". 

The Belgraves' afternoon tea can be served with either Veuve Cliquot or a botanical gin tea pot for two. It's not cheap at £70 for two, £90 with a glass of Veuve Clicquot or, £100 with botanical gin tea pot. But for this, you get pretty much  a three-course meal and enough cocktail to give you a warm glow for the rest of the day. 

Afternoon tea, british institution, dolton tea service

The Botanical Afternoon Tea experience proved very popular during the Chelsea Flower Show and it will continue the whole of the summer. We started off with a pot of botanical gin tea. 

My companion who has more experience than me, in researching cocktails, explained that the T was replaced by champagne and the Gin was infused with tea, the white jasmine kind. By now, I had resigned myself to be totally confused but in a very nice way.



Our treat started with six kind of savoury miniatures, each as cute as the next and all very clever indeed. Clever  in their subtleness. My companion's  favourite were an Orange Blossom infused Cream Cheese and Smocked Duck crostini: perfectly formed little toast topped with juicy orange section. As mine was the Rose Coronation Chicken Mini Hoagie Roll (that's the name for the round, long, flat roll). 

The most surprising dish of them all was a Dandelion, Burdock and Honey seared Salmon with Pickled Cucumber presented in a white apero spoon. I won't pretend that I could taste the herbs as the honey was dominant but, this was definitely a combination of flavours which you don't see everyday and a real departure from the traditional smoked salmon sandwich.


Presumably, it's easier to "do botanical" with sweet than savoury and  here the pastry chef excelled himself, The Green Apple: an apple three ways: mousse, gel and caramelised, is on its own worth a visit.

apple dessert, apple mousse, apple caramelised, apple gel

The Cucumber and mint Pimm's Jelly shot with Lemon foam should definitely be on the list of anyone who wants to have a sweet treat without the calories. 


Though, they would have to eat it on its own which would be a shame as they would miss on the Rose Macarons and the Violet Scented Eclairs.


Belgraves' St Pont bills itself as  "the ultimate all day dining experience in Belgravia" and it's well justify to do so. If I had to change only one thing, I would add white tablecloths for the Afternoon Tea customers, the Doulton camaieu service is a delight, though.

For more info about the menu, teas and other treats including the scones, visit: Pont St  or 
20
London
SW1

book online or 0203 189 4850
any dietary requests are catered for on demand

Disclaimer: I was a guest at Pont St. for the purpose of this blogpost. I wasn't asked to write a positive review. The words are my own.

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