One Aldwych, Covent Garden, London

Visit One Aldwych website HERE
COST: £26.50 each

Tea at One Aldwych offered a contemporary twist on the classic afternoon tea. The hotel is in a rather grand building but the clean, simple lines of the decor make it slightly sterile which affected my overall experience of this tea. I went with my mum who suffers from coeliac disease so I had phoned ahead enquiring about the option of a gluten free afternoon tea (no mean feat considering every element normally contains flour!). They seemed very accommodating and explained they are able to offer a fully gluten free option. 

 On arrival, we were able to take our seats immediately and were served the entire offering in one go on a modern tea stand. This allowed me to mix up the savoury and sweet during the tea so I wasn't left with a sugar high. The savoury options were very good, fresh sandwiches together with an unusual addition of a quail scotch egg and welsh rarebit. However, I was rather disappointed with the sweet options. The scones were quite small and dry and I was unsure if the cakes were homemade - they were quite dense and stodgy. As for the gluten free option, my mum was also disappointed. The bread they had used to make the sandwiches needed to be toasted and the cakes weren't worth the calories.


Overall, I don't think the offering quite lives up to the price commanded for the tea. It looks much nicer than it actually tastes.