Afternoon Tea

Do you enjoy going out for Afternoon Tea?  Would you prefer to go for Afternoon tea or a meal in a general restaurant?

I confess that I would always prefer going to a restaurant for something savoury rather than Afternoon Tea.  Whilst I quite like Afternoon Tea, I prefer to have something savoury- the sandwiches are always my favourite part of the tea!  Hazel has mentioned a Savoury Afternoon tea she had or heard about and I confess, that this does sound right up my street!

This neatly segues me into the remainder of this post.  Back on the Saturday of Half Term, CBC and I were invited out to a 30th Birthday celebration.   The first part was Afternoon Tea at Clarence Yard in Southend-on-Sea.  It cost a reasonably £19.99 for the two of us.

You can see me with the tea, minus a few sandwiches which we had already eaten. I enjoyed the sandiwiches and liked the three cakes I grabbed before CBC had a chance to make his own choice. I had the two chocolate ones and the mini cream eclair.  The part I least enjoy is always the Scones and Jam- something always makes me feel a bit queasy about it. I only managed to eat half a scone- this one had orange peel in it which I found hard-going!  Sorry, I am a bit fussy when it comes to sweet food!

For this occasion, I took another chance to wear my Easter Sunday dress from Bernie Dexter before Cherry Blossom seems 'out of season'.  I adore this dress.

It is so comfy and I teamed it with my Irregular Choice floral pumps, plus a Smile and Make necklace, a bracelet my Mum regifted to me and some cute bunny earrings a lovely Australian cosplayer sent to me when she shipped me a dress I wanted to buy from Australia!

Since these photos were taken, the Purple Toadflax behind me to the left has flowered beautifully and the Lavender is almost reaching its zenith.  The Jasmine is flowering as is the Passiflora!

I do hope you are well.

P.S.  Thank you all so much for your kind words on my last post.

x

Sunday afternoon Tea and a cake

Ah, there is something so wonderful about a hazy Sunday afternoon where you and your loved one(s) sit at the table together with a mug of Earl Grey tea and a Chocolate Eclair.  

No, it doesn't happen very often but I DO absolutely love this combination, especially on a Sunday afternoon.

You can keep your carrot cake, Victoria Sponge, Fairy/Cup Cakes,Coffee and Walnut or Fruit Cake for my heart belongs to the Cream filled chocolate eclair.   Accompanied by a lovely cup of Earl Grey.

What would be your Sunday afternoon tea treat?

Do share!

xx

Advent Calendar day 7: The Afternoon tea bus

On Saturday, I stepped out of the doors of Holy Trinity Church, Sloane Square where I was playing in a concert.  It was time to go and fetch some dinner. As I waited to cross the road, I was struck by the bright lights of the Routemaster bus that was approaching me...

 "Hmmmmm, that's a new one!" I thought as I examined the bright lights donning the front.

 "Aha! This is no ordinary bus!" But what was it?

 Afternoon....

Ooooooh, an Afternoon tea Bus tour!!!

That's a new one.  I am most intrigued.

Apparently, it is a venture from B-Bakery and you can find out more here.   I am intrigued, I must admit...

xx

BEDM 8: A day in my life: Jam Jam

Epic fail on the Day in my life post for today. I cannot fathom the taking of photos and tracking of my day on a school day. Last BEDN I did a post of a typical day at school sans l'image so this time I'm going off piste.  Sufficed to say my day involved:
a) rushing for the train due to watering of plants.
b) Doctor Who themed outfit
c) Year 2 Maths investigation based on Symmetry.
d) Year 2 composing bird song compositions.
e) Year 5 learning to play the Blue Danube
f) Music Makers club doing an election-linked drumming composing activity (bet you're wondering about that one!)
g) Dash to town to buy a late birthday present for my Step-dad!


Anyway, so last Sunday, when I was frolicking by Oil Seed Rape fields (horrid name!) there was SO much more to my day than that.  After church, avec headache, CBC and I climbed into the car and drove towards Tiptree in Essex, not so far Chelmsford to visit the famous Wilkins and Sons, makers of the Tiptree jams to visit their tea-room.

It was obviously a popular choice as we had to queue for a little while to get served.

The place is really light and clean and there are some interesting exhibits suspended from the ceiling from their early days of trading- bicycles and lawnmowers with the Wilkins and Sons logo on.  The ceilings are high-beamed.

The menu had traditional afternoon tea for £14 per person or you can get two scones, jam, cream and tea for £6.50. There are various cake options too. On the savoury side, which is more my cup of tea (ho, ho ho), there are homemade quiches, sandwiches, salads and more.  Ice-creams and a variety of drinks are also available.
I chose a sliced turkey salad which comes with hot gooseberry chutney, potatoes and obviously salad.
CBC went for the cheese and onion quiche, also with salad and coleslaw.


When they arrived, CBC berated me for taking my camera out to take a picture and so I had to take this hasty one, so not so good.  More on this later.

It was delicious and very filling. I really liked the gooseberry chutney. Turkey can be a little bland and so this perked it up a treat. I had a chocolate milkshake which was adequate, but as a chocolate milkshake coinesseur, I was not impressed- it was fairly thin and artificial tasting.  CBC enjoyed his quiche too.

I knew my limits so didn't opt for anything sweet although we ordered some Earl Grey tea.



When CBC's scone arrived, he instantly got out his phone.  Took aim carefully. Carefully rearranged the items on his plate.  Zoomed in. Faffed for a good few minutes.  In which time I'd taken  6 pictures of his scone.

One word that starts with Hy and ends in Pocrite!

You pay at the counter which I really do think is a better system than awkwardly trying to get the attention of a busy waitress.

As we paid, I commented that CBC hadn't got his 'Little Scarlet' special strawberry jam and the lady at the counter gave us a jar to take home! As we left, we suddenly realised that they had charged us for the Double scone and tea AND a single scone- a miscommunication between waitresses, so they refunded us the tea without any hassle.


We had a quick glance into the museum which gives some history of the company and life in Essex but we decided we would go onto Mersea island for a walk on the beach, the next part of the adventure, rather than explore it too closely.

After that, we went into the shop which has an excellent selection of Wilkins and Sons products- they have a good selection of chutneys and jams and other treats including cordials, juices, ice-creams and others made with Essex fruits.

I recommend the tea-room as a nice place to visit and eat.  Prices for a salad or main are about £6-6.50 and drinks just under £2.  It was a very pleasant experience despite headaches.  Read for a little info about the Tiptree Wilkins and Sons tearooms


xxx

Happy sun make my marigolds (and cosmos) grow...

Hello there!  I come home fresh (hot and sweaty maybe?!?!) from Exhibition Evening at school.  It is an evening celebrating hard work, art and is the culmination of our special Geography term.   It is a chance to loook admiringly at the creativity of colleagues as they find new ways to get children to make art, write and display the work in a clever way!  For me, this year, it was a showcase of some of the ensembles in school. 
My Year 2 choir sang to their parents for the first time after the festival I took them to 2 weeks ago.  They sang a delightful selection of songs from a lovely book called Happy Sun High from Nikki Davies at Out of the Ark music (a great singing book with CD for any KS1 or FS teachers out there)



Drumming club played samba pieces.  Hilariously, as 3 children turned up late, I managed to enlist an ex-pupil from last year's samba band to play at the last minute as he was sitting watching.  Another ex-member helped out also!

Year 2 music club played some lullabies and a melody they had composed, and did really well, it's the first time they've performed.

My older choir were lively as usual but gave a great spirited performance!

Sweetly, one of my year 5's played a solo version of Titanic!



Though may marigolds are growing, my cosmos are still to flower.  They have definitely grown, but I hope flowers will bloom in abundance in three weeks ready to be my wedding bouquet or at least do SOMETHING at my wedding!


I guiltily bought this vintage dress at the weekend at a shop in Maldon from a very nice lady in a lovely 400 year old tea house called Truly Scrumptious which not only does beautiful food in a lovely setting but has a vintage clothing section and antique section which you can go and browse whilst your fiance plays with their smartphone!
I surreptitiously purchased and carried downstairs but apparently, according to CBC, he knows when I have bought something as I come skipping down the street in glee. Right, must remedy that- must look miserable when having bought something! I like it because it is modest but still cute. Any ideas on date?  They weren't totally sure.  It's a Bertex dress!x

Hope you are well!x

Jubileh 1? Fairycakes

Hello!  Thank you for your recent kindness in visiting, it's lovely to have my loyal blog friends and new friends visiting and being so kind! 
This weekend, I actually did some baking (a rarity in Kezzie-world!) in anticipation of our Jubilee tea-party at church and CBC's house barbecue (which I am now at, sheltering upstairs from the drunken renditions of The Cranberries- it's quite fun but the singing is appalling! ;-)  )

We used the Susanna Blake cupcake book and decided to make summer fruit FAIRYCAKES (for you Alex if you are there?) and lemon and blueberry ones also.

 Here are the finished articles of the former...

 But before that, there was prep for CBC's party!  We prepared 10 metres of Union Jack chains

 ...plumped the Tescos cushions

 Strung the sad-looking bunting...

 CBC chalked a Union Jack onto the pavement

 Found innovative ways of hanging up the chains!

 I couldn't believe making cakes was so relatively hassle-free!  Why have I not tried it sooner!

 The fun part was decorating the cakes with the fresh summer fruits.

 CBC went a little mad with the icing sugar...

 And we went a little too far with the Jubilee themed Decorations (did you realise that I chose them because of their colouring too?!)

 The lemon and blueberry ones were a little more complicated, with more ingredients including polenta! But I zested a lemon for the first time!  (yes, I hear you gasp and roll your eyes at this, but it's exciting for me to do something new!)

 I was going to attempt to wear red,white and blue all weekend but I don't think this will last, not least that the red was solely in the earrings!! The daisy suited the colour-scheme!

I did try to make my socks match the dress though! (why do I look like a lobster?)

Hmmm, was just finishing uploading the last picture when it said I'd run out of Picasa storage and needed to buy it now!  Help!  Anyone know about this?  What do I do??!!!

Linking to Annie the Felt Fairy's Make a month for 2012

Moet et Chandon, monks, scary parking-meters, secret tunnels and deliciousness!

Our last view of Chateau Hermonville near Reims- we decided to take the Champagne route as a detour on our way to Bruges!! 

It must be amazing in the summer with rich, verdant vines in all directions!  The panorama was still enchanting even when the vines resembled gnarled witches' claws!

The variety of colours was beautiful!  My powers or navigation were up to their usual level of utter stupidity!  I find maps so hard to fathom!

We stopped at the small abbey at Hautvillers, famous for being where Dom Pérignon is said to have discovered the secret of champagne making in the 17th century.
We saw his tomb!

The church was freezing but picturesque but all was strangely quiet in the village!!!

We drove on to Epernay, the town where all the champagne houses have their grand residences and cellars-as you went along the road, it felt like you were surrounded by the celebrities of the wine world- Veuve Cliquot, Moet et Chandon, Pol Roger, Bollinger, Perrier-Jouët, Mercier and more!

Not being champagne connoisseurs, we decided to stop and ask the tourist office about which was the best champagne house to visit the cellars of.  We stopped at this super high-tech parking metre which said 15 mins only, and as soon as we'd parked, this scary timer started counting down from 15mins!!!  We were instantly scared and wondered what happened when you exceeded your allotment! 
Maybe a cage landed over your car?  Perhaps a clamp rose from the ground?

The tourist office had moved,so by the time we had gained the information we needed, we were painfully aware that the 15minute deadline was imminent!  Fear meant we ran down the road!  As we arrived, the screen was flashing with big letters (we were 15 seconds over) saying, "YOU HAVE EXCEEDED YOUR TIME, THE POLICE HAVE BEEN CALLED!" in French!).  If we weren't so panicked and wanting to escape, we'd have taken a photo, but being law-abiding citizens we were terrified!!! Luckily, no high-speed chases with the gendarmes ensued!

The tourist office recommended either Moet et Chandon or Mercier (or something beginning with A).  We decided to go for Mercier since it had a TRAIN that took you through the cellars, but sadly it was closed! 

Thus, we headed for Moet and Chandon, who were offering a Valetines deal to have the tour and taste a glass of Vintage rose champagne instead of the usual one for the cheaper price!  The tour commenced at 3pm so we headed off into Epernay for a quick scout!

Impressive eh? Moet et Chandon headquarters!

We stopped in a brilliant Patisserie where I had a chocolate Religieusse, CBC had a coffee one (a choux pastry filled with chocolate cream).  It's called that because it looks a bit like a nun! (excuse the silly shot, CBC had his camera on vivid colour mode!)

We arrived back to Moet and Chandon to join 8 others for the tour!  We learnt a little about the Moet family, with Chandon who married into it!  We watched a rather silly video with Scarlett Johanssen doing a voiceover first!  She then taught us all about the process of Champagne-making, grading, maturing etc.  Each champagne is different from another, even though they all are made using the same three varieties of grape: pinot noir, pinot meunier, and chardonnay. 

Next, feeling rather like the Famous Five, we were led down into the cellars!  They are all linked up, all the champagne cellars and continue for miles and miles and miles under the town- it's like a secret town under the town!

She taught us that grapes are graded in terms of Cru- linked to the village of Cru, where they are rated.  The lowest rated villages are rated at 80%. There are Premier crus villages.  These are rated between 90 and 99 percent.  Finally, the best rated villages, with 100% ratings are Grand crus.

For the really expensive and special vintage champagnes, there is someone who's job it is, just to turn the bottles a little bit!

A sort of secret code listed the type, year and special blend of champagne.  The bottles are packed back from the front so there are probably 200 bottles here alone.

When there is a vintage year, this is because the person in charge decides that it will be a vintage year, so the champagne is kept for much longer before it is released!  The next one they will release is a 2004 vintage- apparently, it is going to be a real corker!!!

You can see the scale of the storage here!

It goes on...

And CHECK out the mould/dust!!!!! Totally grotty!

It's a good thing I didn't go wandering off with my sense of direction, you seriously could become lost as I said, there are at least 16km of Moet et Chandon cellars!

The Moet et Chandon family trees!

We went into the shop where they taught us about the bottle sizes!  Magnums, Jeroboam, Methuselah,
Salmanazar Biblical, Balthazar etc!  I had NO idea they did them so big!!!!  Imagine being the poor fool who trips over with one of these babies whilst serving it!

Seriously, that last one is half my height!

Having visited Mr Perignon's tomb, I felt a sense of affection for him!  Until I saw this bottle was 332 euros
or something like that?!

I loved this champagne flute chandelier!

We headed into the function room to be treated to a champagne and meal matching expert- Moet et Chandon's chef!

We had our vintage Rose, which was ok (I think the tour-guide caught me grimacing as I first tasted it!!!!)

It was wonderfully interesting, particularly as I would never have chosen to go to something like this before!!!  I think the 'secret passage-like' nature of the tour appealed to me!

It was quite late when we left Epernay for the long drive to Bruges! 

Finally, we arrived at Huis Kunig, our beautiful B&B in the centre of Bruges, at around 9.30pm! 
It looked beautiful: glowing, warm, cosy yet large and our host seemed wonderful!

She gave us a whistle-stop guide and then pointed us in the direction of an exquisite restaurant!
CBC went for the 3 course menu and I went for a main dish of veal with cauliflower mash, parsnip shavings and something else I forget!   The appetisers and bread were a meal in themselves!

CBC's trio of desserts!

As you can tell, I was exhausted after the day but it was wonderful!

More anon...