The Secret Garden Tea Company is one of the places to go for afternoon, or high tea in Vancouver. This was my second time visiting Secret Garden, and the food quality was definitely a lot more tasty and memorable than my first time here.
This is a really busy tea house, on a weekend you probably will not get a table without a reservation. There were 3 high tea reservations times: 12pm, 2pm and 4pm. Each reservation has a 2 hour time limit. The deal for high tea for this place is you make a reservation, and you select your tea once you have arrived, you don’t have a choice on the food. The food would come in 3-tier platters including sandwiches, pastry, and scones.
They had a really large selection of teas. I was given a tea menu at the table, there was about 4 pages of teas. I decided to go with the good old fashion Earl Grey, while my friend got the Secret Garden’s Secret. The Earl Grey was good, it had a really intense flavor, however, I really recommend the Secret Garden’s Secret. It had a really nice aroma, and the taste was consistent with the smell, unlike other flavored teas. And I also thought it went better with all the food than Earl Grey.
The system to the 3-tier platter was to start from the bottom, and work your way up. The bottom tier of food was delicate sandwiches, included: egg salad rolls, crackers, and mini croissant sandwiches. The egg salad rolls was very light and creamy. The mini croissant sandwiches were REALLY good. The ingredients on the crackers and in the sandwiches are different from day to day. The sandwich we had had cold cuts, aged cheese, with roasted vegetables. It was really really yummy.
The 2nd tier was my favorite. It had miniature cranberry scones with Devonshire cream and raspberry jam. It was so yummy. The scones were not dry, and all together with the devonshire cream and raspberry jam, so good! so good.
Lastly the very top layer was pastries. They came in 3 types of pastries, but they almost always have the lemon tart because it’s one of Secret Garden’s specialties. Personally I think the lemon tarts were OK, and the pastries were good in general.
The food might not seem like a lot when they were presented on the tiers, but they were actually really filling. After 2 hours of tea drinking and eating, I still had to box some home. The rating for the quality of food and tea was no doubt 5/5.
If you’re wondering how this place end up with only 4 stars, I was a bit peeved about where I got seated. We got stuck on a very small table that was very close to the bathroom. It was such a bad location for diners because I could smell the cleaning detergents from the bathroom from time to time. It was a very high traffic area for the restaurant as there was always people going to and out from the restrooms. Having to already made an reservation 2 days in advance, you’d think they seat us at a better location. I disliked my table so much, that I don’t think they should put a table there at all. Never compromise your customer’s experience to maximize your profit.
Also the waitress was not very attentive at all. She only came to ask to refill our tea pots twice. And we waited forever to let her to box up our leftovers and give us our bill. 3 stars for the environment and poor service.
High Tea here is $25.95 per person.
This is a really good place to go to spend a relaxing afternoon, to catch up with your friends. Even though my experience was ruined a little bit by the staff and were I got seated, I’d still come back or bring my friends here.
Note: Make reservations! Street Parking.
Secret Garden Tea Company
5559 West Blvd
Vancouver, BC V6M 3W6
(604) 261-3070
www.secretgardentea.com/
3 Comments on "Secret Garden one of Vancouver’s Best Tea Houses"
The high tea menu changes on a monthly basis — which is great if you ask me because you get to try something a bit different each time. I agree that this menu was GREAT. I’ve been to the Secret Garden several times, and this was one of my favorites.
This months (February 2010) menu consists of egg salad pinwheels, roast beef and garbanzo bean canapés, genoa salami with red pepper and provolone cheese on mini croissants, the mini scone and tea cake of the day, signature lemon tarts, pineapple cottage pudding cakes, and double dark chocolate mousse pies.
The best items from each tier:
- Croissant sandwiches = SUPER tasty
- Cranberry scones = z0mg Devonshire cream
- Pineapple cottage pudding cakes = yummers!
Thanks to Amanda at the Secret Garden for providing details on the menu.
A chum recommended me to look at this site, nice post, fanstatic read… keep up the good work!
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