Abbey Garden Tea Room

This tea room is a mixed bag. Although I found myself disappointed in a few things, I left happy overall. PROS: The decor is wonderful, contemporary English without the fru-fru 'old granny' look so many tea rooms fall victims to. Really a great atmosphere. Our waitress was friendly and attentive. The scones were... AMAZING! Literally some of the best I've had in my life. The scones are a must. The tea is brewed and removed BEFORE it's served so you don't have to worry about it over steeping, a wonderful practice. CONS: With the exception of the scones- which were delicious- the rest of the food was pretty disappointing. I ordered the Abbey Tea (a scone with jam and clotted cream, 3 finger sandwiches of your choice, and fresh fruit). The sandwiches were the most unsatisfying. They were la... (more)rge, but the cucumber has very little cucumber and too much dill. The smoked salmon was just a premade smoked salmon shmear without anything else and was very overpowering. And the 'curried chicken salad' sandwich was kind of ridiculous. I'm fairly sure it was deviled ham with curry powder mixed in, and if it wasn't- it certainly tasted like it. The remainder of the tea was just fresh fruit, four slices of orange, sliced apple and a strawberry. The fruit was nice, but honestly the tea is about $13, which is pretty outrageous for what you get. I don't consider fresh fruit to be it's own course at tea, and I don't think many others do either. Not for $13 anyway. They have a wonderful variety of tea, but it's kind of odd. They had teas like 'Hot Cinnamon Spice', 'Citron Green' and 'Paris' which are all Harney and Sons brand. I ordered the Paris and it came just as expected. But when I went to buy some it was packaged as 'Abbey Garden Tea Room' brand. So I asked, 'Is this Harney and Sons Paris?' and the waitress said, 'Yes, well. I mean we order it and then we make our own mix.' Which I thought was kind of weird. It sounds like they order expensive brands and then cut it with inexpensive teas to sell it as their own. Overall though, I enjoyed it. I will probably not order the sandwiches again but I'd like to see what else they have.