February 17, 2018 - Tanya Making Memories and Elisa's Memories of London Afternoon Tea

Tanya's Daily Scoop
Covering the West Coast & the World
CURRENTLY TRAVELING IN: CHICAGO  

Making memories 

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Tanya is bopping around Chicago today and will post when she can!! - E

Elisa's Daily Scoop
Covering Long Island & NYC Boroughs
​CURRENTLY ON LONG ISLAND

Memories of London Afternoon Tea

It's Saturday and I've got a great day planned with my daughters!!! We are going to have a "belated Valentine's" celebration today at a wonderful Afternoon Tea at the world famous Garden City Hotel!!

Due to Kelsey getting on her braces, we had to lay low Wednesday (the real Valentine's Day) and trust me, we'll be making up for things today!!

I'm very excited about our day today - me and the girls ABSOLUTELY L-O-V-E Afternoon tea.

I'll be doing a full story all about Afternoon Tea on Long Island next month, March 12th, to be exact!

Thought I would take a stroll down Afternoon Tea Memory lane...

Last April, in celebration of Gianna's 13th Birthday, we took a special trip to London, where we were joined by the cousins! 

Although we did and saw so many things, one of the key highlight of the trip overall, was our daily afternoon tea.  I thought I would re-post History of "High" Tea from a previous blog back in August of 2016, for your reading pleasure...

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Enjoying High Tea is one of England's most enjoyable pastimes and one about which I was most curious to know the history.

What I was most surprised about was that "High Tea" or "Afternoon Tea" it is a relatively new tradition, dating back only to the mid-1700's in England. 

Tea itself and the custom of drinking tea dates back to the third millennium BC in China.

It became popularized in England in the 1660's by   King Charles II and his wife the Portuguese Infanta Catherine de Braganza, but the well-known modern day tradition took another hundred years or so to become customary. 

High Tea in England is credited to Anna, the seventh Duchess of Bedford, in the year 1840.   

According to Historic UK, "The Duchess would become hungry around four o'clock in the afternoon. The evening meal in her household was served fashionably late at eight o'clock, thus leaving a long period of time between lunch and dinner. The Duchess asked that a tray of tea, bread and butter (some time earlier, the Earl of Sandwich had had the idea of putting a filling between two slices of bread) and cake be brought to her room during the late afternoon."

Photo credit: DamonBanks.com

As word spread among her friends through her frequent Afternoon Tea get togethers, the late afternoon "meal" grew in popularity as a social event. 

According to Fortnum & Mason, "‘Tea rooms’ were all the rage in the late 19th century, quickly becoming THE place for meeting friends and sharing gossip. They were also considered one of the few respectable places for women to meet without a chaperone, so the out-of-home Afternoon Tea took off like a social network. At some stage music was added to the occasion, and fashionable young people attended afternoon ‘tea dances’ in the most stylish of hotels, a practice which continued until the Second World War."

(c) travelincousins.com

By the late 1880's the tradition was in full force and upper class women would change into dressy gowns, adorned with hats and gloves for their High Tea, which occurred between four and five o'clock.

Typical Afternoon Tea includes the tiers of smart little crustless sandwiches, scones, cakes, clotted cream, curd, and even cheese on toast would have been served. And of course, heaps of tea!

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OUR AFTERNOON TEA MEMORIES IN LONDON IN APRIL 2017:

​London Afternoon Tea Bus

Afternoon Tea Bus Tour (c) travelincousins.com

Afternoon Tea Bus Tour (c) travelincousins.com

​The Chesterfield Mayfair Hotel

Afternoon Tea at the Chesterfield (c) travelincousins.com

ME AND MY GIRLS AT CHARLIE AND THE CHESTERFIELD AFTERNOON TEA (c) travelincousins.com

At the Chesterfield TOP TIER OF DESSERTS (c) travelincousins.com

At the Chesterfield MIDDLE TIER WITH FINGER SANDWICHES (c) travelincousins.com

At the Chesterfield BOTTOM TIER WITH FINGER SANDWICHES (c) travelincousins.com

WITH MR. WONKA HIMSELF (c) travelincousins.com

The Delaunay Hotel

The Delaunay (c) travelincousins.com

At the Delauney for Afternoon tea - ME AND MY BESTIE COUSIN IN LONDON - YAY! (c) travelincousins.com

At the Delaunay (c) travelincousins.com

At the Delaunay with Kelsey (c) travelincousins.com

VEGAN Afternoon tea service at the Delaunay (c) travelincousins.com

Cosette & Gianna at Delaunay (c) travelincousins.com

Not afternoon tea - but I had to throw this in of my girls in front of Tower Bridge (c) travelincousins.com

The Courthouse Hotel

THE COURTHOUSE HOTEL, SOHO - our destination for afternoon tea (c) travelincousins.com

At The Courthouse Hotel - our last Afternoon Tea of our trip (c)travelincousins.com

Lots of goodies! (c) travelincousins.com

Goodbye London (c) travelincousins.com

Have you been keeping up with Tanya's Chicago trip this weekend?  Don't forget to check in!

Well, we're off to have a fun afternoon!!

See ya back here tomorrow!

-E
xoxo