Queen for a day!
Bottomless Champagne afternoon tea at The Rubens overlooking the Royal mews of Buckingham Palace is a truly splendid affair. Everything about this hotel is quintessentially English, from the plush seating to the regal striped red and gold wallpaper. The service was impeccable and every guest is made to feel really special.
On arrival, we were seated overlooking the mews and Robert introduced himself as being in charge of our Champagne top-ups, he was adamant that our glasses were never to be left empty! Indeed, they were not. The bottomless champagne here truly is bottomless. Carlota was remarkable, she carefully explained the menu to us and asked us to choose our preferred tea. I opted for the Royal Jubilee tea and my husband chose the planter's green. We shared the traditional sandwich offering of smoked salmon & horseradish cream cheese on beetroot bread, coronation chicken & toasted almonds on white bread, ham, cheese & tomato chutney on sundried tomato bread, egg & watercress and cucumber & cream cheese on brown bread. My favourites are always the salmon and the cream cheese and cucumber whereas dear husband prefers coronation chicken and the ham. You can imagine that a lot of bartering goes on in our lives! The sandwiches were replenished twice more, although this time we opted for no egg as neither of us is a fan. After this, we decided to tackle the absolutely stunning selection of royal-themed cakes. Each sweet was created to mirror the likes of our royal family members. The crown was inspired by the Queen as she is purportedly a chocolate lover. This crown-shaped cinnamon chocolate mouse sat on a brownie biscuit with a coconut marshmallow filling. Despite preferring fruit-based deserts I absolutely loved this. The flavours were intense without being overly sweet and the cinnamon gave a lovely finish to each mouthful. The next offering was my absolute favourite. This was a tribute to Her Majesty, the Queen's orchard at Windsor Castle. The desert was shaped and tasted like a peach with a peach melba centre. It was such a lot of fun to cut into and so delicious too. The Royal macaron is an ode to the late Prince Philip who famously loved an apple dessert. This macaron was double-sided and filled with caramelised apples, coffee whipped ganache. The seasonal Ruben's Eclair is a homage to Prince Charle's sustainable farming. This was filled with strawberry jelly on a pistachio base with a white chocolate mousse. Finally, the bread & butter was a spin on the late Princess Diana's favourite with a sourdough bread pudding cream, rose and raspberry and lemon sponge. Finally, we shared a traditional scone with lashes of clotted cream and a thin veil of orange and strawberry jam. This finished our afternoon off beautifully. We had a few more sips of champagne and let the Ruben with the remaining scones which were packed up for us and lots of lovely memories. We had such a wonderful afternoon and I really cannot recommend the experience enough.
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