Being British, I am of course obsessed with tea and cake. It’s what we’re famous for – afternoon tea, and to be honest no other country does it as well as us. Whenever we go to the US we take bags of Yorkshire Tea bags, as you just can’t replicate a good British brew. I have experienced a lot of afternoon tea’s and have rated them as I go, based on many factors… the tea itself (obviously), the range of cakes/sandwiches (sandwiches must be so small we look at them and say ‘aww’), the setting (must be Instagram worthy), staff (don’t judge me for stuffing my face with cake), and any sort of novelty factors.. The best afternoon tea I’ve experienced so far was the BBbus tour, which I was treated to for my birthday last year, which was a London bus transformed into a tea room, riding around London. 

My mum bought me this ‘Tea & Cake London’ book as a stocking filler last Christmas and it is filled to the brim with a range of London tea rooms. Flicking through I was amazed/embarrassed that I have already gone to quite a few of the places listed, but of course there are many others I’m dying to visit. The pic above is of the treats we had from Patisserie Valerie on Saturday.. I had my favourite ever Tiramisu, while B had some sort of creamy flakey thing (I was obviously so excited about mine I didn’t even ask what he got!). The cakes were delicious, but oh my the portions are large. I ended up throwing about a third of mine away – which was probably for the best actually..

Listed in my ‘Tea & Cake London’ book, was the Betty Blythe Tea Room – a 1920s Vintage Style Tea room in West London, where I actually spent my 23rd birthday.  Not many people have heard of this place, which upsets me as it was such a cool experience, I feel I need to tell the world..! So for this particular birthday, me and some friends booked Betty Blythe for tea, cake and champagne – but with a difference. As well as all these lovely treats, in a beyond pretty setting, heading downstairs from the tea room itself was a separate room called ‘Betty’s Boudoir’ where you and your party can raid the dressing up boxes and adorn yourself with vintage style clothes and accessories. This was of course a lot of fun, as some of the outfits turned out ridiculous (my brother in particular looking like some kind of Pimp), and made the photographs all the better. We had a great time there and the food was delicious. I would recommend it to anyone looking to go somewhere for a new tea experience!