Halloween was yesterday, but I went out for a post-Halloween Halloween afternoon tea earlier today with friends. This is the second time I have seen any of my friends since the start of February, so I was have been looking forward to it for a couple of months. The Halloween-themed afternoon tea was enjoyed at Waddesdon Manor in Buckinghamshire. Continue reading about my Halloween tea at Waddesdon.
Waddesdon Manor is a very large mansion owned by the Rothschild family, and I previously visited here in August, but my first visit was last December. I had been planning to visit the house this summer, but that did not happen for obvious reasons, and I have heard that the house takes a long time to walk through as it is so large. I hope things can be normal soon so that I can visit it.
The afternoon tea was located in a room that appeared to be the old kitchen, and various gourds, squash, and pumpkins decorated the old kitchen cabinets and worktops. These made an excellent autumn display, and my photographs of it remind me of a painting.
All of the afternoon tea was served with a glass of Prosecco. I forgot to take a photograph of the tea pots, but they were unique and of Asian style. Visitors could choose their tea, and I choose the Darjeeling.
Next up were the sandwiches. Waddesdon offers a great selection of different types of sandwiches and bread with their afternoon tea. These included a selection of rolls, croissants, tarts, and flat bread. The sandwiches included: Pumpkin, spinach and goat's cheese tart; Haddock, leek and chive tart; Egg and cress slider; Beet root cured salmon and dill cream; Smoked chicken croissant; Roast beef and horseradish. I substituted for an avocado mashed on flatbread.
After the sandwiches, we had a miniature three-tier stand with two layers of pastries and a scone with clotted cream and jam. We moved on to the scone. I forgot to photograph the scone, but it came with a little pot of clotted cream and jam, which was just enough for it.
The pastries included the following:
Death by chocolate opera gateaux. This had a dark chocolate skull and dark chocolate coffee bean on top. It had a slight hint of coffee, but thankfully it was not too much as I dislike coffee.
Toffee apple cinnamon spiced panacotta. This was served in a tall glass shot glass and was a creamy apple and cinnamon treat that I enjoyed. I didn't really taste the toffee.
Raspberry pistachio bat-enberg. This is a batenberg cake that came with a white chocolate bat. I enjoyed it, but I didn't really taste pistachio or raspberry flavours.
Mummy macaron. This was a vanilla macaron with a strawberry or raspberry jam in the middle.
Pumpkin and pecan cake. This little cake had a pecan on top and tasted like a spiced pumpkin cake flavour. (For some reason, they gave me a millionaire's slice instead of this, and I traded it.)
My favourites were the pumpkin and pecan cake, toffee apple panacotta, and the macaron.
After the afternoon tea, we had a quick walk around the grounds and saw a new sculpture with elephants being installed. These elephant sculptures were created in India by local people out of an invasive plant, which is wrapped around a wire frame. The elephants are a part of a charity work that will take place in London's parks next spring to draw attention to the endangered animals. There will be eighty of these sculptures placed around the parks.
The winds have been high for a few days as well as last weekend, so unfortunately, this has caused many of the beautiful autumn leaves to fall off the trees earlier this year; it has also been the wettest autumn for many years. However, there was still a bit of colour at Waddesdon. I wish that we could have enjoyed the autumn colour for longer, though, particularly as every weekend has been cloudy or wet weather while the weekdays, while I have to work, have usually been bright and sunny.
For more posts about Waddesdon on this blog, see the below:
Morning at Waddesdon (National Trust, Buckinghamshire): Lockdown Edition
Christmas and Winter Light at Waddesdon Manor (Bucks, England)
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