Review: Afternoon Tea at The Roof Gardens, Kensington

Style Points: 5/5
Price: £££
Overall: 5/5

The Roof Gardens in Kensington have long been one of London’s opulent destinations for lavish meals, parties and good-natured frolicking. The recently launched Afternoon Tea menu served 100ft above London has added yet another reason to visit this stunning location. 

The Roof Gardens are comprised of three themed gardens with resident flamingos, a private members Club and the Babylon Restaurant. The Afternoon Tea itself is served in a beautiful heated marquee which was lovely and toasty during our visit. 

What's on the menu? 

The Afternoon Tea at the Roof Garden is booked in sittings, and ours what at 1.30pm. We arrived and made our way through the many gardens and past the dozing flamingos to the marquee. 

We were led to our gorgeous little table in the middle of the room and took our seats. Our waitress explained the offerings included in the Afternoon Tea and the fact that it was unlimited, as was the tea! After perusing the tea menu we made our selections and also ordered a glass of rose champagne.

The Afternoon Tea offering started with a stand of the savory selection. This included quiches, cheese sandwiches, grilled tomato sandwiches prawn buns, vegetables wraps and salmon savory tarts. Each bite size piece was well created and a joy to eat. By the time we have finished the savory stand we were actually quite stuffed already!

Next came the sweet selection on another beautifully presented stand. This included lemon macarons, strawberry meringues, caramel eclairs, and chocolate brownies. There was also a slice of maderia cake and a small tub of jelly. 

We were completed stuffed by this point and couldn’t finish the sweet stand let alone order seconds! The sweet bites were actually not as appealing as the savory, as the meringues had gone soft and eclair pastry was slightly soggy. If the selection had been of a high quality we may have been unable to resist finishing it all off. 

There were no scones served to us on this Afternoon Tea so we finished off our tea and headed back out to explore the gardens some more!

Could I afford to dine here again?

The Roof Gardens in Kensington are seen as a high end venue which is one of the reasons I hadn’t ventured here before. 

However our Afternoon Tea was a very reasonable £35 per person. This is an astonishingly good price given the gorgeous location, quantity of food and the fact that it was unlimited. Champagne was an additional £10 per glass, or a bottle could be purchased too. 

In addition the standard price for Afternoon Tea in London seems to be about £65 these days so this certainly was a fantastic deal!

Overall?

The Roof Gardens Kensington in Kensington are certainly worth a visit, as exploring the gardens and meeting the flamingos is always a joy. In addition the Afternoon Tea menu is such good value for money it certainly makes it worth while. 

Visit The Roof Garden’s website 
Closest Tube Station: High Street Kensington
Address: 99 Kensington High St, Kensington, London W8 5SA