Grand Hotel – Afternoon Tea
Filed under: *, Östermalm, Bar, Cafe, European, French, Luxury, Norrmalm | Tags: tea, view |
Södra Blasieholmshamnen 8
+46 (0) 86 79 35 85
Monday-Sunday 14:00-17:00
www.grandhotel.se
Map
We’ve recently fallen into the habit of having tea at Chaikhana on Sunday afternoons. There are other tea houses we should probably be trying, but something keeps drawing us back to our favorite. So it was a pleasant surprise when S’s mother decided to celebrate her birthday with afternoon tea at the Grand Hotel.
The Grand offers a lovely view of the royal palace and Gamla Stan (particularly nice if you’re lucky enough to be seating on the varanda). The hotel itself is everything one would expect it to be, with beautiful high ceilings and ornate decorations. A bit old-fashioned perhaps, but there is a certain charm to enjoying a small feast of tea and scones while observing the other guests. The combinations are endless; the middle-aged man with the beautiful young blonde, the old ladies in the fur coats, the American tourists, and the man who feeds his cocker spaniel tea sandwiches.
The afternoon tea is served in the Cadier Bar, to the right of the entrance. It is possible to book a table a month or more in advance, but the hotel only allows half of the tables to be booked, so you can also just go and try your luck.
The afternoon tea itself consists of a veritable tower of tasty tidbits, a glass of champagne, and tea. The food is in three layers: scones on top, sandwiches in the middle, and sweets on the bottom. One of each is provided for each person. The scones are plain and chocolate chip. We agree that they are mediocre at best, and no comparison for Chaikhana. The sandwiches, however, are a real treat. Fillings include reindeer and lingonberry, Swedish shrimp salad, salmon and caviar, and porcini mushrooms. All were excellent. The sweets were a bit disappointing. Not bad, but not really exciting either. Maybe we were just too full. The Champagne is excellent, the Grand Hotel’s standard Pol Roger. The tea was also noteworthy. The hotel has their own blend, which is similar to Earl Grey, the nicest we’ve had of it’s kind. All this for 395 kr/person.
The price is certainly a bit on the high side, and we won’t be going on our own, but the experience was lovely and certainly out of the ordinary. We wish the scones and sweets could match the quality of the sandwiches, but that would make it dangerously tempting…
Summary: Great atmosphere for a special occasion, but a bit pricey for the quality of the food.
Rating: *
