A couple of weeks ago I spoke about Buy A Gift in the gift guide for travel lovers. We were lucky enough to receive two complimentary experiences through Buy A Gift, once of which was Sparkling Afternoon Tea for 2 at the Beechwood Hotel in North Walsham, Norfolk.
When you order an experience through Buy A Gift you are sent a lovely presentation card with information about the experience as well as a code to redeem online. The great thing about Buy A Gift experiences is that you can exchange a lot of them online if it isn’t quite suitable for you. I love this because a lot of people get this kind of thing as a present and they might want something else so I think it’s a great idea to be able to exchange online.
To arrange the Sparkling Afternoon Tea experience all I had to do was give the hotel a call, let them know I had a voucher and tell them when I wanted to book in for. It was really very simple. During the phone call to book I was also asked if there were any dietary requirements and the hotel was more than happy to accommodate my picky request for sandwiches!
We arrived at about 3:50 ready for our booking at 4pm. Our coats were taken on arrival and we were led through to the dining room and shown to our table. Being a weekday and late afternoon, the restaurant was really quiet with one one other table in use. This was really perfect for us because we had Erin with us and sometimes she can be quite loud!
The lady who served us was wonderful from the moment we arrived. Seeing that Erin was with us, she cleared space on our table so the food could be put out of Erin’s reach. There aren’t many places that ever think of this which has resulted in a few broken plates on various occasions. I had also requested some plain ham and cheese sandwiches for me and Erin when I booked and this was remembered and checked before the food was brought out.
Before having any food we were asked what drinks we would like. Mum had a coffee while I had a glass of coke. I don’t drink hot drinks and there was no problems with ordering something different. When our food arrived we were served with my plain cheese and ham sandwiches as well as more filled with coronation chicken, cheese and chutney and prawns with marie rose sauce. We also had cheese and sweet scones, chocolate eclairs, raspberry sponge cakes, macaroons and lime and apple posset.
We were all so happy with the food. Erin quickly dived into the cheese scones and I think that was mainly because she hadn’t seen the cakes at this point. The sandwiches were delicious, fresh and really more than we needed! We actually left some as we knew we wouldn’t have as much room for cake if we did.
The cakes were pretty amazing. Erin got so excited as soon as she realised they were. She ended up having some of the scones with jam, raspberry sponge cake, eclair and macaroon!
As you can see, Erin was a huge fan of Afternoon Tea at the Beechwood Hotel. I thoroughly enjoyed our Afternoon Tea and it was certainly one of the best I have ever had. The sandwiches had great fillings and the cakes were really varied!
Our Afternoon Tea came with a glass of prosecco each. I actually forgot about this and so did the lady serving us but it was brought out near the end of our visit. This wasn’t a big deal at all and had I actually remembered and wanted the prosecco, I would have asked for it! Whatever it was we had was really quite strong but delicious too! It really finished our Afternoon Tea off perfectly.
I’m very lucky that the Beechwood Hotel is actually just a 5 minute walk away from where I live so the location of the experience was perfect for me. North Walsham has a train station so it’s also easily accessible by train, bus or car! We loved our Afternoon Tea so much that we have booked a meal on Christmas Eve for the whole family. I cannot wait!
The Sparkling Afternoon Tea For 2 Experience costs £49 and is well worth every penny. If you’re local to Norfolk, or know someone that is, this would make the perfect Christmas present this year!
We received a complimentary Sparkling Afternoon Tea Experience for the purpose of this post. All opinions are our own.
