Jasmine Afternoon Tea at Taj 51

First Impressions

Upon our arrival at Taj 51 we were greeted with a delicious Salted Caramel Lassi which was the perfect start to our Jasmine Afternoon Tea experience which I had booked as a birthday treat for my Mum.

Unfortunately, I was a little disappointed with the setting as the pictures on the hotel website are quite deceptively taken, showing the colourful food and beautiful tablecloths, I was NOT expecting the tearoom to have such a corporate feel. Furthermore, because of the Covid precautions that were in place at the time of our visit, there were no physical menus or tablecloths at all, nor was the room decorated, so it did feel as though the experience somewhat lacked the opulence I expected. 

The table did have some lovely gold chargers, plates with a gold rim and the food came beautifully presented on golden platters. If you know me, you know I love pretty ceramics, unfortunately the teapot and teacup we were presented with were a plain white and wouldn’t look amis in a budget hotel, which kind of took away from the charm of the overall table setting.

I would give the setting  2/5 stars

The Food

The Jasmine Afternoon tea is a fusion of a Traditional British Afternoon Tea that consists of savouries, scones, sweets and of course the aforementioned tea but with Indian inspired flavours.

First the savouries, they were fantastic! For our sandwiches we had, cheese and tomato pinwheels in beetroot bread and curried egg mayo in a sun dried tomato bread. Then the warm savouries included chicken tikka in wraps, spiced potato toast and my personal favourite… spiced paneer puffs. Some feedback from my mum was that she would have liked some sauces to accompany her savouries.

Whilst we really enjoyed the Indian savouries, the same could not be said for the sweets, they were just not quite to our taste, there was a lot of milkiness (Chocolate Rasmalai Cups) and cardamon flavour (Pistachio Crusted Fruit and Cardamon Flavoured Srikhand Tart) and whilst I feel like the sweets could be nice to some people, they just didn’t quite suit our sensibilities, however they were so beautifully presented that it almost didn’t matter and we enjoyed trying them.

On to the scones, they were also suitably different and nothing like what I had tried before, Gulabi Scones with Kismis and Almonds, served with Homemade Alphonso Mango Compote and Cinnamon Clotted Cream. I LOVED THEM. My mum however was less of a fan, though our waiter was kind enough to bring her plain scones and jam which she gobbled up appreciatively.

We washed everything down with tea, I went for the Chai Masala (a new found favourite) and my mum kept it safe with the traditional English breakfast.

Overall I would give the food 4/5 stars

The Service

I cannot say a bad word about the service at Taj 51, it was perfect, they were fantastic hosts in each and every way. Our waiter came round to offer us additional tea, scones and savouries but they didn’t hover over us and we were left to kick back and enjoy our tea at a leisurely pace. And to my mothers delight a cake was even brought out nearing the end of our tea to celebrate her birthday which was a really nice touch.

For service it has to be 5/5 stars

I really enjoyed my Jasmine Afternoon Tea experience at Taj 51 and would rate the overall experience

73% satisfaction rating

Jasmine Afternoon Tea at Taj 51 is £45 per person + a 12.5% service charge