Memoirs of Aleisha

Another Sunday, another high tea in Tokyo. I’ve been going at a rate of one per month. This time we headed to the ANA Intercontinental hotel in Akasaka (accessible from the Nanboku metro line) Spending a few hours in an luxury air-conditioned hotel eating cakes and sweets with a cup of tea is a perfect way to escape the heat and humidity of Tokyo in June. Skye and I each brought a friend to join us for a ladies afternoon tea – spreading the love one cuppa tea at a time. The ANA Intercontinental hotel serves afternoon tea between the hours of 2-5pm in the Atrium Lounge, although you can lounge about for as long as you like. It was surprisingly very busy. There are a choice of two afternoon sets – the bread set or the sweets set. We all decided on the sweets set. As usual, there are an assortment of teas to choose from, with free hot water refills. Most places that offer afternoon tea should give you pot refills. The biggest disappointment with this venue for afternoon tea was the absence of scones!! The height of rudeness. How blasphemous to exclude the humble scone from an afternoon tea. The scones are the best part. Big points lost right there. It was still a lovely set though. I also wasn’t a huge fan of the sandwich. It was just the one sandwich but it was triple-decked so the salmon mixed with the ham wasn’t really to my liking. Much prefer when the sandwich fillings are on separate sandwiches. Oh well. As lovely as it was, it wasn’t a very “traditional” afternoon tea (no scones!). The sets are 2950yen per person (3 tiered platter plus tea) plus tax. If you make an advance reservation for the weekend, you will get 10% off the bill. It cost us 3000yen per person with the discount. The Peninsula Hotel and St Christophers Garden remain my two favourite places to date in Tokyo for high tea. But there are still many more places to review. All the details for afternoon tea at the ANA Intercontinental hotel can be found here