What better way could one possibly find to while away a chilly Saturday winters afternoon, but by having a good gossip with a good friend, at high tea at Hadleys?
For a mere $22, you can indulge yourself to the max, be waited on hand and foot, and partake of a self-indulgent afternoon tea while you relive life from days of old sipping on tea along with scones, jam and cream, mini chocolate éclairs, ribbon sandwiches, cheesecake, mini quiche and a few other random goodies.
You can imagine how it felt to be a Lady or Lord, sitting in the grandiose surroundings of Hadleys. And with the added bonus, should you be fortunate enough, of having eye-candy Thomas waiting on you – well what more could a Lady ask for?
Every day from 2 – 4 is the time to take advantage of this time-out from today’s hectic lifestyle. Make sure you book, and make sure you get along there. I can’t imagine a more civilized way to pass the time.
For a mere $22, you can indulge yourself to the max, be waited on hand and foot, and partake of a self-indulgent afternoon tea while you relive life from days of old sipping on tea along with scones, jam and cream, mini chocolate éclairs, ribbon sandwiches, cheesecake, mini quiche and a few other random goodies.
You can imagine how it felt to be a Lady or Lord, sitting in the grandiose surroundings of Hadleys. And with the added bonus, should you be fortunate enough, of having eye-candy Thomas waiting on you – well what more could a Lady ask for?
Every day from 2 – 4 is the time to take advantage of this time-out from today’s hectic lifestyle. Make sure you book, and make sure you get along there. I can’t imagine a more civilized way to pass the time.
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17 comments:
Sounds heavenly Rita. I'm there.
I can just imagine Sir-Grumble-Bum sitting there sipping his Earl Grey.
*Rolls Eyes* =D
What's this rolls eyes =d stuff?
Why do people who don't know you feel they can have a go?
I only let my friends insult me.
They know what they are talking about.
Dosent look insulting to me.
Pretty certain =D is a smily face.... the = being eyes. and the D being the mouth. But you need to rotate your head to the side to see it.... if that makes sense.
I wasn't offended anon, just trying for a bit of fun.
I can see me right at home in front of that cake stand too.
It was often thus in the UK. Sausage rolls, mini pies, sangers, cakes of wonder. Huge pots of tea, jam, lemon curd, marmalade, butter, honey, cream...
in fact everything you need for good cheer and good health. Almost.
PS try it at home.
correct me if i am wrong but from the photos it all looks like bought in processed rubbish..
Might have to correct you here Anon 9.50, but knowing Simon's passion as I do (and as you could too, if you checked out his blog) for local food, and knowing of his contempt for people who buy goods in instead of making them themselves, I feel I'm on solid ground sayong they were definitely not bought in.
Processed rubbish? Matter of opinion - but MY food there was great. It was so good that I'm returning this Sat for a repeat afternoon tea, and taking some friends too.
thanks Rita i will stand corrected
Might have to correct you Rita... Sorry! :D :p
I remember using some of that stuff on functions. I used to scoff down a piece of that caramel slice on my split when I was working on functions. Got sick of the par bake rolls! Then I got sick of that! LOL! The came in a cardboard box about 30-45 centimetres wide and about double that long. I also remember those quiches. Horrible things they were... Grrr.... Talk about commercial...
Remember, he might have a passion for making everything and local produce but this IS a hotel and I know I have seen that caramel slice at other hotels in the chain. Darling Harbour and Brisbane was where I saw them. Or maybe Darling Harbour and Melbourne.... Can't remember which one it was.
I know that the chefs have to follow a budget tightly - even more so than a restaurant. Hotel restaurants are VERY numbers oriented. ALL of the hotels I have worked in (3 of the suckers, all different chains including the Mercure) have all been the same in regards to exacting figures and buying in goods.
They quite simply don't have the time to make the goods. Or it's so "soulless" and "business orientated" that they don't - a product rather than an "experience". Or it may be that they want consistency across the chain - a hallmark of hotels and hotel restaurants. It might be all of them.
They DO make a lot of stuff from scratch but when it comes to things that save time and money they jump on quickly.
I'm not saying it's bad that they brought it in. I'm not saying it's a reflection on the chef or his skills either. Or a reflection on the restaurant and it's atmosphere. Or anything like that!
I'm saying that the chef is working in a big business - with shareholders, a board of directors, executives, retirement deals, fleet cars etc etc. A place where annual reports are all that matter, the bottom line is more important than "higher quality", soulful served in a restaurant and consistency of product, whether it's food, the room, the uniforms or whatever is what the place is about.
Still... glad you enjoyed it!
Last few Anonymouses (or mice) - I owe you an apology - I called Simon this morning to verify the source of his slices etc to find that he does indeed currently buy in a lot of the product included in the high tea due to a few factors relevant at the moment. I think that after the big Hadleys renovation, it will be a different story.
Well thats a big point of difference then.
Chefs who make and chefs who buy in.
I would prefer to have a smaller amount of house made quality treats than a larger selection of commercial stuff. If you are really into it surely one would choose a position where you CAN make your own stuff and dont make excuses because of the constraints of shareholder interests.
Each to their own, but if you buy product in don't expect to be taken seriously, no matter the venue.
Yep have to say I thought the cakes looked average. Having worked in a b&b hotel in Scotland. Would get there at 8.00am and cook(lady,who reminds me of Rosemary Shrager from ladette to lady) was baking fresh cakes for the afternoon hightea which was straight after lunch time service. The smell in the kitchen was amazing. The look on the customers face when I told them everything was freshly baked that morning.Plus I got to eat a few treats after too :) . Yum Yum. Would be nice to find that in Hobart.
Hello everyone thank you all for the feed back on the high teas.
Firstly I would love to be in a position to be able to produce everything in house but at this point in time I simply do not have the facilities or the staff to do this. This is something that we are working very hard to rectify. In the next two months my main kitchen at Hadleys will be undergoing a major redevelopment to help alleviate this problem. Plans are done, equipment sourced, tradies booked all ready to go. I make no apologies for buying some items in at this stage and we certainly do not use processed rubbish. Let's face it Rita is not shy about telling you if something is no good. I simply can not make items such as quiche shells and tart cases as goods as or as consistently as I can buy them. Please note that we buy the shells in and fill them ourselves. Using these two items as an example we use a product that is all butter pastry and of excellent quality. As far as cakes and slices go until I can get a pastry chef on my team, and this will be soon, we need to buy some of these in as well. A pastry chef can make these items a lot more efficiently than a chef can. It is the old saying time is money. I will gladly pay a pastry chef to produce all we need as I know I will get the return on my investment. We have recently started using a supplier in Sandy Bay for some of these items and in no way could their products be called inferior or of poor quality. For the items we buy in we do not buy on price we buy on quality and we pay for it.
At the end of the day this is a commercial business and I have to make it pay. The better I do this then the more I will be able to do. The products that we do buy in are they bad products? Of course not or we would not use them. As far as choosing a position where I can be truly into it goes no matter how good we make Hadleys we are still and will always be a large, soon to be very large corporate hotel. This means we need to use items that are not always in season in Tasmania. Let's face it our guest's still demand tomatoes for breakfast and on their BLT for lunch. But with our restaurant menu we try to utilise the best of what is available at any given time of the year. My brief when I started at Hadleys was to fix the food side of the hotel and get to a point where we can focus on quality Tasmanian produce. It is not as easy as going from point A to point B more like starting at point X and getting to point A as soon as we can. The entire new management team at Hadleys is single minded in attaining this goal. And this is what attracted me to Hadleys and the promise of what it can be and the challenge of getting it there. Are there any large hotels in Hobart that make everything in house? If so then I would love to talk to the chef and see how they do it as I am always keen to learn.
Hi Simon,
Steve Cumper here. A word from a grizzled veteran of Hobart food blogging. Be prepared to take a few 'hits' from some anon axe grinders but don't let them get you off message.
Also never engage with those anons who pour scorn, you can never reason with them.
On your own blog, put comment moderation to 'on' that way you can determine whose being constructive or not.
Good luck in your new and exciting position, I look forward to Hadleys new direction.
Cheers Steve
Thank you Steve. I look forward to getting back to RVL soon. I will call ahead as it would be good to meet you and have a chat.
Whose been critical?
Great to see the grand old lady get a new lease of life (I mean Hadley's).
Love it, love it, love it.
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