Britomart Country Club

Date of Visit: 18 August 2012
Location: Britomart Country Club, Galway Street, Auckland City
Website: http://www.britomartcountryclub.co.nz/#/Home
Cost: $20 pp

Another GrabOne purchase, I recently visited Britomart Country Club for high tea. I was interested to check this high tea out because it’s a slightly unusual place to serve one (it is predominantly a bar). I have been there in the evenings, but not during the day before. Unfortunately, the general verdict on this high tea is that they should probably stick to their ventures as a bar until they are able to serve fresh food…

I came here with my brother. I made a reservation almost a month out as the initial date that I wanted was fully booked and then we were both busy for several weekends. The website stipulates that they need at least 48 hours notice when making a reservation. Parking was easy in one of the downtown car parking buildings.

There was a large selection of teas offered which were of the Dilmah variety. I drink a lot of Dilmah tea these days so was fairly happy with this. I had the Mediterranean Mandarin tea, which was ok. I got quite excited to see that the tea was served in English bone china, it really adds something to the experience. My brother, not being a tea drinker himself, went for the coffee option, which he declared to be average. A nice touch though was the water jug that had orange and mint added to it.

The table setting was attractive. There was ample space for everything, including a jar with a flower and the water jug.

I don’t like to write anything bad about places, but sometimes you have to be honest. I guess the biggest thing I was disappointed about was the food (which is quite a big thing in a high tea). There were three sandwiches in the selection, all of which were made with white bread, which was dry and beginning to curl slightly. The scones were probably the biggest disappointment of the high tea, while they appeared at first to be warm, it would seem that they had been heated rather than freshly made. The result of this was a rock hard outer scone and which was chewy and essentially inedible. To add insult to injury, the cream was over-whipped and also starting to separate. The savoury muffin was actually fairly reasonable. Luckily for the Britomart Country Club, their sweet selection improved vastly on their savouries. The highlight here was the red velvet cupcake with cream cheese icing, which was very tasty. The mini cheesecakes were also quite nice, however gave the impression that they were made the day before. In fact, as my brother pointed out, all of the food seemed to have that ‘made the day before’ look to it. Some foods keep better than others.

 

Although the food was not so great, the service was quite good. The servers were attentive, checking on how we were going and providing prompt service.

I enjoyed the setting of the Britomart Country Club. It has that outdoors feel (which is essentially is), and I loved the little hedge and the artificial grass on the ground. It is quite a unique environment. It is a casual setting, but I liked it. Weather is a huge factor for high tea here. Because it is quite open (though completed covered) windy, rainy days are quite cold. We were lucky enough to have a sunny afternoon, though it did become a little cooler as the afternoon grew later.

Come here on a nice sunny day but avoid the high tea. Maybe stick to the lunch menu or come in the evening for drinks? The pizzas looked good. In terms of high tea, they are one of the cheapest options around, however, that is no excuse to serve old food. I think they do have the potential to serve a good high tea; they just really need to get the food right.

Service: 3.5/5
Food: 1/5
Tea: 3/5
Atmosphere/Ambiance:  3.5/5
Layout (of restaurant): 4/5
Setup (of table):  4/5

Overall: 3/5