Redeeming Quality
When the Dealfind advertisement popped into my inbox last year I jumped at the chance at buying their two for one high tea offer from The Fairmont. It turns out that so did eleven thousand other people. Naturally, when I waited and waited to make a reservation, it was pretty difficult to actually get a one. It wasn’t until the day before my coupon expired that I actually had the opportunity (and the reservation) to redeem my coupon with a friend.
High tea at The Fairmont is held at The Castle, a restaurant behind 900 West Lounge. The room was decorated in the same fashion one might expect a room at Buckingham Palace to be–upholstered wooden chairs, patterned carpets, crisp white linens, and delicate china, but without any British accents or nose in the air attitude. We were seated at our table which had cream and sugar already waiting in silver containers, and left to make our tea selection. It didn’t take very long to for me to decide on ‘maple maple’ as my tea since the list of tea was short by comparison to other tea parlours in the city.
The silver tea and cream containers met their matching tea pots when they were shortly brought to the table. Sitting prim and proper, the tea steeped while dainty finger sandwiches, pastries, devonshire cream, and tiny pots of strawberry jam joined the party moments after. Once the tea finished steeping, I added a teaspoon of the sugar crystals and a splash of cream from the refined silverware and took a sip.
Subtle aromatic flavours punctuated by the woody sweetness of the tea told me the story of its Sri Lankan origin. I began working my way through the tower of pastries, beginning with the finger sandwiches on the bottom tier. The most notable savoury pastry was the curry chicken salad on a slice of French baguette because it complimented my tea best. Next were the sweet pastries consisting of lemon tarts, chocolate cupcakes, eclairs, and raisin scones–each more charming than the next. There were enough scones for both of us to have two, but we were so numb from the sugar that neither of us were able to finish a second.
After sitting for a while longer, we summoned our server and requested that they do away with the remnants and bring us our cheque (because we were approaching our allowed seating time). Fully satiated and quenched, we headed towards the car, but stopped to view some Canstruction. When I got home I realized I was feeling sick from all the caffeine I ingested from the tea and the sugar in the pastries. Eventually the headache passed and I thought fondly of my afternoon high tea once again.
wooo……..ahhhhhh…….the canstruction looks really cool.
Great tea ! Why can’t I grab your second scone through the screen ?
This “canstruction” exist as an official exhibition. Wow… if my “neighbors” knew they were artists.There are few homeless that camp near my station, and their job is to collect them empty cans that people throw away and bring them to the recycle place. But sometimes, they make some objects in cans and keep them for a few weeks. They made a log house for one person. They often made smaller ones for their dogs. Another time a Christmas tree. Sadly, they “lost” the yard where they could do that last year because the road was enlarged. I wonder if they moved somewhere.
The canstruction is an exhibition that has started only a few years ago, but their popularity has grown a lot. Plus, it benefits the local food bank. Hopefully your “artist” is practicing his craft elsewhere, or has moved on to greater things.
What a delicious, exciting adventure! Vancouver is our favorite city in the PNW – we live in OR – I’d give my left arm to spend some significant time eating my way through Vancouver – but then all that good food just might become the norm, and take the excitement away. Even so, I’d like the opportunity.
Good thing about Vancouver is that there is always a new restaurant opening up–you can never keep up! Haven’t spent much time in Oregon, but the food truck scene in Portland is light years ahead of our here. Hopefully I will get the chance to go down there again this year. If you have any good suggestions, let me know!
Too bad you got a headache but that could mean you have reason to consume more tea and sweets in the future to build up your tolerance level eh?
I guess I could look at it that way too.;)