Opinion

Anita Robinson: Afternoon tea is a wonderful occasion - and must be done properly

Afternoon tea - make sure there are some high-class sandwiches and/or cakes
Afternoon tea - make sure there are some high-class sandwiches and/or cakes Afternoon tea - make sure there are some high-class sandwiches and/or cakes

I was intrigued by a picture in a tabloid newspaper last week of a small plate upon which reposed two slices of toast (crusts on,) spread with ‘smashed’ avocado; beside it, four Malteser-sized chocolate truffles in a tiny dish.

It was ostensibly the fare offered by Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, to a guest invited to afternoon tea. Whether it was an illicitly-taken snap or a press set-up shot I don’t know, but it struck me as being on the miserly side of mean.

Afternoon tea should be a lavishly glorious thing – a three-decker cake-stand, dainty triangular or finger sandwiches on the lower deck, warm scones with jam and cream on the middle tier and luscious cakes and pastries on the topmost. I was introduced to afternoon tea at a precocious stage. My twenty-years-older sister was frequently lumbered with my presence on Saturday afternoons when she met her friends and teaching colleagues in a more restrained era when manners mattered, before pub culture evolved. I’m sure they could’ve seen me far enough.

Foster’s restaurant in Derry was aww’fly smart, ‘the’ place to be seen – and there was I, minding my p’s and q’s. I learned young that to have a second cake was considered social death, a scruple I managed to overcome in later life. To me, Foster’s was, literally, heaven on a plate – glazed linen tablecloths, heavy silverware and ancient waitresses with pleated Art Deco headbands and bad feet, who shuffled back and forth laden with wrist-breaking trays.

It was there I learned the art of people-watching. The ancient clientele were almost exclusively female – mothers and grown-up daughters, groomed and gloved, with carrier bags from Geo. F. Crook or Austin’s of the Diamond and well-coiffed ladies of a certain age with manicured nails and good jewellery. ‘Nice’, in the nicest sense of the word.

A frequent highlight of those Saturday afternoons for me was the entrance of the Fairy Queen. I’d been a star-stricken elf in the children’s chorus of the annual pantomime and had sat cross-legged at her feet for a whole fortnight, gazing upwards in mute adoration as she sang like an angel, before I went repeatedly wrong in the elven dance. Now, here she was in Foster’s with her equally handsome mother. Even without her billows of silver-spangled tulle, she was beautiful – and still is.

Anyway, Elder Sister Dear, without a thought for my further education in etiquette, went off to live in Africa, I grew up with a modicum of manners and Foster’s is long gone. Like many another social experience that taught children how to conduct themselves in adult company, it was much missed.

But, rejoice! The cake-stand is back – and with it, the resurgence of grace as afternoon tea has taken its place again upon the social menu, with the added attraction of ‘optional’ Prosecco – an option rarely refused. This has turned out to be a mixed blessing. ‘Ladies who lunch’, when too busy for lunch, opt instead for afternoon tea and are still on premises when the first diners of the evening arrive. Where conversation used never to rise above a discreet hum accompanied by the genteel tinkle of bone china, things now can get a little… lively. Eventually, somebody’s husband who’s come home from his work to an empty house, no sign of his dinner and his wife missing, has to be requisitioned to run them all home. “My Brian will do it. He won’t mind a bit.” “No, no! I’ll ring my Gerry. He’s nearer.” “My George would come, but he’s in Ballymena today.” Wise man. Cue, scrabbling in handbags for mobile phones. “My Jim” draws the short straw – but he’ll be half an hour. “Shall we have another wee Prosecco while we wait?”

The renaissance of afternoon tea is a cynically manufactured ploy on the part of the catering trade to bridge the barren profit gap between lunch and dinner. The Prosecco is the sweetener. A bottle furnishing little more than a single glass for four, they’ll almost certainly order another.

It’s a far cry from Foster’s.