As we arrive, we walk into what I now know is the upstairs area, which is more of a casual cafe/tea room with classic and kitch tones to its decoration. A staff member welcomes me and after I explained we had a booking, she lead me downstairs to the main restaurant.

The main restaurant feels like a different kettle of fish. As it's a basement area, there are no windows, HOWEVER... this somehow works because of the clever placement of lamps, candles, fairy lights, and full wall mirrors, giving the place a curious and interesting night-time lounge feel, and due to the darkness behind the lamps, makes it feel like somewhere to explore. It also has some of the same kitch quirks from upstairs, including lights made from bowler hats and top hats, and classic plates on the walls. Owner Jenny has been quoted as saying she wants a "home from home" feel, which was ironically on the nose for us, as we were sat by a standing lamp which is the exact same one we have at home in our living room, and the same cutlery we have!

As our coats are taken and hung up, we are introduced to the host/manager who remembers me from booking with him over the phone, but much to his surprise he hasn't booked us onto the system, which he said was for no reason other than jokingly admitting "I'm crap", before leading us round to our table, which further to his confusion is bedecked in "Birthday Girl" banners and balloons. He removes them and leaves us with the Afternoon Tea menu and a drinks menu, but oddly not a tea menu, which is the main part of an Afternoon Tea!

 After we get settled into the deep and comfortable armchairs, we're joined by a waitress to take our order, and who tells us the sandwiches that come with the Afternoon Tea, happy to replace some with others per our taste if need by, but she can't remember off the top of her head, and so dashes off to bring us the Tea list. The menu was nice, but not very clear about what the teas actually were, or who they were by; ie: "Palm Paradise (Flavoured Black Tea)", but it didn't explain what the flavouring is, this applies to the rest of the tea menu. I'm sure the other teas are delicious but I'd rather have a bit more detail about them before I have to decide, and time to look over them before my order is taken. As it stands, we order the Earl Grey. You can't go wrong with Earl Grey at Afternoon Tea!

The music playing varied between soft bluesy jazz numbers, Adele, and Robbie Williams. I imagine you can't go full "tea room" style in a venue like this, as it has a definite restaurant feel to it. The only thing about the layout I found strange is that the ladies were on the far left of the restaurant, and the gents on the far right, nowhere near each other. Also sadly, our table was right on the main "traffic route" to the ladies, but that can't really be helped. 

Our Afternoon Tea is promptly brought out to us, and is beautifully presented, (but purists might sneer that the tiers are in the wrong order, with sandwiches on the centre tier! tsk tsk tsk!) ;). 

The tea is delicious, but at this point we realise that the darkness of the venue makes it a little hard to see everything clearly, resulting in a couple of... shall we say "mis-pours"? But to be frank, the pleasant atmosphere and ambience was worth it. We started with the sandwiches, which were tasty, but lacked a little something, perhaps a chutney or something. The scones were absolutely perfect, very light and fresh, they split perfectly, and were lovely and soft. Maybe lacking a bit of fruit, but they were delicious so I don't care. The top tier was the cakes, which on this instance were a strawberry tart, a vanilla slice, and a small Victoria sponge. The sponge was lovely and light, and perfect for an Afternoon Tea, but as tasty as the other two were, they were a bit too big to be finger cakes, and we had to ask for a couple of forks (which resulted in two staff arriving at our table both presenting two forks at the same time!), the host delivering a great gag about us being "forking demanding" (ha!), but more than happy to oblige. The strawberry tart fell apart in my hands when I tried to take it from the cake stand to move it to my plate, so it was more of a "splodge" on my plate, but a very tasty splodge! 

Overall the Afternoon Tea was very nice, and the tea was delicious, but in my opinion it was a bit expensive at £39.90 for two, considering what was offered, but I suppose that's to be expected from a City Centre venue, especially given the fashionable recurrence of Afternoon Tea.

As we pay, there's a hilarious moment when the waitress takes the card machine and walks around a bit trying to get signal. To be expected from a sub-ground area, but it must drive them mad having to do that all the time!

As we leave, the host/manager tells us that next time we should remember that we're meant to take the experience over a few hours, lounging and chatting, rather than just an hour. We were only visiting for a lunch break, but when we next visit, especially if we bring my parents or our friends, that's definitely some advice we will be considering! I can definitely see it being somewhere to take friends, family, or even have a party, works Christmas do etc. 

Nice work, Annies! I'll come back soon, maybe just for a slice of cake and a brew in your upstairs tea room rather than the full Afternoon Tea, but let's not rule it out... that was a nice Afternoon Tea! But get that Tea List sorted, I'd love to try some of your other blends if I knew a little more about them, and who they're by!

Annies

5 Old Bank Street

Manchester City Centre

M2 7PE

(0161) 839 4423

http://anniesmanchester.co.uk/

The Tea Cosy is a quaint vintage style tea-room which has recently opened in St Andrew's Court in Bolton town centre, in the little building central in the courtyard, where it also has outdoor seating. It only opened last month, so this is the first chance I'd had to see it, but I can't resist a tea room, so here I was! 

Walking into the venue, it's decorated with cool grey painted walls, and traditional tables and chairs, covered plastic table cloths of different designs and colours, giving it the perfect eclectic look, which also matches the mis-matched vintage crockery. Nobody greeted us, so we sat down and read the menu a bit.

The menu lists classic simple breakfasts and lunches, but also mentions things such as high tea, eggs benedict, and other tea room staples. However it, and their Facebook feed seems a little mixed when it comes to their offerings. Their image is that of a vintage tea room, but they offer things such as pizza, and fish and chips, all served on very modern style serving boards and paddles, which doesn't really go with the theme. It was nice to see a sign in the window saying that they are breastfeeding welcome. It's nice to see somewhere embracing the modern world with a sense of decency.

The counter had a basket boasting some of the more exotic blends of tea offered, allowing you to smell their aromas etc, but it doesn't mention who provides their tea. The Pear Caramel caught my partner's eye, so he ordered that. The lady serving us told us that she actually didn't like any of the exotic teas offered except the Pear Caramel. I fancied something a little more simple like an Assam or Darjeeling, but surprisingly neither were on offer, which is quite odd for a tea room. The blackboard mentioned Organic Earl Grey though, so I went for that. We placed our orders; I went for the high-tea, which was a scone, jam and cream with a pot of tea, and my partner went for the eggs benedict, which is one of his favourites. We chose to sit upstairs where there is more seating. 

Linking to what I said earlier, upstairs doesn't seem very vintage tea room either, with bright modern art pieces on the walls, and a couple of lime green sofas with grey faux fur throws over them and some cushions. More coffee shop perhaps.

My partner's Pear Caramel tea was very tasty and unusual, but sadly my Earl Grey was very unpleasant! Personal taste I'm sure, but it tasted soapy, so much so that I was curious if my tea pot had only recently been washed out with washing up liquid and had some left in it. But again, I'm sure this is just personal preference. 

The problem is that even though it took 20 minutes for our tea to arrive, we still didn't have any food to go with it. 5 minutes later my scone arrived, but for reasons I can't contemplate, it had been cut for me, and buttered with margarine! Why?! They were lovely large looking scones in the display box downstairs, but I didn't need it cutting, and certainly didn't need it "buttering", especially if I was also provided with jam and cream to go with it. I scraped some of the margarine off and spread the cream on. The cream was nice, but the jam was cheap Hartley's jam straight from the jar, and so didn't spread very well. The scone was tasty though, I definitely can't fault that. Strangely, my scone also came with a pile of squirty cream and some strawberries in it. The strawberries were lovely and fresh and tart, but the cheap squirty cream came right out of a can, and promptly turned into a bubbling puddle on my plate. At this point the friendly and nervous waitress came up to apologise and explain to us that the eggs benedict would only be 5 minutes.

It was another 15 minutes until my partner's eggs benedict arrived, served on one of those wooden serving boards, meaning the frankly unpleasant looking hollandaise sauce simply dribbled over the edge onto the wipe-down tablecloth. There was only 1 egg despite two muffin halves, and there was no seasoning or anything on the egg, just the aforementioned hollandaise sauce. EGG benedict rather than EGGS benedict I suppose. The presentation basically left a lot to be desired considering we'd waited 30 minutes for it to arrive when there was only 1 other table of people in the entire building.

This was the worst eggs benedict either of us had experienced. The hollandaise sauce tasted very much of vinegar, and didn't sit well in the stomach. The egg was both overcooked, and frightening to look at the inside of. We didn't get any napkins at any point, but the cutlery with the eggs benedict came wrapped in a bit of kitchen roll. 

I could see in my partner's face alone that he was deeply disappointed to receive this horrible version of one of his favourite foods on what was supposed to be a little treat of a visit. 

When we finished, we went back downstairs to pay. The waitress asked if everything was okay, but I simply replied that I'd brought the sweetener down with us. I didn't want to tell this perky friendly waitress the problem with everything, as she was only doing her best to serve. The woman who originally served us didn't say anything to us or ask how things were, as she was now busy explaining what an eggs benedict was to the single other table that were in the building, but going on to explain that she actually doesn't like it, as she doesn't like the hollandaise sauce. Frankly if that's the only hollandaise sauce she's tried, I'm not surprised she didn't like it!

We paid up and left. The friendly waitress saying goodbye, but the woman who took our order never so much as spoke to us again after we initially ordered. Shame really, I like it when the owner (or who seemed to be the one in charge at least) takes the time to interact with their customers and their experience. 

In conclusion, I love a vintage tea room, but this wasn't one, it was a café pretending to be one. The tea was nice for one of us, and horrid for another, the drinks and food took an age to arrive, the scone was cut and spread with margarine, the eggs benedict was stingy, unpleasant, and overcooked, and my partner later that day ended up with severe stomach trouble.

The Tea Cosy needs to focus on what it wants to be. Their Facebook page quotes, "Bolton's got everything except a proper tea room", but it isn't one! It's in a strange limbo between café, quirky diner, tea room or modern coffee shop, and then focus on the quality of the product they provide, and the quality of their service. Bolton DOES have proper tea rooms. I've reviewed at least two of them, including The Oxford Tea Rooms within walking distance of The Tea Cosy, and which does a much better job as a tea room, and Poppins Tearooms in Horwich, which is one of my all-time favourites. 

We were looking forward to this visit, but left disappointed. 

The Tea Cosy

St Andrews Court

Bolton

Greater Manchester

(01204) 398 061