What’s Brewing--From Kansas City to Thailand

Not long ago, I checked into the Vista International hotel in Kansas City in the early afternoon in preparation for an evening business meeting. As the bellman opened the door to my room, he performed the usual tasks of explaining the obvious locations of the bed, bathroom and air conditioner.

As he has leaving, he gave me my key and wished me a pleasant stay. “Oh yes,” he added, “will you be joining us for afternoon high tea downstairs?”

Was I in the right hotel? In the right city? Indeed, the bellman assured me, I was in Kansas City. And, he then told me, the hotel’s afternoon high tea service was very popular with the guests as well as with the locals.

He was right. At 3:30 that afternoon, I went downstairs and, sure enough, there were a lot of tea drinkers quietly sipping away. For only $5.25, I was served assorted finger sandwiches, scones, pastries, and last but not least, my choice of teas.

It’s Pouring All Over

As I soon discovered, the Vista is not the only hotel in Kansas City offering a traditional afternoon high tea service. And Kansas City is just one of dozens of U.S. cities where hotels are offering them.

It has essentially become the newest, most popular service at a few hundred U.S. and foreign hotels.

The high teas have become extremely popular with businessmen looking for ways to conduct their business outside their hotel room, but not outside their hotel. As a result, in many cities, the hotel afternoon high tea is becoming yet another power business meal.

The high tea has also become a favorite with vacationers staying at hotels as a way to quietly relax or meet new people in a peaceful public setting.

And finally, the concept of the high tea has gained followers among hoteliers. Not surprisingly, the high tea service tends to generate additional revenue for hotels during a time of the day when their public areas and restaurants are usually dormant.

Anyone with a sense of history can tell you that the afternoon high tea service is anything but new.

Afternoon Break

Almost all the credit goes to Anna, the seventh Duchess of Bedford. The 18th-Century aristocrat complained often of having a sinking feeling in the afternoon.

This was soon remedied by her house servants, who served tea and cakes. She invited her friends to her London town house to enjoy the daily experience and the tradition was launched.

At some hotels, maintaining an afternoon tea custom has become a logistical problem.

“It’s very difficult to import the kind of tea we want here,” said Clyde Min, general manager of the Regent hotel in Bangkok. “But we planned ahead and did it.”

The Regent tea is patterned after the Dorchester Hotel’s high tea in London. The hotel offers a full line of Twinings teas, as well as matoon tea, a local Thai tea made from bale fruit.

Each afternoon from 3 to 6 local Bangkok socialites as well as hotel guests gather for the tea. As a small chamber music group plays from the balcony, the hotel offers the teas, along with finger sandwiches, scones, fresh fruit and a selection of Thai dim sum. “The dim sum,” Min said, “is to let them know we’ve maintained the British traditions but to remind them they’re still in Thailand.”

Bargain in Thailand

The price for the high tea in Bangkok (about U.S. $3.80) is also much less expensive than it is at the Dorchester, the Ritz or the Savoy. At these three London hotels, tea service can get pricey. At the Ritz, tea runs 8 (about $12) a head. At the Savoy, it’s 7.50, and the Dorchester will set you back 7.30.

Still, reservations at these legendary high tea hotels are a must. Despite the high prices, it is not unusual for afternoon teas to be see-and-be-seen, sold-out events. London’s society ladies frequent the teas, and it’s not unusual for the Queen Mother or other members of the Royal family to drop in occasionally at the hotels to sample a few scones with clotted cream.

However, back in the United States, even at the hotels that have been offering the traditional service for quite some time, afternoon high teas are no longer the exclusive bastion of socialites looking for ways to quietly and delicately pass the time between more formal meals.

The Clift Hotel in San Francisco offers an excellent tea service. The Mayfair Regent in Chicago takes their tea service very seriously. The hotel’s large and beautifully appointed tearoom offers guests 24 separate tea choices, as well as a great view of Lake Michigan.

Fashions, Fox Trots

Some hotels have combined their tea service with afternoon dancing, especially on Friday afternoons.

Other hotels, like the Mandarin in Vancouver, offer a series of “fashion teas” in the afternoon.

The Lancaster hotel in Houston converts their lobby each afternoon for an elegant tea service. And its tea menu provides guests with a short history of tea drinking.

The high tea boom has also had a renaissance on cruise ships. On some cruise lines, the afternoon high tea almost qualifies as another meal. (For those cruise passengers who have late dinner seatings, the high tea may in fact be a most necessary meal.)

Afternoon tea traditions continue in the air as well. At virtually any time day or night, it’s teatime on any number of British Airways flights somewhere around the world. The airline, which will use 28 tons of tea this year, served more than 64,941,000 cups of Brook Bond Green Label tea in 1985 to its passengers.

A Daily Event

On Holland America line ships, high tea is a daily event, even when the ships are in port.

“We try to maintain the high tea service,” said Holland America’s senior vice president Bob Brennan, “not only because it’s a nice touch but also because it says something about our ships, it preserves a certain style and grace. Also, it seems to fit with the mood that we aren’t trying to rush anywhere . . . or anyone. The tea service tends to bring people together.”

It’s a philosophy shared by the management of the small Spindrift Inn in Monterey, Calif. “With only 42 rooms in the entire hotel,” said Spindrift general manager Betty Warren, “our afternoon tea becomes a special social time for all of our guests to meet each other.”

Each afternoon in the hotel’s small lobby, trays of finger sandwiches, cheeses and of course a selection of teas are served to the guests in front of the main fireplace.

Even at some larger hotels, the thinking has been to keep the afternoon tea service intimate. At the Century Plaza hotel in Los Angeles, the high tea is served in the living room of the hotel’s new tower from 3 to 5, seven days a week.

No more than 34 people can be accommodated. The Century Plaza serves seven varieties of Twinings, as well as such baked delights as hot English scones, finger sandwiches, pastry cookies and of course traditional tea cakes. Cost: $9.50.

‘A Positive Value’

“Many of our guests from Europe feel quite at home when they visit us during teatime,” said spokeswoman Georgiana Francisco. “But we think there has been another, more positive value in this service. We also see a lot of executives who come in to do business over tea rather than traditional cocktails. Not only is our tea service done with a great deal of refinement and style, it also takes the edge off the normal high-strung pace of the cocktail hour.”

But don’t get the idea that you can only find teetotalers at the Century Plaza between 3 and 5 each afternoon. The hotel doesn’t exactly consider itself a purist in these matters.

For those who have come to love teatime without a similar attraction for the tea itself, the Century Plaza gladly offers a special vodka and caviar menu.