Spark a Little Romance With Some Tea

Tea suggests the sort of high romance you read about in Victorian novels. English tearooms, festooned with lace and chintz, were an ideal setting for decorous flirtation over a table of savories and pastries.

Many L.A. hotels have perfectly fine places for romantic afternoon teas, but the following tearooms offer an escapist’s dream. Their owners have created elaborate English fantasy settings suggesting Beatrix Potter’s books or “Vanity Fair.”

A few hours in any one of them--especially on Valentine’s Day--is bound to inspire romantic thoughts.

The Vintage Tea Leaf in Long Beach goes all out for Valentine’s Day. Festivities include a candlelight tea dinner today, a Victorian friendship Valentine’s tea with lyrical musical entertainment at 2:30 p.m. Sunday and a Valentine’s afternoon tea menu is served today through Sunday. This massive tearoom holds dozens of shabby-chic overstuffed chairs to sink into. Victorian bric-a-brac is everywhere and there is intimate seating on a quirky mezzanine.

A long menu offers 11 tea service combinations as well as luncheon and a la carte items. Many are wonderfully original: scone pudding with lemon curd and whipped cream, sandwiches on herb-seasoned scones with fillings such as chicken and homemade jam or souffle-like creamy spinach.

The finger sandwich list includes smoked salmon-ricotta mousse, artichoke and Parmesan on pumpernickel and tuna-currant salad with champagne-pepper jelly.

Tea service is fanatically proper. The house serves only whole-leaf teas brewed in warmed cozy-covered pots and poured into bone china cups that patrons select from the house teacup collection.

The skillful proprietary blends, numbering more than a dozen, are a vast improvement over anything obtained off a shelf. They include Friendship Blend (teas from three countries) and Tango-Spice Blend, with orange peel, rose petals and spices.

* The Vintage Tea Leaf, 969 E. Broadway, Long Beach, (562) 435-5589. Afternoon tea, $12 to $20; candlelight supper and Victorian teas, $30 (including tax and tip); Valentine’s tea menu, $26. No alcohol. Street parking. All major cards. Open 11:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Thursdays though Mondays.

At the Four Seasons Tea Room in Sierra Madre, antique linens and chinaware collections lend an air of gentility to the cozy dining rooms.

As the name suggests, the seasons rule here. The tea menus change throughout the year. Winter always brings a Valentine’s candlelight supper. On sunny days, you can take tea on the lattice-covered patio.

Tea sandwiches--five are served with the afternoon tea and the sandwich tea--change seasonally. Pumpkin bread with cream cheese, chicken salad with rosemary and golden raisins and roasted pepper with sun-dried tomato sandwiches may be among them.

Delicate scones with cream and jam, moist lemon-blueberry cake, a rich, chocolaty fudge brownie and butter-infused shortbread squares complete the menu. The salad tea features mixed greens with dried cranberries, almonds and blue cheese. The only teas offered are a house blend of Assam and Darjeeling and a decaf Orange Pekoe. Teas tend to be brewed on the weak side unless you request otherwise. Reservations are essential.

* Four Seasons Tea Room, 75 N. Baldwin Ave., Sierra Madre; (626) 355-0045. Afternoon tea, $11.50 to $16; Valentine’s candlelight supper, $35. No alcohol. Street parking and public lot. All major cards. Open 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays.

The Gilded Rose Manor in Northridge takes up an entire Colonial-style house that’s been painted a passionate shade of lavender. You may take your tea in one of several themed rooms: the Blue Parlor, the Rose Salon or the Atrium, whose walls are covered by a seashore mural.

As you settle back on slipcovered chairs, you’re handed menus and a list of teas and infusions affixed to a quaint Victorian paper fan.

You can choose the cream tea, the afternoon tea or the all-out royal tea. The sandwiches--curried chicken, cucumber and cream or egg salad on lavender bread with a hint of dill--look impressive on the tiered pastry servers.

The scones are tender and feathery, the not-too-sweet lemon curd is homemade too, as are sweets, which include raspberry-chocolate bar cookies and fluted cups made from good chocolate and filled with fresh berries and cream.

Theme tea parties and children’s teas are welcomed here, and there will be a Valentine’s candlelight dinner tea from 7 to 9 p.m.

* The Gilded Rose Manor, 17114 Devonshire St., Northridge, (818) 831-0511. Afternoon tea, $7.95 to $19.95; candlelight supper, $30. No alcohol. Parking lot. All major cards. Open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays, noon to 5 p.m. Sundays.

Grab your hat (and boa) and leave your worries at the doorstep at ColletTea.

This sweet neighborhood place, just a block from the ocean in Redondo Beach, provides a selection of boas and floppy, wide-brimmed Victorian hats for patrons to wear while they immerse themselves in the teatime experience. Damask-and-lace-draped tables, Victorian gewgaws and cozy-covered teapots provide the proper English cottage-by-the-sea ambience.

Tea menu items change frequently. A huntsman tea, served on a wooden plank, includes homemade soup (the chicken and dumpling soup is very fine) or a salad--perhaps the mixed greens with fresh raspberries, bleu cheese and caramelized pecans--plus cheese and an individual loaf of bread, such as thyme-rosemary.

Soup and salad come with the full ColletTea, after which arrive finger sandwiches (tea-poached chicken salad on potato bread, egg salad or European cucumber) and freshly baked scones with imported Devonshire double cream and lemon curd for spreading.

A plate of assorted fruit pieces and a little sweet, rich shortbread or a carrot bar round things out. Several lighter tea services are offered here too.

The favorites on Collet’s long tea list, all brewed with loose leaves, are the citron-infused green tea and the “courtship” black tea spiked with ginger.

* ColletTea, 320 S. Catalina Ave., Redondo Beach, (310) 372-0348. Afternoon tea, $6.25 to $20.95. No alcohol. Street parking and public lot. All major cards. Open 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays.