Afternoon Tea at Steakhouse 55

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I recently read in the Disney Parks blog that Disney was going to start serving afternoon tea at Steakhouse 55 at the Disneyland Hotel. I love afternoon tea – and I fondly remember the “Practically Perfect Tea” they used to serve at the Paradise Pier Hotel, which included an appearance by Mary Poppins! (This photo is from 1997!)

Practically Perfect Tea

“Classic Afternoon Tea at the Disneyland Hotel” was scheduled to begin on Friday, January 22, so I made a reservation for that day and invited my friend Kristin to join me, so we could celebrate her upcoming birthday. Tea is served from 12:00-3:00 on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Though no ending date has been announced, “through spring” is what Disney has stated.

We checked in a little early at Steakhouse 55, but were seated after just a short wait. Only about 2/3 of the tables were occupied, and there were empty tables, almost like a buffer, between most of the tables. Of course those tables were nicely set with tea cups and china, also.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea

There are three different tea services on the menu: two for adults, and one for kids. I’ll warn you that it is fairly pricey. The Classic Tea Party ($50) and Premium Tea Party ($65) offerings for adults both include scones, tea sandwiches, desserts and as many different teas and herbals as you wish to sample. The Premium also includes salad, a glass of Iron Horse Fairy Tale Cuvee, and a farewell gift of truffles. (If you’re familiar with my blog, then one guess as to which one I chose. 🙂 )

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea

The Kids Tea Party ($35) includes chocolate chip scones shaped like Mickey’s head, tea sandwiches, and desserts. In addition to tea, kids can also choose juice, milk and hot chocolate.

A selection of aperitifs, wines, ports and sherrys is available by the glass (additional charge).

Classic Afternoon Tea at the Disneyland Hotel Menu

Our tea began with our glasses of the Fairy Tale Cuvee. Kristin hadn’t tried it before, and really enjoyed it.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea

Our server asked us what teas we might be interested in, and offered some recommendations. She explained that we could try as many as we liked, and we could each have our own teapot, or share one. We initially chose the “house” tea: Perfect Afternoon, a blend of Assam, Darjeeling and Ceylon. The teapot was smaller than those you usually see in tea rooms – but that was fine, since we wanted to sample, and the smaller pot meant we wouldn’t waste a lot.

The first course was the salad. Baby lettuce with mint leaves, orange segments, sliced grape tomatoes and radishes, with Green Goddess dressing. I found the mint leaves odd, and after the first bite I put them aside, but Kristin liked the taste.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea salad

To go along with our tea, we had a selection of sweeteners – including rock candy sticks – as well as lemon wedges and honey.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea

The tea was fine – not the best black tea I’ve ever had. It didn’t have a very strong flavor.

Once we were done with our salads, our server brought the tiered plate server with all sorts of beautiful goodies on it.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea

There were two different kinds of scones: currant scones, and blueberry scones with an orange glaze on top.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea scones

We had Devonshire cream, lemon curd, and strawberry jam to go with them. Kristin preferred the currant scone, and I liked the blueberry, but they were both very good.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea

For tea sandwiches, we had cucumber and water cress, deviled egg salad, salmon gravlax, and mozzarella, basil, and tomato. Cucumber is not my favorite, but this was sliced very thinly. The water cress leaves were large! The mozzarella tomato was my favorite, but the egg salad and salmon were also very good. All were served on a different type of bread.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea sandwiches

We ordered a second pot of tea – we went back and forth between the Chakra Silver Tips (a white tea) and the Redbush Caramel Velvet, and decided on the latter. It was a rooibos tea (no caffeine) with a dulce de leche flavor. Very nice – just needed a bit of sweetener to bring out the caramel flavor.

We were starting to feel a little full, but we still had a plate of desserts to go! There were two chocolate-covered strawberries: one white chocolate, one milk chocolate. Also two mini fruit tarts and a selection of macarons. There were two chocolate, a strawberry, and a pineapple. The pineapple one tasted like caramel and not pineapple. The chocolate ones were my favorites.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea desserts

We asked about coconut macarons and our server said they had some, and brought us an extra plate. I didn’t taste coconut in them – they had a passion fruit filling.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea macarons

Our server told us that we could request that any of the teas be iced – and that we could get some to go. So we tried a third tea iced to go: Mountain Berry a caffeine-free herbel tea. It was very refreshing.

Last but not least we received a little packet with two chocolate truffles in it, to eat later. Because we were certainly too full to eat them at that time! It was a reasonable amount of food, plus it was on the rich side, and very satisfying. We saw a number of people taking “to-go” boxes out with them who obviously had not eaten everything.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea truffles

The tea was nicely paced, and we never felt rushed at all. It took about an hour and 15 minutes. The restaurant was quiet and it was a very relaxing and pleasant atmosphere. As I mentioned before, they did not seat all of the tables, which helped keep it quieter. I asked if there were two seatings, and was told it’s about a seating and a half. So they’ll turn the tables seated within the first hour or so, but not all of them. If you wanted to make it a special event such as a birthday party or bridal shower, there were some larger tables available.

Disneyland Hotel Afternoon Tea

Some people dressed up for the occasion, but I’d say that the majority were in park attire as we were. We certainly did not feel at all uncomfortable.

The service was excellent. The servers were excited about this new offering, and eager to answer any questions we might have. A manager came around and asked us about our experience.

As I mentioned it’s rather expensive. Annual passholder discounts are available, but even so it was over $140 with tax and tip. My opinion: it’s worth paying the additional $15 for the Premium Tea Party since it offers several additional items. It also includes salad, truffles and the glass of sparkling wine (the wine alone would be $17 if you purchased it separately).

I think Classic Afternoon Tea is an excellent special occasion type of experience, though at this price it’s not something I would do very often.

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Laura Gilbreath is a native of San Diego, CA. She has been making the trek up Interstate 5 to Disneyland since she was a small child and terrified of talking tikis and hitchhiking ghosts. She and her husband Lee enjoy trips to Disneyland and Walt Disney World, as well as sailings on the Disney Cruise Line.

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