About two months ago, a college acquaintance of mine posted photos on Facebook of a lovely…read moreafternoon tea, tagged only that she was in Tampa. Since she doesn't live here, I wondered where this place was, because the tiered trays looked delicious. I scrolled through her photos and realized it was somewhere in Midtown, so I dug a little bit online to find out that it was at William Dean Chocolatier (which I honestly didn't even know was here... though admittedly I'm not at Midtown very much). My mother-in-law's birthday was coming up, so I knew this was the perfect place to take her.
They do the afternoon teas on the weekends (though I was told they were going to be stopping them for a little while, and they expect to start up again around February). It was $35 per person, which is reasonable for tea service. Each person gets their own teapot and choice of tea, along with the tiered tray of savory options, scones, and desserts.
I really enjoyed the savories, which included a cucumber and lemon dill cream cheese sandwich, cranberry and pecan chicken salad sandwich, mini beef wellington, bacon and leek mini quiche, and a cheddar and gruyere scone. For the sweet options, we each had a vanilla scone, raspberry and almond petit four, lemon tart, earl grey financier, bouchon brownie, and passionfruit macaron. The brownie, macaron, and lemon tart were all quite tasty, but by and large, I found myself preferring the savory options more. All in all, everything was quite good, and we left VERY full. It's always pretty surprising how seemingly tiny finger sandwiches, a scone, and mini desserts can end up being so filling!
Their chocolates on display all looked amazing so we decided to get a small selection before we left, along with a box of their dark chocolate coconut squares. The chocolates were all tasty, but those chocolate coconut squares in particular were divine!
FYI for any parents, they do not have high chairs -- I asked about this when I called to make the reservation, so I knew ahead of time to bring the stroller for my son.