Yauatcha City’s Summer Tanqueray Tea Garden.

Being back in London means I get to spend my evenings wining and dining at my favourite restaurants and bars again. The restaurants within the Hakkasan group have long been favourites of mine, and so a couple of weeks ago I spent a wonderful evening testing out Yauatcha City’s beautiful new Tanqueray Tea Garden and their Signature set menu!
We arrived shortly before the England vs Croatia World Cup match, and although we were initially sad Yauatcha didn’t have a screen set up, we could hear the reactions of the crowd in the bars below us, so quickly realised it was probably best we weren’t watching. We celebrated the first goal with martinis; a Lemonberry martini, and a Lychee martini.
We sat out on the Tea Garden terrace soaking up the summer evening and admiring the beautiful decorations on the terrace. There are two terraces at Yauatcha, and while the West side has been kept as an outdoor dining area, Yauatcha and Tanqueray No. TEN has transformed the East terrace into a floral Chinese tea garden, surrounded by a canopy of cherry blossoms, lush green foliage. and decorated with red lanterns and glowing candles. It was bliss sitting in the sunshine sipping on the specially designed Gin & Tea concoctions; Tanqueray No. TEN and Classical Beauty, and Tanqueray London Dry and Sencha. The barman also gave us a little plate of the tea used to make my Sencha cocktail to have a smell of, and it smelt DIVINE.

Although the Tanqueray London Dry and Sencha was the less pretty cocktail, it was much sweeter than the Classical Beauty and I much preferred it. Naturally you should get the Classical Beauty for the photos though 😉
After our drinks we moved over to the West terrace for dinner. I’ve dined at Yauatcha and Hakkasan so often now I know the menus inside out, however Alex hadn’t been before, and so I suggested we have the Signature set menu as it really does give you a good overall experience of the food at Yauatcha.

 

We started with the steamed dim sum (Scallop shui mai, Lobster dumpling with tobiko caviar, Edamame truffle dumpling) and fried and baked dim sum (Wagyu beef puff, Venison puff, Sesame prawn toast). I actually don’t usually like Edamame, but I LOVE this dim sum. The truffle is quite overpowering which I think it why I like it so much! When it comes to the baked dim sum, the Venison puff wins every time for me. Also don’t worry about there being only three portions…you don’t have to split them, they provide you with three each in separate steamers 😉
And then my favourite part arrived. The Crispy Aromatic Duck. I always struggle to choose between this and the Crispy Duck Salad (they’re both incredible), so it was nice that the Signature menu made the decision for me haha.
By this point we were both pretty full, and Alex looked at me in horror when I told him we had another three courses to go. We ate as much as we could of the Stir-fry pepper chilli seafood with asparagus and Stir-fry rib eye beef in black bean sauce (one of my favourite dishes of all time), but sadly couldn’t finish them.
We did however, demolish the desserts. Because everyone has a separate dessert stomach. The desserts on the Yauatcha set menu are never ‘set’, you just inform the waiter of any allergies and the Patisserie chef decides which desserts to present to you. It’s sort of like a luxury lucky dip, which I rather love as it forces you to try something different!
The Tanqueray Tea Garden is the perfect place to spend a summer evening in the city, but make sure you stay for dinner after trying out the cocktails!

 

*Our meal and drinks were complimentary, but all Hakkasan and Yauatcha love is my own.

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Catherine Lux
Catherine Lux

Catherine Lux is a veteran travel blogger by night and the Head of Content Marketing at Amazon by day. Originally from Surrey, she spent four years living in Australia (2007-2009, and 2016-2018), and now lives in London. An ex-party girl sometimes prone to relapses, she loves nothing more than sharing her fine dining and luxury travel experiences with her loyal readers.

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