The secret booking I made for today was of course the secret booking that I should have secured for yesterday, but Mandi was just going to have a late birthday treat (or Valentine’s Day treat, it is really up to her which one she thinks deserves the accolade). All week I had been trying to wind Mandi up about what we were going to be doing; wing-walking, bungee jumping (she has vertigo) naturist afternoon (only I am allowed access to her nakedness), and other outlandish excursions were mentioned, none of which she believed. The booking wasn’t until half past three so we didn’t have to be up and about too early thankfully (Saturday is my Sunday after all) so Mandi brought cups of tea to bed before she had a shower while I took the dog for a walk.

I had secretly booked afternoon tea at Browns Bar and Brasserie (they see fit to not use the apostrophe so I don’t feel it my place to add it despite having the green squiggle underneath it now as I type these words into Word), a place that neither of us had been before. Mandi wouldn’t let me tell her where we were going as she wanted to be surprised. That is my idea of a nightmare as I hate surprises. That’s not strictly true, I like a surprise but not the anticipation of a surprise as that kind of ruins the surprise so I’d rather not know that a surprise is imminent, just surprise me.

picture from 192.com

Browns is a lovely old place just skimming an area of the city called The Park, and I imagine was once a hotel. The building looks reasonably new to me although has been built in a style sympathetic to its surroundings, unlike a lot of houses in The Park – it’s a private estate and people don’t need planning permission to knock down a grand Victorian villa to build a modern monstrosity. I might be wrong of course but couldn’t pin it down.

The restaurant itself is light and clean, modern looking but maintaining an old fashioned look about it, making it the perfect venue for afternoon tea. When everything was delivered to our table, I wondered if there would be enough for two of us, but then again I have a huge appetite. I needn’t have worried as the platter of sandwiches (salmon, cucumber, egg and cucumber), scones, and cakes filled us up nicely but not uncomfortably so. That of course was the whole point of the concept of afternoon tea, to put you on rather than a proper meal in itself.

At home my tea of choice is PG Tips, who print a code in the lid of the boxes for something called Cuppa Club. This is a reward based system similar to the one once found in certain brands of cigarettes. I had used Cuppa Club points to get a discount on afternoon tea today, which made it even more value for money than it already was, but I was disappointed that they didn’t think to employ chimpanzee butlers for Cuppa Club members.

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