Afternoon Tea at The Goring

Our first and hopefully not the last family celebration at The Goring. Our confidence in the venue was not misplaced.
General observations: include fruit cake, Madeira/cherry cake rather than just patisserie, and warmed scones in a chafing-dish; the large teapots (in our case 5) took up rather a lot of space.
Restaurant staff attentive and ever eager to please and inform.

Features: 1 Room in sunlight, 2 Food, 3 Service. The room in afternoon sunlight is glorious, the food was tasteful and plentiful - the savory sandwiches were best, and service was attentive and pleasant even if not confident. We enjoyed ourselves!

My first tea experience. Six of us.
I thought it was lovely and beautiful.

I cannot comment as I cancelled the reservation well in advance and did not attend the tea.

love the thoughtful selection of nut-free sweets for me and gluten-free selections for my friend, especially that we were given separate preserves dishes in order to avoid cross-contamination

It was FANTASTIC! The staff were extremely attentive and helpful. The food was delicious. And everyone went the extra effort to make my friend's engagement celebration perfect (the cake at the end was a wonderful touch that was very much appreciated).

What a wonderful hotel, your staff are professional, polite and friendly. They made my Sisters birthday very special thank you

Absolutely wonderful- very friendly staff and can’t wait to come again

This is our 3rd visit for afternoon tea at The Goring but we were rather underwhelmed by the experience this time. Our previous visits have been in the Lounge but this is no longer used for afternoon tea & instead we were in the dining room which felt less intimate for tea.
The staff were nice although slightly less attentive than in the past. The sandwiches were tasty & as we were hungry we did have refills but the bread was slightly dry - they had definitely been made well in advance. We didn't ask for them to be changed as it was my daughters birthday & we didn't want her to think the meal wasn't special but the extra plates were the same anyway. The scones were small and also quite dry, the cakes were pretty to look at but the taste was not up to the look for us. I had mentioned it was my daughters birthday & they bought out a piece of cake with a message & candle and that was a nice touch.
The champagne glasses were not flutes so just looked like wine glasses - we had 3 glasses each and because of the pattern on them we noticed that measures were smaller than the ones we had in the bar later. We had two different types of tea but they used the same strainer for both pots - I'm not a connoseuer of tea but it did seem a lack of detail. We watched them actually iron a tablecloth on the table next to us which seemed strange - we have seen them change the tablecloths at Claridges and that is a work of art.
We came because it was a birthday treat but left disappointed & will not return.

A delightful venue for a delicious afternoon tea served with attention and care. The plates and cups were replenished frequently. The room layout meant tables were not tightly squashed and there was no sense of hurrying you out for the next group, which can happen at some of the other big hotel locations in London from our previous experiences. We would definitely go back.