Meg Rivers Artisan Bakery Review

I quite like receiving mail; letters, magazine subscriptions, coupons (bills are another story) but without a doubt the best thing to have come through my letter box this month was cake.

To our excitement, a little box of treats was delivered by the wonderful Meg Rivers Artisan Bakery, who sent each of us a batch of their popular Mini Megs cake collection.



The bakery is based in the village of Blackwell, Warwickshire and uses primarily locally sourced ingredients to create traditional and delicious cakes, biscuits and tray bakes which can be delivered to and scoffed in the comfort of your own home!

First off all, the cakes arrive in a sophisticated and pretty presentation box and are each individually wrapped to keep them fresh on their travels.



The large Mini Megs selection includes six flavours; two chocolate, two hazelnut, two salted caramel, lemon polenta, cherry, and ginger - a perfect mix of flavours so everyone’s sure to find something they love. For us that was the hazelnut and lemon polenta, baked to perfection and full of texture and flavour, shortly followed by the very chocolately chocolate cake - because who doesn’t love chocolate cake?

We managed to sample all flavours with a little help from our friends - if you were looking for a seal of approval, I think the fact that some of these keen taste-testers were immediately eyeing up the Meg River’s Christmas gift sets, is a good enough indication.



The large Mini Megs set is available to order for delivery for £22.00, which we think is totally worth it for nine quality cakes. Plus we recommend taking a peek at the gift collections for some great gift ideas for your loved ones or yourself - oh it is Christmas after all! - (Laura)

For more info, visit: https://www.megrivers.co.uk/

We were kindly provided with complementary products for review, but as usual all thoughts and opinions are our own!

National Afternoon Tea Week - Competition time!

This week you may have heard us banging on about a very special date in our blogging calendar - yes, it's National Afternoon Tea Week. Bring on the scones, pretty pastries and lashings of tea, as we celebrate our favourite afternoon ritual and you could be celebrating too with our fantastic giveaway! 

Last week we were lucky enough to try one of Delimann's fab afternoon tea gift boxes. Packed with everything you need to bring the tea room to your kitchen, we indulged in Delimann's oversized scones, Devon fudge and signature biscuits and now we're offering you the chance to do the same. 

We've joined forces with the lovely people at the Deli, to offer our readers the chance to win a Traditional Cream Tea delivered straight to their door. Excited? Read on. 

The Traditional Cream Tea includes: 

4 Oversized Devon Scones - Freshly baked on day of despatch
Devon Clotted Cream - Made on the local farm with milk from Guernsey cows

Delimann Jam - Winner of Gold Medal in Great Taste Awards

Westcountry Tea - 15 bags of refreshing afternoon tea
Traditional Tea Bread - Delicious signature tea bread, perfect buttered or even toasted.
Tea Lover Biscuits - Delimann's own biscuits, crisp and short and made in Devon
Organic, Clotted Cream Fudge - Made in the West Country with 100% natural ingredients

 

Oh we are good to you. 

 

All you have to do is answer this simple question:

 

In which town is The Delimann based?

Email your answer along with your name to theafternoonteaclub@hotmail.co.uk or tweet us at @TeacupReview 

Entries must be received by midnight on Saturday 17th August and the winner will be announced this Sunday. 

 

For more information on Delimann, visit their website at www.delimann.co.uk

Good luck! 

 

Terms and Conditions: Open to UK residents only. Only one entry per person. Competition will close at midnight on 17/08/2013. The winner will be chosen at random and announced on 18/08/2013. The Afternoon Tea Club's decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into. There will be no cash alternative. Winner will be notified via email. By entering the competition the winner agrees to participate in such promotional activity on our website and Twitter. No responsibility can be taken for any entries which are not recieved for any reason. The winner must be able to provide their own transport to and from the venue and accommodation should this be necessary. The Afternoon Tea Club operates as a separate entity to delimann.co.uk.

Product Review: Delimann Afternoon Cream Tea

Some people get Amazon packages in the post, some get postcards. Us? We get Afternoon Tea - its a hard life.

This week we were lucky enough to get our hands on one of Delimann's unique Afternoon Tea gift packages. Sent directly to our door and packaged super carefully in a neat box full of cream tea goodness, this is definitely the kind of mail we like to get.

Time for a cuppa.

Delimann offers several different Afternoon Tea packages, including; picnic hampers, champagne tea and even a special Birthday tea complete with a mini celebration cake - adorable. We tried their Devonshire Afternoon Cream Tea which included everything you need for a real Afternoon Tea experience in the comfort of your own home - two plain scones with Devonshire clotted cream and strawberry jam, Tea Lover Biscuits, West Country Teabags and Devon Fudge.

Devonshire Fudge - yum!

For starters, the great thing about this Afternoon Tea is there's very little preparation. Just simply heat the oven, pop the kettle on and grab your favourite cup and saucer.

The scones smelled absolutely amazing whilst baking away and came out a lovely golden brown colour. They were a great size too, much bigger than I had anticipated which is never a bad thing where scones are involved!

Biscuits for dipping.

The scones really did taste just as good as they looked. Smothered in strawberry jam and Devonshire cream, they were absolutely yummy. I often find some scones to be a little heavy yet these were lovely and light and not too filling, even with lashings of cream - I may have gone a little overboard on that one but I think I my indulgence can be forgiven.

Warm scones.

I'm a huge fan of good old tea and biscuits too so I was very happy to see the packet of Tea Lover Biscuits tucked away in our gift box. This really gave the tea a charming, homely feel and there were plenty to go around. The biscuits were melt-in-your-mouth good and baked in cute bitesize portions - lovely.

Jam and cream - it's a must.

I must admit when I first spotted the Devon Fudge pieces I was slightly surprised as they're not a typical component to cream tea. However, they were in fact a very pleasant addition - crafted with organic clotted cream, they blended really well with the Devonshire Cream theme. The fudge cubes were really smooth and sweet - perhaps too sweet for some palettes but for me they were a wonderful, unexpected treat.

Bitesize treats.

Finally, included in the box is a full packet of West Country tea - 15 teabags altogether. I really liked this because once the scones were finished with I could still enjoy this tasty tea days later with my morning cuppa - definitely value for money.

I very much enjoyed Delimann's Cream Tea. It was hassle free, super fresh and each part was served in really generous sizes. I would definitely recommend it as a gift for any tea lover - you never know, they may even share it with you.

- Laura

Delimann provide a range of Afternoon Tea gift packages and deliver all over the UK. Prices start at £15.00 for a traditional Cream Tea. To find out more and to order go to: www.delimann.co.uk

The Afternoon Tea Club Reviews: Fanny's Cream Tea by Post

As you know, we at The Afternoon Tea Club are partial to a couple of scones and a pot of tea so we were super excited when we received this yummy little package!

Afternoon Tea often conjures up images of grand hotels, perfect china and crisp white linen table cloths – which we highly approve of, of course! But sometimes there simply aren’t enough hours in the day to indulge in your favourite pastime, and after a busy day you might just want to curl up on your own sofa with a brew from your favourite teacup. Well, Fanny’s Farm makes that possible by bringing the best of Afternoon Tea to the comfort of your own home with their ingenious Cream Tea’s by Post!

Packaged to perfection in old fashioned brown paper and nestled rather creatively in a bed of popcorn, Fanny’s Cream Tea by Post has got your afternoon covered.

Tea for Two includes four fruit scones, a large jar Devon Clotted Cream of and two pots of homemade seeded raspberry jam along with two teabags, sweetly stamped with Fanny’s signature logo. There’s even a napkin each to complete the look – we loved the coordination.

There are handy instructions for tea too. The scones only take five minutes to warm in the oven whilst tea will take 3 minutes to brew for a cup that’s just right. The aroma from the oven was absolutely mouth-watering.

The jam and cream spread onto the scones very easily and there was a more than generous amount of both to go around. We loved that we each got our own jam jars and the labelling was extra cute with ingredient’s including ‘1% Fanny Magic’ – adorable.

The scones themselves were really lovely. We were anxious as to how the products would keep whilst in transit but they were extremely fresh and tasted great still warm from the oven. 

Cream Tea by Post would make a wonderful gift for any afternoon tea lover. You can treat yourself in your own time and have it exactly how you want it. It’s clear that a lot of love and care goes into each of these packages and that’s shown in the fantastic quality and faultless presentation. This really was a completely unique and very lovely experience – now who’s birthday is it next?...