January 2025
Thus begins my florida tea tour; stick around until the end to find out my final score at my first FL stop!
The good, the bad, the ugly, and the yummy of afternoon tea, fort myers florida edition.
For stop #1 of my Florida tea tour I went to Wisteria Tearoom and cafe in fort myers. We reserved online in advance and my mom and I enjoyed tea for two guests; we chose their dutchess tea which came with one tea pot for the table to start. There were several tea options to select from but we couldn’t agree on a flavour so we were permitted to have two tea pots to start. I chose ‘chocolate almond cookie’ and my mom chose earl grey lavender. Both were black teas. They come presteeped to your table so there are no tea bags and steeping time to think about. It was steeped fairly strongly I’d say. We both ended up preferring the almond cookie tea but both teas we tried were good. We noticed the table besides us with 4 guests got to start with two tea pots. You can order new flavours during your visit so tea is no issue here.
Let’s get into the nitty gritty now starting with the Good. The good aspect here was the food on an overall basis. I’ll give the details. Their afternoon tea menu changes monthly and this was their January offering; they also have a lunch menu here with several options if someone in your group doesn’t care for afternoon tea. For us, each guest received a hummus and feta toast, a cucumber cream cheese open faced sandwich, a cheesy puff pastry and a roasted veggie quiche. All of these items tasted good to both of us. We liked the variety of having two pastries and two bread-based items; we always love to see the classic cucumber cream cheese served. I would note that each item had a decent cheesy element which really worked well for us b/c we like cheese but might not be everyone’s favourite. For example, the puff pastry was to be spinach, artichoke, and cheese but we only tasted cheese - again, that works for us but it may not compliment everyone’s palette; not a complaint just an observation. Overall, we liked all 4 savouries in terms of variety and taste.
For the scone tier, each guest received the scone of the day which on this day was white chocolate and apricot. We each got just one smaller scone and we had a shared pot of whipped cream. There was no jam, no fruit curd, no butter, and no proper clotted cream served. However, having been to this tea room a few times in the past (including just last year), we knew they didn’t have clotted cream so we stopped at World Market on our way here in the hopes of finding some. We lucked out by finding these shelf stable jars of clotted cream there for $4.49 per mini jar. So if you’re in the market for clotted cream you can likely find it at World Market (We also found the refrigerated version at Whole Foods the day before; seen here). Anyway, this clotted cream was fine except we would have liked it slightly cooler b/c it was a bit too runny from being room temp in the florida sun. In terms of the scone at Wisteria, I liked this scone b/c it had sugar baked on top and the white chocolate chips had caramelzied a little bit so it was really yummy for me. But honestly it had more of a crumbly coffee cake consistency than a scone consistency. However, my mom would have preferred a more classic scone served with jam and cream as she enjoys a plain scone that can really carry the toppings of jam and cream; she’s not wrong but it’s all about personal preference. I, of course, wanted two scones or one that was larger. To me, the scone tier is what makes afternoon tea, “afternoon tea” so it’s very important to me that it stands out as part of the experience. This one did not really stand out.
For the top tier, the sweets each guest received a cheesecake bite, a bundt cake, and a creme brulee. The cheesecake was supposed to be turtles flavoured (chocolate and pecan), to me it was just cheesecake so nothing special. The bundt cake was orange chocolate and had a nice consistency and flavour. The creme brulee was espresso flavoured. I don’t mind a coffee flavour but since I don’t drink it ever, this wasn’t my favourite flavour. The temperature and consistency of the creme brulee though, was perfect.
So overall, this food was good as they were quality bites with good variety, with minor misses on some of the bites.
The Bad - there wasn’t anything really bad here. I would say the closest thing to a bad aspect was the scone tier. There are not any other afternoon teas that I’ve been to, and I’ve been to a lot, where only one accompaniment is served with the scones. Not even any jam is served here which is quite a departure from the norm. Of course, if you’re serving a thing called afternoon tea, proper clotted cream should always be served. And as mentioned, the scone texture here was more cake like than scone like, in my experience. Still a tasty treat just not the usual scone. Not necessarily bad though.
The Ugly - nothing is ugly here. As you can see it’s a small space with lots of tables but it’s well appointed.
The Yummy - The best bites for me were the savories as they all tasted quite good.
This afternoon tea costs $37 USD per person which is about $53 Canadian dollars, using today’s conversion rate. This price, at least in US dollars is on par for this offering recalling that there were 4 savouries, 1 scone, and 3 sweets. We often see servings a wee bit larger than this for a wee bit higher price, like around $40 US or more, so this price matches the portion served. The service here was good and our server was friendly.
Based on my experience on this day, my overall queen of afternoon tea rating is 4.2 out of 5 stars. If you’re in this area this is a good option to visit. Have you been to wisteria for afternoon tea? Would you go? Comment below and please follow and subscribe for the rest of this Florida tea tour.
