TWG Tea Salon Experience

As Tea Lovers, Keevee and I often exchange notes on our different tea experience. Once we did a Mini- Tea -Party at the office, where I brought my Japanese Tea Set and had tea during an afternoon break at our pantry with matching pastry (i think its Dew Berry if I'm not mistaken). She had mention to me about the TWG Tea Salon at Greenbelt Makati which I always passby whenever i'm in the area but never really got myself to enter the store... maybe because I was intimidated by the crowd. But agreed we'll try it out someday. And that someday came sooner when I had to join a meeting with her client for a possible long term contract deal. And so it was planned that we will stop by Rockwell, where they have another branch, before going back to the office.

The meeting went smoothly than we have expected... (we expected the worst!) and to our delight, the possible long term deal became a reality and so i was more than fitting to celebrate our closed deal with tea-time. It was Lunch time and I was expecting the place to be crowded just like in their Greenbelt branch, but it was almost empty except for 3 tables that were occupied.

A display of mouth watering french macarons greeted us at the entrance, they look so delicious that I felt like I was in a trance (reliving that first bite of a Laduree macaron). Keevee and I are just so excited when we were greeted by the hostess and was escorted in our table. I was impressed with the customer service (offered to get another chair for our bags to sit, pulling of the chair and the table attendants are very courteous) which I should expect since they are selling "world’s finest luxury tea brand".

French Macarons lined up at the entrance

The Wellness Group Tea Company, usually shortened to TWG Tea, is a Singapore-based tea company. It began in 2008 and primarily sells tea and light snacks.

And so we were given the menu and i was overwhelmed with the choices... they're could have been 1000 different flavors of tea in that menu. So we asked for the best seller... we were give a lot of choices and had the chance to smell the tea leaves as our attendant patiently explain to us what constitutes that particular tea... So I settled for the Happy Hour Tea ( P195 ) and Keevee got the Happy Birthday Tea (P195) .. which i guess was just appropriate being this is what our state of mind was at that time (HAPPY!).

Way toooooo many to Teas to choose from

Keevee and her Happy Birthday Tea

Me, waiting for my Happy Hour Tea

Can I take you home Mrs. Potts?

And then we ordered the macarons (P55 a piece), we chose Napoleon Tea & Caramel, Camelot Tea & Praline, Vanilla Bourbon Tea & Kaya and the Earl Grey Fortune & Chocolate. And to my horror, the Earl Grey Fortune & Chocolate was not just as hard as a cookie that my knife can't even cut it without flying to the next table (i had to use fork and force to slice it) but it tasted like a bark (maybe because it smelled like dried leaves too so I immediately associated it with a tree). The Napoleon Tea & Caramel wasn't as bad (maybe because of the caramel) but its as hard as a cookie as well. Vanilla Bourbon Tea & Kaya was not as hard as the first two but it didn't have a distinct taste either, it was okay. The only one that we liked was the Camelot Tea & Praline it was not hard but it was not soft either, it was again okay. I think the Praline saved this one.

Looks can be deceiving.. This is true even to a French Macaron

Over-all, I had to say, the Tea tastes good but the price its just too much for commoners like me. And I was expecting that when additional hot water is added to the pot, we'll be able to enjoy a second round but I was wrong. No second round here... you need to order another pot. And try other pastries, they might taste better that the stone-like french macaron.

xoxo,
S