Sarah S.
Yelp
The Commons Club is an adorable lounge area on the Virgin Hotel's second floor. Virgin hosts their happy hour for hotel guests there from 5-6pm, but you can also pop in for some eats or a drink throughout the day. When I went, there were a bunch of people also just hanging with their bags and getting some work done. Free WiFi ftw!
My friends and I went for their Upside Down Afternoon Tea which is served on the weekends from 2-5pm. The space itself is just filled with tons of interesting items - great photo ops abound! But for my friends and I, they set the table up in the most cute fashion ever! It was the perfect afternoon tea environment. Not to mention it's the best afternoon tea deal IN THE CITY. For endless tea and a tray of delicious tea bites, it's $25 per person. Way less than other city tea options like the Drake. That being said, it is a more casual possibility, less froofy, less fancy, but more fun! Not only can you do the $25pp regular tea option but they do boozy teas! It's called Upside Down Tea for this reason specifically. If you want the liqs, you can do one boozy or champagne teapot for $40, unlimited boozy teapot for 2 hours for $60 or unlimited all boos for 2 hours for $80.
In their regular tea selections, I was able to try the Moonlight Jasmine (hand tied green tea with jasmine flower & medium caffeine) and the Gingerbread Dream Rooibos (rum barrel aged South African rooibos blend with ginger and vanilla, caffeine free and truly smelled like gingerbread)! I thoroughly enjoyed both and they stayed on top of refilling out water for the tea quite well.
The bites were really great ranging from savory to sweet with bacon wrapped dates, PB&J mini donut, cheese & meat skewer, Salmon Cracker, Fourth of a BLT, churro, scone w/lemon custard, a berry parfait type of thing, mushroom & cheese mini quiche and a jam filled pastry. Ten little bites and it ended up being more than enough. We had one lady in our party that did not eat pork and they actually brought out an avocado toast & another jam toast for her so that was nice. The best things for me were the bacon wrapped dates & the PB&J donut! Noms!
Everything at the Upside Down Tea was incredibly cute, food was tasty and it was a great value! I'd definitely recommend it for a low-key, chill afternoon tea option.