Pre-wedding vegan high tea

So...our wedding is coming up at a rather startling rate.

I think I've mentioned previously that the wedding itself will be quite small. Neither of us could cope with the idea of a large-scale event, and so we are keeping the guest list to our immediate families only - a grant total of 15 people (including us!).

In light of this, I wanted to celebrate with some of my friends in advance of the day, in a way that would have less attention on me and more scope for casual and one-on-one interactions. The solution: a pre-wedding high tea.

When I decided on this, some months back, I set about trying to find a suitable high tea location. I didn't want one of the fancy hotels, because I wanted children to be able to attend and guests to be able to mingle if desired. I nearly booked one of the better known (non-hotel) high tea providers in Perth, which has a great location by the river, but I kept hearing poor reports on the food.

Then my searching turned up Heavenly Plate Cafe. This is a vegan and vegetarian restaurant that primarily does main meals, but they also do vegan cakes and slices. Reviews on Urbanspoon and elsewhere are positive. I asked if they could do high tea, they said yes, and my location was decided.

I am so glad I did find them. We arrived to three beautifully set tables and the wait staff coped brilliantly with our large group, which included 20 adults, 3 children, and 2 babies (plus prams).

The afternoon started with a tea menu that dazzled me with its choices. I had the Ginger Twist, which was everything the description suggests (and very good), but was also intrigued by the Chocolate Mint Truffle.

The food was also wonderful.

I wish I'd asked for a summary of what the plates included, but as I didn't, the following is my interpretation of the flavours. Each three-tier stand was for sharing across two people, so the serves were generous.

The bottom plate included mini cups of tomato soup, which were beautifully flavoured - slightly sweet, slightly salty, with plenty of tomato flavour and a smattering of herbs (I think basil). The soup was well received by everyone and managed to be warm without burning hot, which was impressive when considering they dished up 23 individual cups.

The bottom tier also included sandwiches, which consisted of salad and a faux meat that reportedly tasted "just like chicken". In fact, my sister insisted it was chicken, until I explained to her that everything was vegan and chicken was thus impossible (!). I skipped over the sandwiches to allow room for sweets, which means I can't comment on these myself, but they certainly looked impressive. In hindsight I should have taken my share home, but I was so dazzled by the sweeter offerings that sandwiches paled in comparison.

Moving on to those sweeter offerings, the middle plate included vanilla cupcakes with very cheerful yellow icing, mini fruit tartlets, and mini cheesecake-like layered puddings.

It was a very good tier.

The cupcakes were soft and fluffy, and their icing was dense and fluffy. Definitely no hint of vegan ingredients.

The mini fruit tarts tasted exactly like the non-vegan variety I enjoyed as a child, and may have reignited a love for fruit tart products.

The highlight for me, though, was the mini cheesecakes. I do wish I had asked about these (I was distracted with socialising), as they were the talk of several tables. The base had tones of ginger, and managed to be soft and sufficiently textured all at the same time. The middle, 'creamy' layer reminded me of ricotta cheesecake: light and sweet and perfectly offset against both the base and the fruit topping. There was some debate over the flavours of the fruit topping, but the consensus was passionfruit and mango. Other than Mr Bite (who appeared at the end and tried some) and the three children, I think these were universally liked. They were certainly liked by me.

On the top, we had scones, served with raspberry jam and coconut-based cream. The scones were of the 'dense' scone variety, in the sense that they were crumbly and solid rather than soft and airy. I liked them very much. The coconut cream was also impressive, and was the one feature that was clearly vegan. Everything else could have passed for a non-vegan version of the dish in question, but the coconut cream was novel and very cleverly done. People seemed to like it, and the jam was thick and very much full of fruit.

Being me, there was a certain amount of anxiety in the morning of the event (would people enjoy themselves? would the cafe work out? would the food be okay? would people hate the vegan options? would things go smoothly?). Once I got there, though, there was no need for worry and Heavenly Plate did a truly wonderful job with the catering. My non-vegan (and mostly non-vegetarian!) friends seemed genuinely impressed with the food, and given how large the serves were, there were surprisingly few leftovers.

All in all, it was a wonderful afternoon and I am very grateful to my friends and family for facilitating it. The food, the venue, the people, the conversations, the time celebrating with friends...all of it was fantastic.

Heavenly Plate Cafe is at 899 Canning Highway, Applecross, Perth, Western Australia.

Tell me - have you been to any high teas?

Tweet

Pin It