Rating: ★★★★☆

Address: G/F, Mandarin Oriental Hong Kong, 5 Connaught Road Central, Central 中環干諾道中5號香港文華東方酒店地下

Telephone: 2825 4006

https://www.mandarinoriental.com/hongkong/fine-dining/captains-bar/

Many people who work in Central know Captain’s Bar as the obligatory post-work watering hole. Centrally located in the opulant Mandarin Oriental, this long-standing, classy haunt is famed for serving draught beer in silver tankards and their live jazz band in the evenings.

Captain’s Bar and The Chinnery have recently introduced some tasty afternoon tea sets that both look and taste incredibly attractive, and a few friends and I went to try them out!

(1) The Power Snack ($238 per person) is a compact afternoon tea set which features a mini pulled pork burger, a truffle croque-monsieur, an English pie and a chocolate cigar. The truffle croque-monsieur immediately stole my heart, as the bread was well-toasted and airy, and the truffle taste utterly distinctive.

Everyone loved the chocolate cigar and started posing with it in photos! Not only did it look adorable, it tasted mouthwatering too – this little bundle of goodness was filled with refined chocolate ganache, and even the “ashtray” was completely edible!

(2) If you are feeling hungry, you can order the Power Afternoon Tea ($328 per person), which offers more food than the Power Snack set.

The pork pie and smoked salmon bagel were clean-tasting and satisfying, and I particularly admired the topshelf quality of the salmon.

The roast beef with mini Yorkshire pudding was a delightful blend of flavours. The very British welsh rarebit was not my favourite item but it tasted decent, and there were also two pieces of our favourite truffle croque-monsieur.

A tea set is never complete without some sweet treats, and the chocolate cake, chocolate brownie and apple pie from The Mandarin Cake Shop certainly soothed and comforted all of us. My only complaint, though, was that the apple pie’s crust could have been a tad thicker.

(3) The tea sets come with a coffee/tea, and as usual, I ordered a tall, hot cup of latte.

(4) The gentlemen at the table preferred some cold beer, which was also available as an included drink. Should you prefer, you can even upgrade your beer to a smooth 12-year Macallan whisky for an additional $40!

Some people think that these new afternoon tea sets are very suitable for men as they are more meat-heavy with less emphasis on desserts. While this is true, as a girl I enjoyed them very much too, and no person, male or female, would ever turn down a scrumptious, decadent chocolate cigar!