Winning charm: why The Montagu Arms in Hampshire is the best Country Hotel in Britain to take your tea

30th May 2013

The Montagu Arms Hotel in Beaulieu, Hampshire has won the Tea Guild's Top City and Country Hotel Award for 2013

The New Forest - once the hunting ground of kings - is a well-loved and well-known part of the UK, famed for its wild ponies, wooded walks and pretty towns. Now, it has another accolade to add to the list.  The Montagu Arms Hotel in the village of Beaulieu has won the Tea Guild’s 2013 Top City and Country Hotel Award.

The Tea Guild’s annual awards are considered the Oscars of the tea world and are highly coveted by members. Inspectors visit each venue anonymously and judging takes place over sixteen separate categories, from the staff’s knowledge of tea, and how it is served to the cleanliness of the bathrooms and the quality of the scones.

The Top City and Country Hotel Tea Award is a fairly new category. Awarded for the first time in 2010 it enables the Tea Guild to recognise those amazing country hotels where tea is very much a part of British tradition.

The Montagu Arms gained a nearly perfect score. "The hotel was favoured by the judges for its delightful surroundings, the staff’s extensive knowledge of teas, and really scrumptious food," says Irene Gorman, head of the Tea Guild.

Afternoon tea is served in the Magnolia Lounge where log fires roar in the winter. In the summer, guests spill out into the conservatory or onto the terrace that overlooks the gorgeous country garden. Taking tea at The Montagu Arms really is a quintessentially English affair.

The hotel's reputation for excellent food had flourished under the expert eye of Roux scholer and head chef Matthew Tomkinson. But resident manager Sunil Kanjanghat was keen for the hotel’s afternoon tea to catch up.

"There is a wide variety and assortment of teas available in this country to enjoy and tea should be taken seriously. My thinking was to make the experience interesting, exciting and memorable for the guest," says Sunil.

"It was a fantastic surprise to win this prestigious award," he says. "But a lot of hard work went into to achieving the end result. Credit must go to the team and to the Tea Guild for all its advice and feedback."

All told, it took four years for Sunil’s labours to bear fruit.

"We visited other winning venues to learn from their example. We also had several meetings with tea suppliers to make sure that we were giving guests the highest possible standard of teas - at the right price. There have been countless training sessions, and we regularly retrain the team so that their tea knowledge is constantly up-to-date," he explains.

There is a range of afternoon tea options for guests to choose from. Those who wish for something on the light side can choose to take the cream tea (two scones served with clotted cream and New Forest jam). Those with savoury leanings can pick one of the sandwich and tea pairings such as organic smoked salmon and milled black pepper with Lapsang Souchong tea or honey glazed ham with Pommery mustard paired with Russian Caravan tea.

"In our restaurant we pair our wines with food, so I thought why not pair our teas with our sandwiches," says Sunil. 

But for special occasions or for spending time with family, friends or colleagues, the full traditional Afternoon Tea is served throughout the week.

"Our guests take their tea course by course," explains Sunil. "As a surprise we like to give our guests an amuse-bouche to add to their whole afternoon tea experience, which starts with the savoury selection, followed by us serving warm freshly-baked scones and then finally the delicious cakes and pastries from our patisserie."

For Sunil, winning this award is obviously a dream come true.

"I feel totally overcome with emotion to have won. This is simply one of the best things (if not the best thing) that has happened to The Montagu Arms Hotel."