Wedding Afternoon Tea - Opinions please!

[DearDiary321]

Hey everyone!

We have started planning for our wedding which will be next June.

It will be a small intimate wedding of 25 guests. Registry office wedding at 3pm followed by a few photos outside the town hall, then a short drive to our reception location (a country park) with more photos here as it is beautiful. The building that the reception is in opens for us at 5 and ends at 9. There will be welcome drinks on arrival and a few canapés.

We have exclusive use of the venue for our reception, which is lovely but very small. The venue only offers cheese/meat platters so allows us to provide our own catering instead which we are going to do. We were originally thinking a cold buffet (there's no option for the food to be kept hot) but space is limited for where the buffet would actually be set out.

This led me to think of the idea of afternoon tea as the food would be on tiered stands on the tables we are sat at and therefore wouldn't need a designated buffet table. Has anyone done this before/been to a small afternoon wedding and had this? If so, how was it?

We would make sure there was a surplus of sandwiches etc so that the stands could be refilled if needed and people weren't left hungry.

We were thinking one stand between 2 people. With the stands having an array of nice sandwiches, pinwheel wraps, scones with jam and cream, nice mini pork pies with chutney, sausage rolls etc at first.

Then we were thinking of these being collected and coming back out later with little cakes and other desserts on them. We thought doing it this way would ensure that people would have enough food? People would have eaten breakfast and lunch before the wedding, and our invites will specify that it will be afternoon tea. What do you think to the idea of having the cakes separately rather than on the top layer of the stand?

What are your opinions on this please?

Thanks!

One of the best weddings I've been to was an afternoon tea. There were copious amounts of delicious sandwiches and little cakes/pastries. They just kept bringing more and more out when the tiers were empty. Tea, coffee and water on the table and the bar was open for those that wanted it. It was so relaxed and I loved it. The bride told me it was so much cheaper than a sit down meal to.

I went to a wedding that served afternoon tea at about 3pm (service at 1.30) with bubbles, speeches, and the bride and groom left at 5.

There was then a smaller evening reception with a sit-down dinner.

Worked really well.

I agree that if this is the only meal you may need to make it more substantial and consider gluten-free

I think it's a bit late in the day (6pm) to be doing Afternoon Tea. I think you'd be better off with food vans.

I think it sounds lovely, as long as you make it clear that's what the meal will be so people can plan a bigger lunch if they want

Sounds lovely, though with only 25 guests maybe a food van a little later on with some hot food? Cones of fish and chips or vegetarian sausage and chips? It would send your guests home with a satisfied tummy. No idea of cost though.

Friends daughter had this and it wasgreatbut there was plenty of savoury options including quiche etc.
Another idea would be a pizza van. Nephew had this for a small wedding and it worked really well.
Or a fish and chip van.

I don't think it's enough tbh. I don't eat sandwiches and my dh is fussy with fillings. So we'd maybe have a scone and a piece of cake. That's not enough having not had anything from lunch. Could you hire a pizza van or another type of street food place to come ?

You say there's little room to set up a buffet table, but where is the food storage and refilling the plate stands going to happen? Is there a kitchen?

The wedding is at 3pm and the venue is open to you at 5pm. That in itself sounds a long time to wait, but will the venue be open earlier to allow set-up of the food? Or do you need to factor in extra waiting time for that?

Sounds great, I would do a savoury one then followed by a sweet course.
As you day do more than sandwiches, mini quiches, posh sausages rolls, pork pies etc. Caterers these days can do a gluten free afternoon tea. Vintage crockery might be nice as well. Serve with tea coffee & fizz of course.
When my daughter got marries we collected vintage china for her day looked lovely.

Given that your time slot is 5-9pm I think you need to have a proper meal. I think people will expect it. If the whole event was earlier and your time slot was mid to late afternoon, the afternoon tea would be fine.

We had a cream tea, so scones/cream and cakes. This was at 4pm (wedding was 2.pm).
We then had a hog roast at 7.30pm.

I've been a guest at a wedding with afternoon tea. It was really lovely. It was done in courses as you have suggested with scones, cream and jam, sandwiches then cakes.

My sister did some thing very similar. However covid got in the way and the venue wouldn't honour the afternoon tea part, as they said they didn't offer it anymore. Instead they charged extra for a sort of ploughman's type platter. It was lovely and we really didn't need the meal
Out in the evening!

We did afternoon tea but also had a hot meal in the early early evening. Friends an relatives contributed to the afternoon tea (with things they made), which was nice. However, there was a bit of what a previous poster termed “cake overload”. We had mountains of cake. We also hired staff to make sure the trays were kept full and collect used plates, cups and glasses etc.

Thanks everyone! The venue have agreed to let us have a food van now. So we are having canapés on arrival and then probably opting for the BBQ food van. Looking at the photos online, there definitely won't be anyone going hungry!

Thanks so much for all of your help 😊

I've seen pizza can, burger and fish and chips. Personally I preferred the pizza one. Afternoon tea sounds lovely but alcohol will take a it's toll. I'd have lots of lovely soft drinks like fentimans as well. You do need more liquid eating claggy food

Afternoon tea is particularly tricky if you have guests with food restrictions such as people who are coeliac, vegan or vegetarian.

It will not be easy to produce special versions of the tea and would probably not be in pairs so you can't do one cake stand for two people.

The best wedding I've ever been to was an afternoon wedding with afternoon tea at about 4pm. It hit the spot perfectly. So did the buffet at 8pm though.

It will not be easy to produce special versions of the tea and would probably not be in pairs so you can't do one cake stand for two people.

It is possible. I have been to several afternoon tea type weddings where it has been done. Every plate was clearly labelled. Afternoon tea doesn’t necessarily involve cake stands for couples, so that wasn’t an issue.

Granted, there is always the possibility that omnivores will hoover up everything in their path. A reminder that there are people with dietary restrictions present may be needed.

We recently used Waitrose sandwich platters for my daughters wedding....they came in boxes which we fridged for a few hours until we needed them , and we put them on serving plates...they were fresh tasty and we felt worth the cost !!