I’ve been fortunate to have had the chance to visit quite a few tea houses in Vancouver (in fact, the Greater Vancouver Area) over the last 8-9 years. My goal for this and next month is to visit the rest of the few (5) tea houses I’ve never been to before.

The first on my list was La Petite Cuillère in Mount Pleasant, which I visited yesterday. I had passed by this tea house many times before when I used to take ballet at Mt Pleasant Community Centre.

The entrance, decorated for Christmas

The first thing I noticed when I walked in was how high the ceilings were. LPC may be pretty narrow but the ceilings made the small space less cramped and more inviting. The second thing I noticed was the number of china (tea cups and teapots) in the tea house. There were at least 2 cabinets filled with tea cups from different brands, in varying conditions. Many of these were for re-sale, which I thought was a clever thing to do.

One of the china cabinets filled with tea cups

The third thing I noticed were all the antiques and vintage pieces above the…mantel? (Sorry, I really can’t think of what it’s called.) Not only were there more tea cups, there were dolls, model ships, and tea caddies.

The centre of the tea house: cashier and kitchen

I decided to sit near the entrance so I could sit in the comfortable armchair. Every table had its own style of tablecloth, chairs, and lamps. My table had a teacup used as a plant pot, which I thought was pretty neat.

A teacup for plants! Never thought of that!

The painting hanging by my table. It reminded me so much of Lübeck, Germany for some reason…

There are three options for afternoon tea:

• La Petite Cuillère Tea: $12.75
• Afternoon Tea: $24.50
• High Tea: $13.75

As I was very hungry, I decided to go with Afternoon Tea, as High Tea would have had half the amount of savouries and sweets. For those of you used to High/meat Tea, let me tell you that in Vancouver, Afternoon and High Tea are used interchangeably. They are all Afternoon Tea. I don’t think there’s a tea house here that actually serves High Tea (cooked meal, bread and butter, tea).

Afternoon Tea

I was full when I reached the second tier and was unable to finish the cream puff and strawberry cream tart. (Don’t worry; I took it home and my brother gobbled it up.) Perhaps it was from all the oolong tea I had. My favourite selection was the warm croissant. I would have liked the apricot scones to be warm too but I know very few tea houses seem to have warm scones.

I was particularly impressed with the service at LPC. I’m not sure if our server is the daughter of the owner (or perhaps she is the owner) but regardless, she is very polite. They say we Canadians are very polite but nowadays, I find that there are fewer and fewer of us who are ‘repetitively polite’. These few are the ones who say ‘thank you’, ‘sorry’, or “you’re very welcome” a million times when most people today think saying those words once is enough. Perhaps it’s not a big deal for many, but I prefer the repetitiveness over the silence. I call this EXCELLENT and GENUINE service. 🙂

So stop by LPC and know you’re in good hands. 🙂