Original Maids Of Honour

A total flashback experience. The food was good and the staff so friendly.
Roast was spot on!

Maids of honour is in the middle of a busy road in Kew. The place itself looks like an old lady’s cottage. When you enter, there’s a counter with their daily wares and a seating area to the right.
The menu itself is quite big, full of sweet and savoury options. Afternoon tea combinations as well as single options and full meals.
We went for cream tea which is 2 scones and tea for £7. The scones weds, as expected, home-​made and crumbly soft. Delicious.
We also tried their savoury high tea and we thought their leek quiche was excellent. Their chicken pie was outstanding, never had a pie outside of my mother’s which was so good.
Overall, the food was excellent, but expensive, £7 for 2 tiny scones and tea and a slice of pie for £6.50?
Service is pretty poor, no personal feel, rushed and disinterested. But they are so busy, they rest on their laurels and I’m sure they don’t care and I think I’ll be back too.

When in Richmond/​Kew it is a must to stop here for a takeaway of the famous Maids of Honour tarts. The eponymous tearoom in Kew Road has been selling the small sweet cheese curd pies since the 18^th century. Even better if you’d prefer to stay for tea — the place is almost always packed (especially at weekends), so it would literally be your lucky day. :)
The décor is indeed old fashioned, but charming — though I do wish the chairs were slightly more comfortable. The classic blue china is by Spode and you are served by uniformed staff. First time I went there I was torn between two pies and the lady behind the counter kindly treated me with two samples on a plate so I could sit down and make up my mind. :) This time I decided to go the whole hog and plumped for a proper afternoon tea. The sandwiches are small but perfectly formed, and all the classics are here: eggs, cucumber, roast beef, salmon, and cheese. The bread not being dry definitely a plus in my books. The two scones that followed were also small but perfect in texture and taste, the jam had bits of strawberries in it and real clotted cream is always a joy to behold.
To finish things off you get to choose a cake or pastry and I went for the mini vanilla cake; you can really taste the vanilla while you delight on your handful of sweet, fluffy sponge. The small-​ish sizes allow you to happily munch your way through the three tiers without feeling uncomfortably full. The pot of breakfast tea was lovely and the charming staff accomodating to my request of extra hot water (it seems to be a problem in some places, go figure). My friends had the chicken pie and the sunday roast, all plates licked clean. I can vouch for the pie myself: it’s delicious.
For «desert» (sorry, not sorry) we ordered a round of Maids of Honour + half a dozen to take away. They’re that good and I will let you in a secret: they taste even better the next day. :) Go the full tourist and take a picture with the old Morris 8 parked in front, framed by pink climbing roses in the summer; instant Instagram appeal. :)

Hmmm… I’ve been there many times, for its lovely tea set and food. However, I can’t give it more stars because of the service, and it seems to get worse lately.
I went there again last weekend with a few friends. It wasn’t super busy that day. There was an empty table by the window, so we asked if we could sit there. The senior looking staff said to us, «You can sit there, I don’t mind, but we have no time to clean up (the table was full of plates, cups and pots), we are very busy.» No smile, no nothing… We couldn’t believe they actually said that to customers. Anyway, we sat down and waited for quite some time, then a young lady staff spotted us and cleaned the table for us and apologised. We didn’t get the name of that staff, but she was very lovely and helpful. After quite a while, we were still waiting for our food, the people who arrived and ordered after us were already eating…
The restaurant provides good food, but they need a proper manager to manage the place, it’s a mess. Often take at least 15 – 20 mins before anyone comes take orders from customers. Or the staff will say, «Give me 5 mins, I’ll come back.» Which you know, they never will. And very often there are a couple of staff chatting/​serving one customer while leaving the whole place a chaos.

Terrible service. Waited 30 mins without our order being taken. No smile, no «we’ll be with you in a moment». The staff have no system and appear very disorganised. Don’t go on a weekend or any time they are busy. While standing in line I should have followed my instincts when I noticed how none of the customers appeared to be enjoying themselves.

Lovely tea room that’s well priced with kind staff. A great spot if you are visiting Kew Gardens. We had the high tea plus a salmon pie because it looked too good to pass up. The pie was indeed tasty and the scones were light and creamy. You get to pick the cake you want with your tea which is rather luxurious!

Quaint little café with traditional cakes and light lunches over the road from Kew Gardens and a short walk from Kew Gardens Station and Kew Bridge Station.

I popped in here after swiftly walking away from the £7.50 jacket potato at the kew greenhouse café and really glad I did.
This sweet little tea room opposite Kew Gardens had always been a mystery to me. I had never visited it as I thought it would be one of those places that looked nice from the outside but was a big disappointment. Also after reading the Unilocal reviews I wasn’t wowed by it.
As I was nearby I popped in, I think me and my boyfriend were the youngest people in here, it wasn’t a trendy café where you’d see lots of beards, asymmetric haircuts, high buns and mismatched cutlery, instead it was a warm, cosy little tea room where the staff all wore matching uniforms and you felt like your gran had scooped you up and put you there-​it was lovely, warm and inviting.
Firstly to get the bad points out of the way, the service was incredibly slow but I’ll allow this as the place was heaving and i had such a great experience.
We sat in the garden, it was so nice being surrounded by the hanging baskets and flowers, the outside is only small but a bit nicer then the inside which seemed a bit cramped and stressful.
We ordered a cheese and leek quiche slice at around £3.75 each and afternoon tea for 1 at £6.95 which we shared. This came with 2 small scones and a pot of tea with extra hot water to refill, you could get about 4 cups of tea each. We had the assam tea which was lovely and I thought the scones were light and fluffy and much better then the ones I had when I visited the Ritz! The quiche was a good size and melted in my mouth, sadly it didn’t come with a small salad or anything.
All in all i will definitely be going back when the sun is out or I might take away some of the quiche’s, pasties they had on offer and go sit on kew green

A little gem of a place to have an informal cream tea or high tea. Go to a fancy hotel for the formal treatment, but come here for a very nice assortment of cakes, finger sandwiches, and scones, as well as good service and a nice cuppa tea. Conveniently located next to Kew Gardens, so stop on your way in–

A beautiful authentic tea house where waitresses wear tea dresses and small aprons which really adds to the authentic feel. The scones and clotted cream are delicious as is the other home made bakes goods available with high tea all priced extremely well. Highly recommend

I felt obliged to stop at the ‘Original Maids of Honour’ as the reviews on Trip Advisor suggested the shop offered the ‘best scones’ I would ever eat, and it was just down the road from my partner’s parents’ house. The scones were good, but hardly the best I have ever eaten. I suppose I was expecting pastries that would simply melt in my mouth and send me into euphoria, but what I got was just a basic scone that frankly, did not taste all that different to Tesco’s. Like some other reviewers, I was disappointed.
We did not stay for tea, so perhaps the overall experience would have been better had we.

A friend introduced me to the ‘Original Maids of Honour’ and we had a brilliant time chatting and eating. Both of these activities I do best. It is a little on the expensive side. But fabulous never the less and definitely worth the splurge.
This place is known for its High Tea or otherwise known as cream tea. It also must be on a tourist guide, because I see a lot of touristy types visiting this café. So it definitely attracts many people from around the world. I suppose this is because this place is the epitome of being English. You feel very sophisticated when you drink your tea — with your little finger out!
Now on the food. I seriously loved jam and cream scones as a kid. This place is right up my ally… as old English food goes straight to a soft place in my heart. The quality is very good — the scones are fluffy and home made. The sandwiches are traditional, which are simply cheese or cucumber. The last course is a choice of dessert to your taste. I had the coffee bun, which was lovely.
I can definitely say I will be back again!

One of the best restaurants in the area. For sure it could be overcrowded sometimes but that’s why I prefer going there in the morning. I enjoy having my breakfast there from time to time.
They serve nice coffee that together with something to eat is just the best start of another day.

Had a wonderful breakfast here before visiting Kew Gardens and loved everything about it! The pasties were uniquely shaped but great tasting, the maids of honour tarts were amazing, but most importantly the vegetarian sausage is some of the best we’ve ever had. It was a wonderful vegetarian breakfast.

I took my mum here and booked a table because it can get very busy, they have two lunchtime sittings. We both ordered the roast lamb dinner and it was very nice. The downside was that as soon as we had finished they asked if we wanted dessert to which we replied no but ordered more drinks while we were drinking them they came with the bill, obviously hinting that they wanted us to leave. We didn’t even get time to digest our food!!! The staff were practically pushing us out of the door. Maybe they had over booked the tables but we felt terribly harassed and it wasn’t very relaxing or enjoyable having members of staff hovering over you to see how fast you were eating. I understand it’s a popular place but I don’t think we will be going back in a hurry!!!

By miles the BEST scones you’ll ever eat. Housed in a traditional Tudor house on busy Kew Road, you’ll find friendly staff serving baked goods ranging from éclairs, strawberry tarts, quiches andhave I mentioned already?: the best scones you’ll ever eat! I went all the way to the Cotswold in search of good scones, and I personally prefer them at the Original Maid of Honour.
The quaint décor might not be everyone’s cup of tea but I love it.

I have driven past here so many times and always said … must go there… the day dawned and we went there.
Perhaps when you really want to go somewhere you build it up in your mind so that when you do get there it can be disappointing.
It was nice but I thought disappointing and a tad on the expensive side. Staff were ‘nice’ but we had to wait ages for service and we were only having a cup of tea and a cake.
Oh well at least I have been there.

Lovely place for cream tea :)
Went here with my friend and you automatically do feel like you have gone back in time. Waitresses wear old style clothing and the décor is very antique in a unique and quirky way.
Nice sized scones and healthy portions of cream and jam! Definitely one to visit.

The Original Maids of Honour is absolutely fabulous. Their afternoon tea surpassed all of my English-​Afternoon-​tea fantasies. And such a great value! For £12, my friends and I each got our own tea, set of sandwiches, pair of scones with jam and clotted cream, and pastry. The scones were fresh and so delicious! The décor is adorable — very cutesy without being over the top. I honestly can’t recommend it enough. Afternoon tea is a mandatory English experience — if you’re gonna do it, and you don’t want to spring for the £30+ fancy set teas that you’ll find elsewhere, go to the Maids of Honour.

They don’t make ‘em like this anymore! (Not since the 70’s anyway) Traditional tea shop close to the main entrance of Kew Gardens. It looks like your Granny’s front room (if you’re British), and serves good tea and cake (go for a cream tea). It gets busy on the weekend, so be prepared to wait. Well worth a visit, as it’s such a strange place to find in London. They serve meals too, but most people go for tea and cake only.
My tip: don’t buy the set menu as the individual items add up cheaper!