Date visited: Monday 8th July 2019
Charles Hands opened a dairy in Bath in 1851, and a tearoom followed in 1860, originally occupying the whole ground floor of a double-fronted building at 1 Abbey Street. The dairy is long gone, and since 2013 the tearoom has been reduced to just half the frontage, and the exterior wall sign celebrating the dairy has faded. However, size isn’t everything.
In addition to the ground floor room for those taking tea, there are also tables outside in Abbey Street. Hands Georgian Tearooms accept cash payments only, with card payments not accepted.
The menu, for both food and beverages, is relatively short, and the selection of teas unusual, but still covers breakfasts, lunches and afternoon tea. There were just two cakes on display on the afternoon I visited. A slice of coffee and walnut cake (very nice, with pieces of walnut throughout the cake) and a pot of green tea lemon – with the lemon more noticeable than the tea – with extra water came to £6.30. Service was cheerful and with a smile, despite the staff having to manage some challenging and demanding tourists taking tea at their outside tables.
