Lazing on a Sunday afternoon (or eating out with Asperger’s)

As part of my recent birthday celebrations my boyf and I went for ‘Afternoon Tea‘.  For those outside the UK this is, I believe, a somewhat fancy English activity.  It involves three tiers of delicacies, which are eaten from the bottom up – sandwiches, then tea-cakes, then artsy yummies.  It is all washed down with lots of tea, poured from a teapot and sipped from little cups and saucers.  It is very quaint and often takes place in equally elegant surroundings.

Food: I had been looking forward to my Afternoon Tea for quite a while and had deliberately chosen the venue with the best reviews and the prettiest top tier.  When the spread appeared, my eager eyes saw this:

My poor boyf saw this:

The red and green lines represent his negative and positive reactions.  I’m lucky in that whilst I have some strong food preferences, I don’t have many food aversions.  So whilst I had managed on the phone to tell them that neither of us liked egg (because I don’t), I had forgotten to say that boyf didn’t like most other foods either!  There were far too many definite no-nos, and several unacceptable UFOs (Unidentified Food Objects).  The poor sod had to settle for the few items he identified as palatable.

Drink: I like to push myself occasionally and try new food and drink, so when it came to the extensive tea menu I chose Lapsang Souchong, which arrived in a red hot contemporary but fitting pot:

Boyf had a latte.  With hindsight I probably should have ordered my usual cappuccino, but I was in a tea room and wanted to submerge myself fully in the experience.  I chose Lapsang Souchong because I had heard the name before but had never tried it.  Plus the description said it was a ‘smoky tea’, and I have always liked smoky things – cheese, fish, matches, the smell of a burning fire.  Good job too, because it was like drinking a cup of bonfire.  I guess it complemented the smoked salmon (and cucumber!) sandwiches, but it was rather overpowering.  I may not have many food aversions, but I have hypersensitive smell.  I have detected gas leaks in the road that the gas man could only find with his electronic nose.  Needless to say it made the whole meal taste of smoke.  I stuck loads of milk in it to try and dilute the taste, which is probably not the proper way to take it.  The tea lingered in my mouth for about four hours afterwards, only being displaced later that day by a curry.

Because boyf had had so little, and I couldn’t eat everything, I gained a nice little lunch box for work the next day:

And whilst I was busy enjoying myself, my bored boyf was making planes out of his napkin:

© Catastraspie, 2012.

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