The QT Hotel is a modern, funky spot on the Gold Coast, so it stands to reason that their high tea offering would be just as contemporary and fun.
I took my 9 year old daughter Rose with me to sample their Halloween high tea, “Trick or Tea“, available daily throughout October.
If you’ve been following Tea Room Travels for a while, you’ll know I love a themed high tea, so I was especially excited for this one. For other themed high teas that I loved, check out my reviews of the Mad Hatter’s High Tea at the Stamford Plaza, or the Golden High Tea at the W Hotel.
Here’s my full review of the QT Hotel’s “Trick or Tea” Halloween high tea.
The QT Hotel
The QT Hotel is a chic, quirky hotel in Surfers Paradise, just a few blocks from the beach – perfect for a weekend getaway.
It’s a playful, fun hotel, known for it’s excellent dining – their Bazaar buffet is one of my favourite places to eat in Surfers.
The high tea is held in Fixx Cafe, in the sunny lobby of the hotel. With retro design touches and a light, open feel, this is a nice spot. When we visited on a weekday lunchtime, the hotel was fairly quiet and we almost had the cafe to ourselves.
They’ve made a great effort with the Halloween theming in the cafe – even the tables were dressed for the occasion, with spider web tablecloths and skeletons and pumpkins sitting on top.
Speaking of excellent hotels on the Gold Coast – check out my review of The Imperial.
The Menu
On offer for the “Trick or Tea” Halloween high tea is:
- Halloween QTea – $69 per person
- For the little monsters – $39 per child (5-12 years)
There are lots of options to add a glass of bubbles or go bottomless for an additional cost.
The Drinks
Now this is something new for me! The standard high tea is served with tea, coffee OR the “Blood Moon Brew” – an iced green tea mocktail with strawberry syrup and lychee eyeballs.
If you choose the mocktail, it replaces the pot of tea (which you can still order for an extra charge). We did choose to have the mocktail – I mean how could you resist something so fun? – making this the first high tea I’ve ever had without a pot of tea. And I’ve been to a lot of high teas!
The mocktail was so much fun though: an iced green tea topped with lychee and blueberry eyeballs, and served with a syringe full of “blood” (strawberry syrup) that you squirt into the drink yourself. I love an interactive element in my high tea, and kids will especially enjoy this part. And actually, the strawberry syrup is necessary to sweeten the drink. Once the syrup was squirted in and mixed, it was tasty and refreshing.
If you don’t enjoy the taste of green tea or would prefer something more traditional, you can opt for a pot of tea or coffee instead. Rose would have preferred a little pot of fruity tea, but she did enjoy playing with the syringe!
The Food
The food is served on multiple modern, geometric tiered stands, with each treat nestled in its own little compartment. Your high tea comes with a selection of savouries and sweets, including scones. The adults’ high tea is very Halloween themed, with ghosts and pumpkins everywhere you look, but on the children’s high tea only the sweets were themed.
The Savouries
For the adults’ high tea, the savoury selection included a witch’s hat filled with sundried tomato cream cheese filling, a chicken salad sandwich, a pumpkin, sage and honey macaron, a beetroot arancini eyeball and a puff pastry cocktail sausage. All were Halloween themed, with imaginative names like “Dracula’s Eyeball” and “Frankenstein’s Finger“.
The children’s selection featured a ham and cheese sandwich, ham and cheese mini quiche, sausage roll with ketchup and the same chicken salad sandwich. Unfortunately none of this was themed, which was a little disappointing for Rose. It wouldn’t have taken much – perhaps cutting the sandwiches into pumpkin or ghost shapes – to carry the theme through.
Neither of us were too keen on the chicken salad sandwiches, but the pumpkin macaron was outstanding, and the witch’s hat came a close second.
The Scones
At the bottom of the tiered stand, hidden underneath all this Halloween extravaganza, was a pair of neat green pandan scones. They were petite in size, and served with little pots of blueberry jam and mascarpone cream. The scones were excellent little bites with the jam and cream. The blueberry jam was delicious and the cream wonderfully thick. It wasn’t clotted cream, but it was rich and luscious.
That’s the second high tea I’ve had on the Gold Coast with properly thick cream for the scones, and I strongly approve. Come on Brisbane, you’ve got some catching up to do – you need to up your cream game!
Keep scrolling to watch my video of the high tea!
The Sweets
The sweet selection was themed for both the adults’ and the children’s high tea, and we each had the same spooky treats. A wobbly coconut ghost filled with chocolate, a choux pumpkin with raspberry and lime cream, an eyeball filled with salted caramel, and a green witch’s hat with strawberries and chocolate inside.
For a final touch, there was a little graveyard made from crumbled biscuit crumbs, complete with a chocolate pumpkin and headstone.
All of the sweets were delicious, but our favourites were the eyeball and the ghost.
The detailing was excellent on the sweets, from the delicate coconut veil over the ghost, to the glossy, jelly-like sheen over the eyeballs.
Final Thoughts
The QT Hotel is a funky, quirky destination, and the high tea offering matches that vibe perfectly, with modern, bold flavours and heaps of personality. There are some outstanding elements here, like the pumpkin macaron and the blueberry jam.
This is a fun, playful high tea. With interactive elements and strong theming, backed up by genuinely tasty food, it will be a winner for both adults and kids alike.
I can’t wait to see what themed high tea the QT Hotel comes up with next!
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