Palm Court Grill — Restaurant in Spokane

I came to have high tea on January 11th, with 2 guests. Here was my experience. First of all, the website says the tea is $49 a person. I was charged $54 each. If the price has gone up, that should be reflected on the website. The table setting: The signature china was lovely. The budget hotel style water glasses, an eyesore. The “panna cotta” was served in an unremarkable shot glass, again not a “High Tea” standard. The panna cotta itself was sickly sweet. Traditional panna cotta is not. There was not a demitasse spoon provided for panna cotta, so we had to use our teaspoons to eat it. The teapots with their glass handles are very difficult to pour from, as the handle has no grip. There is a reason teapots have a flourish on the handle, it gives your finger a place to brace. The teapots had built in strainers. The problem with that is if you do not pour ALL the tea out right away, it continues to steep, making bitter tea after a few minutes. There were individual strainers on the table, which with the way the tea was served, were superfluous. There should ALWAYS be sugar and milk on the table when tea is served. I had to request it. The teas that we tried ranged from average to good, however, not offering them for sale to take home was a wasted opportunity. The food: The cucumber sandwich. The bread to spread ratio was way off, thick bread and nearly no spread. The bread itself was severely dried out. The chicken salad, while a good mix, was also dried out. The salmon profiterole was lovely. The savory tart was unremarkable at best. The deviled egg was tasty. The “scone”, was absolutely wrong. Scones should be like a good biscuit, cut with round cutter and NEVER frosted. Serving a scone without clotted cream, or at the very least, butter, is unheard of. The lemon curd was, again, way too sweet. The cherry spread was wonderful, nicely tart. The macaron was simultaneously too sweet and unbelievably stale. The éclair (which we only received 2 of) was nearly inedible. Covering the Pâte à Choux with sugar glaze AND filling it with an overly sweet filling, with an odd aftertaste, was a shame. The truffle was terrible. Covering the chocolate in nonpareils created a waxy, flavorless, gritty finish. The chocolate cups completely overpowered whatever was in them. The wait staff were all very personable. All in all, I was unbelievably disappointed in my experience. For a price tag of $201 I expected a LOT more. I not only would not recommend it; I would make a point of steering...

The little sandwich shop needs to hire more workers for this busy airport location. When I first arrived the line was out the door. Which made me think I made a good choice. Then I stood in line for 25 min listening to the frantic people in front of me who hadn't e en ordered yet and were all commenting they aren't going to be able to get food before their flights. I was watching these people panicking as one man was behind the bar but doing nothing. One woman was also behind the bar making mixed drinks for the patrons who were comfortably seated in the outside sitting space. A young girl serving these drinks and one woman making the food over in the grill area. No one was taking orders or cared that hungry people were going to leave with empty bellies because this place was under staffed and they could not prioritize. The first group of three women who were able to purchase nags of chips and bottled drinks to take left not happy. Then it was just me and this guy who too needed to eat but had a flight to catch. We continued to stand and wait....and wait; I finally go to who looked like the manager and said is no one taking orders? She said that the were taking orders in the Bae. I said no they aren't she is just making drinks. I tried to get her to take the guy in front of mes order. But was told the gal making the drinks would do it. Finally she's done making martinis and takes the guts order. And it's my turn; I ask for the hot turkey sandwich. It came with a side they offered chips or coleslaw. They never gave me an option and my order came with house made chips. They were still warm and perfectly salted. The sandwich had an unusual taste, I think it was the mayonnaise they were using. But it wasn't enough of an unusual taste to stop eating it. The turkey was choice and plentiful. The bacon was soggy and lacking with a ridiculous one or two slices on the entire sandwich. But I added some mayo packet and found myself happily consuming this 18 dollar sandwich pretty steadily. I started watching a tennis match on one of the two little tvs behind the bar and before I knew it I has eaten the entire meal. I would give it a 5 out of 10 only recommend if you are not in a rush because the service is mediocre but worth the bite if...

High Tea was really awful, avoid this place if you can.

Sandwiches were served on bread so stale that the only question we had at the table was how old was it? My bet was a week of being left out, others thought 2 or 3 days.

The savories that were supposed to be served on toast points were soggy. Wait staff rolled a tray of three tiered plates by that were pre plated and wrapped with saran wrap, probably to be served next week.

The scones were dry and hard, inedible. The cream and fruit sauces on the table were scant and room temp. The eclairs were old and strange tasting.

The teas were served with the water not touching the tea leaves, so when I finally asked about *that, the waitress unbelievably told me that's how tea is presented (no it's not). The water line was below the infuser so nothing was steeping. This, don't forget, was a high tea experience. It appeared that they ran out of hot water and didn't have enough to fill a full teapot.

Things just kept getting worse and worse and we finally asked for someone to fix the problems and they said that it was "the experience" we were paying for, not the food quality. We never got the deviled eggs and realized that these lazy staff members couldn't leave *eggs out for days, on the same trays as the bread so they just removed them and didn't serve anyone eggs.

Finally, after a laughable session at this expensive supposedly fancy high tea, we ask for the check. After all the complaints we made they added on a 20% gratuity that we disputed.

They refused to remove the forced tip, and we were stuck with it. When we explained that they need to notify folks before auto charging tips, by law, they argued that they didn't.

By the time we got home the Davenport had added that language to their website. This is the biggest scam in Spokane, laughably horrible. At $60 per plate ( don't forget the forced tip!) It's pretty horrific.

We are trying to escalate this...