Any suggestions? Is the Russian Tea Room the best? Would like price/content opinions. Not looking for fanciest, just with good tea, scones or other 'treats' in a relaxing setting.

There is a restaurant called Russian Tea Time near the Art Institute. Not much in the way of scones there. It's not terribly pricey but I don't recall it being relaxing. It was bustling.

The Drake does a very nice afternoon tea (the scones kind) for about $20/person (less for kids). Very elegant and quite relaxed.

I'll bet the other big name hotels in Chicago also serve tea (Four Season, Ritz etc).

I know you were looking for personal experiences and I hope you receive them here, but don't neglect a really good website metromix.com. It's a great resource for Chicago dining.

obxgirl,

I'll look at metromix. Do you know any other message boards geared to Chicago? I found one before that seemed to have lots of good tips but forgot to save it.

The Drake sounds good. Thanks!

Sorry, makingtracks, I don't know of any Chicago message boards. The search feature here will yield lots of good info. Chicago is a great town!

The Drake is probably the most well known place to have tea and I've heard that the Penisula also has a nice one. Any of the fancier hotels should also have tea.

I didn't know Russian Tea Time had an afternoon tea but they do, here is a link to their tea service menu

http://www.russianteatime.com/html/teaservice_menu.html

And here's a link for the Drake

http://dining.thedrakehotel.com/palm...t_cuisine.html

www.877chicago.com has good information on Chicago. You can also pick up a copy of the free Chicago Reader once you get here, they have them in most book stores (Border's, Barnes & Noble)and they come out on Friday. Their website is www.chireader.com.