They have a wide variety of baked goods to go with your tea. We had a short cake cookie and a muffin spiced with cinnamon and some citrus flavor. I thought it was lemon. We ate them with a 1/2 pot of Hawaiian roast coffee in a french press. The coffee was wonderful. Not a hint of bitterness to be found. It was a little lighter than I normally drink but I would certainly get it again. The short cake cookie was nice and crisp with plenty of butter and sugar to let you know this is a place that will serve you a rich and wonderful compliment to the extraordinary coffee. Who knew I'd enjoy an Americanized version of tea and crumpets. At least I didn't start talking in that Monty Python British woman voice. Though I would have thought it funny.
We also ordered some breakfast and it was equally delicious. I had a sausage roll and a scrambled egg while Steph had a bacon buttie and a scrambled egg. The sausage roll was more than tasty with it's puff pastry exterior surrounding the sausage. I don't know how they did it but the pastry wasn't grease soaked at all and kept it's flaky texture throughout the meal. The sausage was different from the breakfast sausage I'm used to with the sage and such. This had a nice sweet flavor with just hints of spice. I'll be going back for more of those sausage rolls I assure you. Steph's bacon buttie was also wonderful and the toasted and buttered bread was the star of that show. They don't make the bread inhouse but we were told it is made from the owner's recipe. The bread had a good sturdy quality to it like when you knead the dough a little bit longer to get it just a little chewy and dense. The bacon was good quality but we didn't really notice anything out of the ordinary about it. Truly this dish was all about that beautiful, chewy, crunchy, flavorful bread. And I can't finish up without mentioning the eggs. They make their scrambled eggs with a light fluffy texture and cook them in plenty of butter. It reminded me a little of how my dad would make an egg. That perfect combination of fluffy egg and butter is a real treat.
I thought the service was good at Friar Tuck's though we did have to ask for flatware to eat our eggs. The waitress was very helpful and told us about all the baked goods they had that day and helped Steph pick out the coffee so I'd say they try hard to please.
Unfortunately there is a slight down side to all this wonderful food. Friar Tuck's is very children friendly so if you go at the wrong time you might want to take some earplugs. We were fortunate enough to go while there weren't any families so Steph and I had a nice, quiet Saturday morning breakfast but that soon changed as we were about to leave. Several armloads of children arrived and I can tell you they have nothing on the walls or floors to stop the echo when they all start shrieking at the same time. It went from quiet and pleasant to romper room in a matter of minutes. Some people won't care but some people will so just keep this in mind if you're looking for a nice quiet afternoon tea. It might not turn out that way.
Have a great day!
You can get Steph's perspective on Friar Tuck's Pantry here. And she has pictures too!
No comments:
Post a Comment