On arrival we were greeted and seated with professional staff - a nice change from the hipstery "Hi Mate, sit anywhere Pal" you might get in The Old Bike Shop for example.
The place is styled to be English and old fashionedy. A baby grand piano in the middle of the room, it might have been nice to have some background tinkling. The carpet was grandparent style.
The menu was large, and on the expensive side, but plenty of choice on offer.
There seemed quite a lot of coffee options, too many to know what was best, so I asked for a strong black coffee. For some reason I was a bit dubious that it would come out good. I was wrong.
The coffee came promptly, and it was very good. Strong, but not too tarry, and with the full flavour spectrum. There seems to be a tendency in some of the newer cafes to serve a tarry / tomato soup tinged coffee. This was one of the best long coffees I've had for a while. Things were looking up!
Food arrived pretty quickly, though half the coffee had gone down.
It was one of the tastiest breakfasts I've had in a while. Toast was good. Sausage well flavoured, hash brown was fine and crispy. A very good egg. Bacon was to my liking and the tomato juicy and well cooked. I'd have preferred my black pudding to be a tiny bit burned, and the beans were at the low level of acceptable hotness, but these are minor quibbles. I really enjoyed it.
On the downside, it IS a bit pricey, but the staff were friendly and helpful, allowing my colleagues some substitutions. Overall, I have to admit the Cambridge Evening News was right. Very good.
- Food 4.5
- Value 4
- Service 4
- Ambience 3
- Coffee 5
