The best restaurants serving British food in East of England

Encore coffee house has great tasting coffee and at great value compared to more well known brands. A friendly welcoming atmosphere and a great place to work or meet people. The food is freshly made on site and there's a great range of sandwiches, panini, jacket potatoes and soups. I'm egg and dairy free and they're always accommodating to make something if there isn't anything already available on the counter. Non-dairy milks available at no extra cost!

Amazing place, good quality food, good size potions, first class service. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. seated upstairs too...

Nice, clean and friendly very helpful. Food tasty and nice to see lots of variety. We don’t all like the traditional . Glad to see them back after they left lakeside.

Looked for a dog friendly place for a cup of coffee on our day trip to Lyme. Located near the Cobb, we had coffee and some very good (and large slice of) Dorset cake. Really friendly service and free dog treats too.

A greatvlittleccafe just off the beaten track. Well worth seeking out. Excellent food and service at fair prices. The range of foods is hood as is their afternoon tea.

Came actually by accident, but had a lovely breakfast and coffee From outside you wouldn’t know what was inside, but it’s well worth a visit

We were a bit early at a recent funeral at West Herts Crematorium for a dear friend The newly opened tearoom named Bluebells came to our rescue and gave us somewhere warm and dry to wait for 20min It was absolutely packed, which is always an excellent sign of good food & service We just had hot drinks, but they were served promptly so as not to delay us Thanks

To start with, despite my rating I do want to say that the food was absolutely faultless. I would go so far as to say it was the best taster menu I've ever had. Perhaps the best meal I've ever had if I'm honest! Every dish was so expertly put together and each one hit all the right flavour notes. You could tell that Steve has worked hard to ensure everything is perfectly balanced. The dish presentation was elegant and didn't feel pretentious, unlike some other taster menus I've had (costing far more) which seemed more about visual wow factor than actually tasting delicious and leaving you wanting more. The service was also excellent and there was a good atmosphere. The waiter was upbeat and there was a bit of well-judged banter too. Each dish was presented with a brief intro to the ingredients, and a nice touch was that Steve also presented a couple of the dishes himself. If this is all that matters to you, you can stop reading my review now because the rest is nitpicking, but for a premium experience I feel a few tweaks would have made for a knockout evening. The points below are far from dealbreakers, so please do take that into account - they absolutely shouldn't stop you going. - No prices on the drinks menu and no beer on offer. I think the wine list may have had pricing, but we don't drink wine so we were looking at what else was on offer. I assume that people will generally go to Eileen's with a healthy budget, and perhaps not really care what they're going to add on top of the taster menu price (which, for what it is, is very good value). However, it felt really awkward to be asking the waiter for the cost of a G+T - and he didn't come back with an answer so we just ordered anyway, not knowing what we would be billed. We also felt that the drinks menu presentation was poor - it was a set of laminated A4 sheets of paper, which just didn't feel premium. There weren't any beers on the drinks menu either - but given that the sheets were all separate, I just wonder if one was missing as we thought this was odd. - Decor. We were in the downstairs area, and it feels like there's a disparity between the food proposition and the environment. There are some uplighters dotted around which feel quite dated, but the thing that felt very non-premium were the cheap LED rechargeable table lamps. When we were seated, the waiter turned it on and within a few minutes it started flickering which was really distracting so I turned it off, which kind of killed the ambience. I asked for a replacement and that one ran out of power within a couple of minutes. The waiter did spot this, calling them the bane of his life, and replaced with a simple candle which was so much more appropriate anyway. They should honestly throw them all away and stick with candles - keep it simple! I would say that the upstairs area, where the bar is, had a bit more appeal. - Music. While the music choice was absolutely fine (rather upbeat for premium dining, but it worked) the music service was a free one - meaning that every few songs an advert came on, like we were listening to a local radio station. This really cheapened the whole thing, and although it probably went unnoticed by people in deep conversation, once I noticed it once, each time an advert came on it really jarred with me. Like I said, the food was absolutely sensational, the service was great and the things above wouldn't stop us returning. I've only docked a point because at this price point you have certain expectations, and there were a few things about the environment that fell a little short - but so easily fixed.

A truly special dining experience. We were so lucky to be seated at the pass and had a wonderful evening watching Alex and the team prepare the delicious tasting menu. Each dish was incredible - we particularly loved the strawberry bao, and the soft drinks flight was equally as thought through as the food. Highly recommend, we can't wait to be back.

I've been to the tea rooms several times for lunch but today was my first afternoon tea there. It did not disappoint. The vegetarian sandwiches were fresh and tasty. The scone and cakes were also delicious and there was so much we brought some home. Would recommend booking as it does get busy. Loved the Harry Potter theme and can't wait to see what it is in October when we are already booked in for our next visit!

Perfect combination, delicious food with very good attention!!!