On the hunt for a special last minute afternoon tea fix, my parents and I headed to Dedham in Essex, Constable country.
The Essex Rose is in a quaint old english beamed building and typical of tearooms around the country. But what makes this one special is that you can have a traditional tiered afternoon tea without booking ahead and it wasn't bad at all...
Between the two of you there are a choice of two sandwich flavours (you end up with half a sandwich of each). The choices are pretty ordinary cheese with pickle, ham and mustard, tuna etc. But what's nice about this is the sauce/ accompaniment is in its own little pot. This may be frustrating for some, but if you have a fussy eater with you, it's actually a godsend. All the sauces and jams were by local manufacturer Tiptree and were delicious. The bread was very fresh.
The scones were everything a scone should be: large, crisp on the outside and soft and crumbly inside. The Tiptree raspberry jam and Rhoda clotted cream topped it off nicely.
The top layer consisted of some little patisseries - cheesecake, profiteroles, fruit tart and coffee walnut cake. All delicious, but a little bugbear of mine is when these pretty morsels have to be split between two people. I would prefer less choice and one each, so we can savour the same ones at the same time.
I'd definitely go back here. Not an extortionate price at £14 each, but two need to share.
