St Thomas Square, opp. St Thomas’s and St Edmund’s church
Monday - Friday - 8.30 - 5.00, Saturday - 8.00 - 5.00
Last Saturday afternoon, after a hard day’s wandering, we finally managed to go into Polly Tearooms rather than walk past wistfully. I ordered a traditional cream tea, consisting of a pot of tea (enough for at least two cups), a sizeable fruit scone (choice of fruit or plain), strawberry jam (choice of strawberry, raspberry, apricot) and clotted cream (or whipped if preferred but why would you?), while my partner-in-tea went for a cream slice (slice is far too diminuative for what it was). As you enter, you can’t stop coveting the array of beautiful cakes and confectionery to choose from: gateaux, meringues, eclairs like you’ve never seen such things. Which one? Which one shall I have?? The tea, although tea-bag was of a high quality and you can buy boxes of it that have smiling ‘Beef-Eaters’ on them (just so there is no doubt about the Englishness of the tea) from the shop. There is also a chocolate factory on the first floor and you can buy the chocolate in the shop among other things like teapots, jams and freshly ground coffee. You can also enjoy Polly’s as a restaurant for light meals but we haven’t done this yet.
A bit of cursory history. The Tearooms have only belonged to Polly since December 2003. Before that it was Snell’s Tea Rooms until it was bought by Sir Brian Mussell. Polly’s older sister, also Polly, is a tea room in Marlborough.
Taking tea at Polly’s is what I can happily describe as pleasant and satisfying. Exchanging slurps of tea with bites of cream and jam has a certain zen to it which I don’t think is equalled by anything other than having a beer after a frustrating day’s work. You feel you are able to sigh in comfort and reflect upon the world with ease. Aaaahhh.
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