Close to home (7 Surrey Street, Norwich)

No 7 Surrey Street,

Norwich,

Opening times Mon-Fri 7:00-16:30,

Sat 8:00-17:00

It is my aim to review as many, if not all, the Cafes and tearooms in Norfolk that qualify for a rating (see post 'there must be rules !'). So living in Norwich this has to include cafes that are rather close to home, like today's choice. 

I had arranged to see an old work colleague in Norwich so I picked 7 Surrey Street as a convenient location. Despite the rain I set off on my hybrid bike to meet him. For consistency it is important to me that I cycle to each venue. Normally I go a bit further than two miles before a stop but at least I wasn't too wet when I arrived.

Due to it's name 7 Surrey Street was easy to find but I'm not sure I like this new trend of naming your business after your address. What are you meant to do when writing them a letter, do you effectively put the address on the envelope twice or do you just put the venue name or just the address? To get round this I will only e-mail them in future.

7 Surrey Street Cafe located at 7 Surrey Street. Sadly no outdoor seating area

7 Surrey Street probably caters for a different market from most the cafes and tearooms I go to on my rides in rural Norfolk and it was very busy, despite this the staff were most welcoming and friendly. It didn't have a spectacular view or outside seating area like many I visit so was always going to struggle for a good ambiance rating but that's not really its fault. If it did have a spectacular view or outside seating area it would have to be somewhere else and won't be able to call itself 7 Surrey Street which is another problem with this unimaginative naming approach.

View from 7 Surrey Street Cafe, not as spectacular as many other Norfolk
Cafes. Although good venue for bus spotters.

As always the first thing to do was to decide on my cake and give the effective cake selection rating (ECS). There was not a lot of choice with a beige theme running through the choices on offer made up of; fruit or cheese scone, raisin bun, choc au pain type thing or sausage roll (which isn't even a cake but is beige). Unfortunately there were no nice big slices of cake even though a coffee cake would have kept to the colour scheme. In these circumstances I always go for the fruit scone.

I ordered my hot chocolate and my guest a skinny latte. My hot chocolate and fruit scone were both ok and about average but my guest wasn't very keen on his latte. I was surprised as other reviews I have seen have raved about the coffee but he didn't crack under further probing from me and to prove his point left half his cup. 

I can't reveal the identity of my guest as he had sneaked out of work to meet me. I wouldn't want to get him in to trouble as he should have been busy creating share holder value and not moaning about milky coffee. From now on he will just be referred to as Mr X.

As a cafe for a business meeting or to pop in after a bit of shopping then 7 Surrey Street is a lot nicer than one of those big coffee chains but due to it's rather close location to my house and obsession with beige baking it is probably one I won't often visit on a bike ride. 

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
6.0	4.0	4.5	6.0	5.0	5.10