Going up the league. (Tabnabs tearoom - Mattishall)

Tabnabs,

Mattishall,

Open Mon-Sat 9:00-16:00,

Highly Recommended

****Although I first wrote the post in 2013 and Mrs Tabnabs has moved on not much has changed and it is still a great veneue (April 2022)****

I was looking through the current ratings table (see end of blog) and was surprised to see that Tabnabs tearoom in Mattishall was only halfway up the standings, as I remembered it having excellent cake. Last time my cycling guest reviewer was Andrew (who is notoriously hard to please) and there were a number of crying babies at one of the tables which hadn't helped the atmosphere and ambiance (AAA) score.

Today seemed an excellent day for a revisit with Mrs Crusader as today's cycling guest.

The ride itself was uneventful and we arrived in Mattishall after about an hour. Tabnabs is in a courtyard near the church. Sadly there isn't any outside seating that all us cyclist crave. (Note: I have since been contacted by Mrs Tabnabs who pointed out that there are outside seats available in the summer or, for the hardy amongst you, you can request a chair and go and sit outside in the winter if you really want to).

Tabnabs tearoom from the courtyard.

Inside has a modern feel with a shiny wooden floor and a number of tables for two. As always I spent sometime at the cake area to award the effective cake selection (ECS) rating. Tabnabs has a large selection of tasty looking cakes so scored very well. One of the cakes on offer was chocolate and beetroot which I hoped Mrs Crusader would go for. Sadly she told me that she couldn't bring herself to have a root vegetable based cake, so imagine my surprise when she choose carrot cake instead. I decided to go down the more traditional fruit cake route and went for a bread pudding.

As always I ordered a hot chocolate before Mrs Crusader decided to act out part of Monty Pythons famous cheese shop sketch but with a coffee theme. They were waiting for a delivery of decaf coffee, milkman had forgotten to leave any skimmed milk, cat had stolen all the cream etc before they confirmed they did have the ingredients necessary for a semi skinny caffeine coffee mocha before asking the Greek balalaika player to leave. (Younger readers ask your parents)

The hot chocolate (which was only average on last visit) was superb being very thick and chocolatey and Mrs Crusader reckoned it was the best (if only) semi skinny caffeine coffee mocha she had had. The cake was also as good as I had remembered and again scored very well.

Fortunately the crying babies were not in today but the indoor seating area was full of chattering lady village folk. I realised that apart from myself (and Andrew on our last visit) I had never seen any other chaps in Tabnabs. From my personal experience it does seem to attract the gossiping ladies and mothers meeting crowd. So in terms of ambiance and atmosphere (AAA) rating it will score highly if you are a chattering mother but not so well if you are a cyclist trying to refuel both physically and mentally. Myself and Mrs Crusader, therefore, couldn't agree on the AAA rating. In these circumstances I always use the 'its my ratings spreadsheet' ruling and gave it my AAA score.

Apart from the lack of outside seating area (see previous note) and amount of non cycle based chatter it had the best drink and cakes ratings I have had at a visit. If this had been the first rating of Tabnabs (scores are averaged over last 3 see 'there must be rules post') it would have gone straight to the top of the tearooms ratings table and I would highly recommend a visit, I know I well be back again.

Note Tabnabs tearoom was also visited in sportive 2 in March 2014, on practice calorie neutral cycle in September 2014 and sportive 10 in January 2015 making it my most visited stop.

Cafe rating based on last 3 visits of many (Last visited April 2022)

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
8.20	8.33	8.66	8.7	7.0	8.18

Map of route

Download GPX file of route to load onto a GPS 28 mile Norwich - Mattishall loop