St Davids to Lowestoft cycle ride Day 5 (Biecester to Bury St Edmunds107 miles)

In search of the best cafe across Great Britain, literally

Day 5 Bicester to Bury St Edmunds
Mister Tea's Cafe
Fresco Coffee House, Bedford
Michaelhouse Cafe, Cambridge

After yesterday's "rest day" it was the long one today where we had our only ride of over 100 miles to do. It was therefore going to be an early start but as it was my turn for the single room I had little confidence of this happening. However much to my surprise we all lined up in reception at 7:00 ready for the off. The night before I had given each team member two bananas and some instant porridge to have before we left, in order to provide our early morning fuel, which they claimed to have dutifully ate.

Breakfast

Once out on the road it took a while for the legs to warm up but we were soon into our stride and bombing along to the first planned stop at Bletchley. As we had missed our normal overly leisurely Premier Inn all you can eat breakfast I had promised my cycling guests we would stop at a cafe that does a good fried breakfast. I had done some internet research and Mister Tea's seemed to fit the bill.

Outside Mister Tea's cafe ready for breakfast

We arrived just before 9:00 and to my horror there were numerous different fry up options but no cakes. If I was going to give it a cafe cycle review then the only option for me was some slightly stale chocolate chip shortbread which isn't even really cake. I have had problems before getting cake at cafes early in the morning so recently introduced my pre breakfast cake flexibility rule which allows biscuits and pastries to count as part of a cake selection before 9:00am. It was only 8:58 so I was alright.

Hot chocolate and 'cake'

To show willing I also ordered a medium fried breakfast before Big George put me to shame using his years of fried breakfast ordering experience. He started his order by putting in a poached egg on toast foundation (totally off menu) which he then skilfully constructed the rest of his breakfast round. I have clearly too much to learn on the fried breakfast front so I will continue to focus on cake.

Beautifully constructed fried Breakfast

There was a huge difference of opinion between me and my cycling guests over the rating of this cafe. For me Mister Tea's rated poorly on my hot chocolate and cake based system but Big George and Dom felt the whole experience was fantastic. However it's my blog and scoring system so I'm afraid Mister Tea's finds itself in last place.

With a now very happy set of team members we quickly covered the 20 mile next part of today's stage to Bedford where I took them to Frescos which was a cafe much more to my tastes.

Outside Frescoes, a proper coffee shop stop

Frescoes is called Frescoes as it has a big copy of a Michelangelo fresco above the door although no explanation as to why. It was a nice feature to study while sitting in the pleasant outdoor seating area just off Bedford high street.

Inside there was a good cake selection to choose from but despite this Big George ordered a Danish pastry when he knew it had gone 9:00 and that my pre breakfast cake flexibility rule for pastries no longer applied. He also ordered a smoothie which does not qualify as a guest hot drink what with it not being hot. It was almost as if he was deliberately ordering things so he did not have to take part in any cycle cafe rating.

Very good drinks

Fortunately Dom, my back up cycling guest, was still prepared to play along for now and had a Latte and chocolate fudge cake. I had the house speciality of black forest gateaux.

Excellent cake although rather small slices

Despite the cake portion being rather on the small side the cakes were excellent and our drinks the best all week so far. Dom was particularly impressed that his latte had not been served in a vase for once.

As a result Frescos leapt to the top of the best cafe anywhere across Great Britain leader board.

The next part of the ride was 35 miles across to Cambridge through the flatlands of Cambridgeshire. I discovered the team were now very good as long as it was flat or downhill so this terrain was much to their liking and we were able to travel along quickly in our highly drilled train formation.

Cambridgeshire flatlands

As I knew there was little civilisation on this part of the route I suggested we had an unscheduled stop at Waresley Park garden centre cafe. Despite this being another potential cycle cafe review stop even I couldn't face another hot chocolate so soon after the last and had a cup of tea, so despite the cheese scone and fruit cake being rather good there were not enough other categories to review so we shall say no more about it. It will go down in cafe cycle history as the stop that never was.

The stop that never was

Refuelled once again we fly along to Cambridge. I felt that after all the early problems in the first few days we were a cycle team at last, or so I thought.

I often get recommendations of cafes and tea shops to try and one such had told me that Michaels House in Cambridge was really good so I thought this was a great chance to check it out. It is situated in an old chapel like building with tables also available outside.

Outside Michaels house cafe in Cambridge

First impressions were promising and I was pleased to see they had a good original cake selection although I went rather traditional with my choice of cheese scone and brownie. By this time both my cycling guests had lost all interest in cakes and order pizza and salad with a cup of tea. I will clearly need to pack 3 cycling guest on future tours.

Good and interesting cake selection

I did at least get them to help rate the atmosphere and ambiance score which was high due to the seating options, setting and very pleasant staff. My hot chocolate was by far the best of the week but could have been a touch hotter. My scone and brownie were excellent too. It was just a shame that my guests only went for a cup of tea as in my scoring system the most a cup of tea can score is 7 as a guest hot drink.

Excellent hot chocolate and cake

Despite this Michaels house cafe leap frogged the field to the number one spot in my cafe search and I would recommend a visit if you are ever in Cambridge.

When I eventually managed to shoehorn my cycling guest out of their chairs and back on to the bikes things took a bit of a downturn. As tiredness set and the more hilly Suffolk countryside took its effect then the team fell apart. Big gaps started to appear between the riders, our average speed dropped and our happy banter turned to silence as the last few miles became a real slog.

Even so surprisingly our longest ride turned into our earliest finish and confidence is now high of completing the last 58 miles tomorrow.

To spoil the mood I did introduce one final twist in that I have to have finished the ride by 1pm tomorrow in order to get to an urgent appointment. This will once again mean a 7am start and no breakfast. At best we will only have time for one more cafe stop and Big George has already voted for Morrisons as they do a good fried breakfast but I can assure you now that won't be happening.

Route

Café Name	Hot Choc Qual	Guest Hot Drink Qual	Effective cake selection	Cake Taste Quality	Atmosphere and Ambiance	Café Score
MichaelHouse, Cambridge	8.5	7*	7	8.5	9	8
Frescoes, Bedford	6	9	7	8.75	7.5	7.65
Jacks, Cirencester	7.5	7.5	7.5	7	8	7.5
Grazing Ground, Caerphilly	7	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.4
No. 28, Nailsworth	6.5	7	7	7	8	7.1
Flanagan’s coastline café, Llanelli	5	7*	6.5	7.5	7.5	6.7
Park Slip Visitors centre café, Bridgend	7	6.5	5	8	6	6.5
Gingers Café, Haverford west	7.5	6	3	8	7	6.3
Café Crumbs, Carmarthen	6	6.5	5.5	6.5	6.5	6.2
Old Studio Coffee shop, Wittney	5	7*	7.5	6.5	4	6.0
Caffi Becca	3	5	4	7.5	5	4.9
Mister Tea’s, Bletchley	6	7	1	4	6	4.8

*Only guest hot drink was a cup of tea so maximum score of 7 as it is just a cup of tea

Zombie Alert. (Savino's cafe, Cambridge and Organic shop and Cafe,Fornham All Saints)

Savinos,

Cambridge,

Opening times Mon-Sat 07:00-20:00,

Sun 09:00-18:00

Recommended
and 

The Organic Shop,

Fornham All Saints,

Now Closed Down

Yesterday I had the opportunity to kill two proverbial birds with one metaphoric stone. First Andrew (who is notoriously hard to please) had recently been to Cambridge and had been taken to a 'fantastic' Italian cafe which he recommend I review. Secondly I needed to do a long training ride as preparation for my London to Paris ride with Big George in a fortnight. I therefore decided to repeat the 80 mile Cambridge ride I did this year (see Going National) and hey presto two birds stoned to death.

As the wind was from the west we chose to get the train to Cambridge and cycle back. The journey was disappointingly uneventful as I listened to Andrew whinge and moan about the lack of investment in rail infrastructure. On arrival I asked him to take a photo capturing the drama of me alighting the train with my bike but it was the first of a serious very poor photographic efforts that were to occur on our journey throughout the day.

Successfully alighting the train ready to start our ride home

It was a short ride from the station to Savino's Italian cafe in the centre of Cambridge. It was not what I expected as it looked just like a typical cafe but with an Italian name. Andrew maybe hard to please but is a sucker for anything Italian so had been fooled by the Italian name, painted flags and false generic continental accents of the staff. 

Outside Savino's cafe which is apparently Italian as it has painted flags on its awning

Still we were here for the excellent cake so I went inside to review what was on offer and award the Effective Cake Selection rating (ECS). To my surprise there were no cakes on display so I couldn't take a photo of the choice available. I bravely asked the waitress if there was any cake and she said it was in the kitchen and they had Italian carrot cake, Italian lemon drizzle cake or Italian chocolate and almond cake. I went for Italian chocolate and almond cake.

As we had been served separately I asked Andrew if he could snap his refreshments on their arrival while I waited for my order at the counter. Without my supervision there was further camera phone confusion and it was not until later that I discovered it was not the photo I was after.

Andrew failing to photograph his drink

Andrew thought his Coffee was good, mainly because it was Italian, but my Italian hot chocolate was far too milky. I did have to admit that the Italian chocolate and almond cake was very good but I'm not sure it was worth the £16:90 train ticket and 80 mile ride home to come here.

Italian Hot Chocolate and Italian Chocolate and Almond cake successfully photographed by me

After our first stop we set off at pace, with wind behind, through the Cambridgeshire country side and sped through lots of little villages. Surprisingly all the villages were deserted. Andrew (who is notoriously hard to please and loves all things claiming to be Italian) convinced himself that the villages had all been taken over by Zombies. I quizzed him on how, if this was the case, we had not seen any living dead out and about. He said it was because they only came out at night. I explained that he was thinking of vampires and that zombies were active in the day time. I reassured him that there was therefore no need to worry unless of course it was a full moon, or was that were-wolfs.

After escaping from the horrors of Cambridgeshire unharmed we arrived at our lunch time stop; the previously reviewed Organic shop and cafe in Fornham All Saints. Not much had changed since I was here last year in terms of both look and menu but we did discover an outdoor seating garden area round the back which upped the ambiance rating. 

I asked Andrew to capture my arrival at the cafe and in a final triumphant showcasing of his photographic skills he mainly captured his finger.

Arriving at our lunch stop along with Andrew's finger

Like before the cake selection was still a bit sparse featuring both types of scone or chocolate cake as the only offerings. I could therefore only give the same ECS as last time.

Sparse cake selection

However I was looking forward to my drink as I noted that on my previous visit the hot chocolate had scored highly so I was very disappointed with today's milky offering. The chocolate cake was nice and Andrew's pot of tea produced a nice cup so not too bad overall. 

Milky hot chocolate and pot of tea, all nicely presented

Both of today's cafes were nice stops but both needed larger cake selections and to make their hot chocolate a lot stronger if they are to get my full stamp of approval.

On the way back Andrew started to fade and claimed I was only going faster because of my new wheels. I suggested maybe he should get some new Italian wheels as they would surely go faster still.

We also spotted a woman in jogging kit being pulled along by a dog who had appeared to have put a lasso round her waist and attached her to it's collar. Andrew was worried she had been captured by some sort of zombie dog and was being dragged back to the Cambridgeshire zombie village area. I told him not to be silly as it was much more likely to be were-wolfs. Just in case we decided not to intervene and got home safely.

Sunday see's the first Annual Norfolk cafe cycle tours 3 top cafe 50 mile spectacular were I will be taking a ride out to 3 of my favourite cafes from the past year. Hopefully it will be good weather and no Zombies.

Ratings for Savino's Cafe

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
6.0	8.0	6.5	8.5	6.0	7.00

Ratings for Organic shop and cafe based on 2 visits

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
7.0	7.25	5.0	7.0	6.5	6.55

Route

Click here to down load 79 mile Norwich to Cambridge GPX file for your GPS