Home-made lemonade and the “best scones in Cumbria” are just a couple of reasons a Keswick tea room has been voted one of the best in the UK.
Mrs F’s Fine Food Emporium on Main Street was judged 10th out of more than 7,000 independent cafes in a survey of top-rated businesses on TripAdvisor – the only Cumbrian establishment to receive the accolade.
Specialising in home-made food, and with décor based on the beams of a 300-year-old ship, Mrs F’s was established in 2014 by Simone Fellows.
She said: “Right from the start our aim has been to make our customers feel right at home, with delicious home-made food and drink in relaxing surroundings that remind you of your nan’s front room.
“We’ve never tried to be the best – but it’s absolutely thrilling to find out that we’ve meant so much to so many people, and to be voted in the UK top ten is unbelievable.”
A complex algorithm was used by TripAdvisor to determine the winners across a variety of hospitality, retail, and leisure sectors.
The average rating and number of reviews for each attraction were collated, before multiplying these figures together to form an overall score for each business, which was then used to determine the top 10 for each sector.
Mrs F’s has a 4.5/5 rating on TripAdvisor, based on 273 reviews, and comments from visitors include “Fabulous service, home-made lemonade and beautiful soft scones with jam and cream!”, “Really friendly staff” and “Just a really lovely, quirky little place, 100 per cent would come back here!”.
Mum-of-five Simone, who is originally from Camden in north London, moved north to Keswick in 2005, having worked in restaurants and attended the Prue Leith cooking school. But she says she received her grounding in baking closer to home.
“Mrs F’s is named after my mother-in-law,” she said. “I learned so much from both her and my auntie.”
Simone said she remained grateful to those who were with her at the start. “When we first started in 2014 it was me and Mosah Strange, who used to be the chef at The Lion and he has recently graduated from The White Pepper Cookery School.
“There is Chinty who used to work here and has opened her own place in Keswick as well, and also Jiri Buchtela also started his own coffee roasting business, Darkhouse Coffee Roasters. It’s great to have worked with all these different people and they are just a few.”
