Jasmine Green tea and Eton Mess

Location: Benson's Tea-room, Stratford-upon-Avon
Date: 27 March 2010
Details: Jasmine Green tea and Eton Mess

Notes: It goes without saying that the tea was perfect - a cup of tea will always be top notch at Benson's. With 80+ varieties of tea, Benson's know their stuff - no basic mistakes like incorrectly cleaned teapots here, no way. Most cafes concentrate on their coffee with tea as an after-thought, just a sorry-looking tea-bag slung into a cup. At Benson's, the tea is designed and prepared by people who care.

It would be a nice adventure-in-tea to taste my way through their tea menu each time I visit, but I like Jasmine Green tea too much to do that. The only blip with Benson's is their newer staff who require proper training about the menu and about tea.

The choice of Eton Mess was down to Polly, an American MA student at the Shakespeare Institute, who had never tried this very English dessert despite living in Stratford for 1.5 years. Americans often cite trifle as a quintessentially English pud and Eton Mess would be in the same family of puddings. Benson's version was very straightforward: cream, merigue and fresh strawberries - simply the basics but simply delicious. Hopefully Polly's now regularly making this pud with her young American cousins.