Time for tea...England's southwest in springtime means many feasts

March 10, 4:46 PMDC Ireland & UK Travel ExaminerLaura Harrison McBride

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Charming outdoor setting, Tudor Roae Tea Rooms

About three years ago, on a trip to southwest England, we stopped for lunch at a little restaurant in a half-timbered house a block or so from Plymouth Harbour. When I'm particularly charmed, as I was by the house (anything from the Tudor era or before delights me), I recall details I otherwise would have missed. That time, it was the prawn sandwich with marie rose sauce. We don't tend to eat such things in the United States; we don't think prawns--huge shrimp--are an appropriate filling for a sandwich unless they are cut up and doused with mayonnaise...not that marie rose sauce is very far away. Still, even the name conjures up servants bringing lunch on a silver tray.

Adolescent seagull in Tudor Rose Tea Room garden

Last summer, we returned to Plymouth, and of course,  sought out the same little restaurant. We didn't recall the name, but one couldn't forget the setting, very close to both Plymouth Gin and a Tudor sea captain's house open for viewing for a small fee. It turned out the little restaurant's name is the Tudor Rose Tea Rooms. Now it is a bit bigger, and the two gentlemen who ran it have been replaced by a lovely lady...whose name I cannot recall, nor can I find her business card.  No matter: I'll be going back as soon as I cross the pond again. But I doubt that I'll be treated to quite the same special things as last time. The Devon Cream Teas will be the same, I'm sure. But I suspect the adolescent seagull, stranded in the back garden and being hand-raised by the Tudor Rose's owner, will have flown his protected home. He had fallen out of nest, apparently, in the Elizabethan Garden that sits behind and above the Tudor Rose's Garden. (The Elizabethan Garden is free, and offers a plashing fountain, nooks and crannies, and a wonderful view of the Tudor sea captain's house.)

A boat moored off The Barbidan, Plymouth, near the sailor's delight, Plymouth Gin

The Tudor Rose Tea Room is on New Street, which is actually quite an old street, in the part of Plymouth untouched by German bombs in World War II (small miracle!), and still home to a myriad fleet of boats of a wide variety of sizes. The area is called The Barbican, and was once home to pirates as well as Plymouth Gin, the Royal Navy's favorite tipple. Well, at least it's the tipple offered by the Royal Navy, with limes, to ward off scurvy. I fancy it in a very, very cold Martini, while my husband likes it with tonic and, of course, lime.  Any of the waterfront pubs will have it, I should think, giving a nice end to a day of walking around The Barbican,sitting round in the Tudor Rose's garden with a lovely snack, and pretending to be a crony of Elizabeth I in the fantastic garden up above.