It is a particular joy when a breakfast menu expands into lunchtime.
I was even more delighted when I saw potato rosti (with poached egg, portobello mushroom and spinach) was a breakfast item at the Angel Cafe.
The icing on the cake (and the cakes being readied for the actual lunchtime trade looked excellent) was that the café sits on the edge of Fair Green. Somewhere out there an elephant is buried.
Fair Green, where Diss fairs were once held, is surrounded by historic buildings including cottages dating back centuries, a former chapel, a grand house with decorative pargetting and a half-timbered hall house.
The café on the corner was once a brewery counting house and the 'counting house' engraved on the front window put me in mind of the queen in her parlour eating bread and honey.
The Angel is pretty, inside and out. On a chilly morning we walked past the outside tables which on a balmier day would be a lovely place for breakfast, and straight into the cosy heart of the business. The first room includes the kitchen and counter and a couple of tables and leads into the front parlour with a few more tables, vintage prints of Fair Green on the walls and shelves including colouring books and pencils for children.
It’s a nice touch in a café where our fellow customers looked to range from under nine to over 90 with every generation in between.
The staff were lovely too – smiley, friendly, helpful and efficient. We were seated quickly and given just the right amount of time to choose from the menu – that potato rosti for me and a full English for my husband. Each came with our choice of coffee which made the prices, of £7 and £10 respectively, particularly good value – and meant we ordered an extra orange juice each.
The breakfasts were fab. Mine was basically an eggs florentine but on a circle of shredded and fried potato rather than bread. Traditional eggs florentine, benedict and royale were also available as well as pancakes with a tempting range of toppings and various veggie and meaty versions of full English breakfasts.
The full English was full indeed with two fat sausages, two rashers of bacon, a profusion of mushrooms, egg, hash browns, toast and a good ladleful of baked beans.
My poached egg was perfectly cooked, the yolk just runny enough to sink through the tender spinach and on to the huge juicy mushroom, layered over the rosti.
Breakfast at the Angel is a great way to start the morning (or afternoon; it is served until 2pm.) Before, or after, the fine food, friendly atmosphere and tempting menu, there are pleasant walks nearby ranging from a wander around Fair Green, including a history board detailing the demise of that elephant, to hopping on to the long-distance Angles Way which runs past the Angel Cafe.
Baldry's Yard, 1 Fair Grn, Fair Green, Diss, IP22 4NQ
