Owner Jeannette Francis: “If the flag’s not flying, we’re like the queen — she’s not at Buckingham Palace, and we’re not here either. My name is Jeannette Francis. What do I do? I cook. We have a little tea room, and I do all the cooking in the back. I’ve been here over 30 years right now. I used to go home and stock up and come back and then when my uh… parents passed away, I thought, ‘Hmm, I can’t get my bisto for my gravy,’ so I opened the shop. It makes me feel warm and cozy to have a good English meal, because you miss it.”

(Bisto is a gravy thickener, similar to bouillon)

Lizzie Douglas, employee: “It’s like looking at old photographs… I am Elizabeth Douglas, or Lizzie Douglas. And I’ve been working with Jan here for four years, nearly five years. Deep down, it’s the proper English Sunday dinner — roast beef, yorkshire pudding, roasted potatoes, mashed potatoes, as many vegetables as you can get your plate and proper meat gravy. It just takes you back, when you make a proper gravy, it just takes you back… like your mum used to make… it just gives you a warm fuzzy feeling.”

Francis: “Things that fly off the shelves right now are: sausages, bacon, mince pie….”

Douglas: “My mum’s still alive — she’s 90. Wait no she’s not, she’s 84 on the sixth of December, and that’s a time when I just want to give my mum a hug. And everybody’s fine, I just miss being with them… as we all do. To be honest with you, if I hadn’t found the British Pantry and Tea Room four years ago, whenever it was, then I don’t know what I would have done with my time. It just gives you a warm fuzzy feeling, that you belong.”

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