Quince and Clover

Great Tew

Our regular morning walk

Great Tew is one of those honey-stone villages that looks staged, and Quince and Clover sits right at the heart of it, in the old post office and village shop on the estate. We treat it as an extension of the cottage. The habit is simple: wander over in the morning, order more than we mean to, and let a coffee turn into brunch. The menu leans hard on the seasons and on local produce, which tells you something about the people behind it, and the room feels more like someone's generous kitchen than a café. It opens Wednesday to Monday, roughly half past eight until four, and closes on Tuesdays, so it is worth checking the day before you set off.

Breakfast and brunch are where it really shines. There are free-range eggs on grilled sourdough, ricotta pancakes with bacon, banana and maple, porridge pots, granola and fruit smoothies, and a shop counter of pastries and cakes made that morning. Friday through Sunday the brunch menu runs all day, which is dangerous on a slow weekend. It is walk-ins only, no bookings, so on a bright Saturday we tend to go early or accept a short wait outside with a coffee, watching the village do its quiet thing. The coffee, for the record, is Origin from the Cornish roasters, and it is properly good. There is a shop side to it too, so you can pick up a jar of something or a bag of coffee on the way out and carry a little of the morning back to the cottage kitchen.

What we order, most weekends

• The slow brunchEggs on sourdough or the ricotta pancakes, a second flat white, and no particular plans for the next hour. This is the whole point of the place.
• Lunch after a walkSeasonal soups, stews and slow-braised dishes, or a grain and roasted-vegetable bowl, all of it available to take away if the weather turns kind and you would rather eat on the green.
• Something from the counterWhatever pastry or cake is out that day, plus a coffee for the walk back. Rarely makes it home, but that is not really the intention.
• The reason we come backThe ice cream. Made in house with local cream and milk, in classic and slightly unexpected flavours, plus milkshakes for anyone who cannot choose.

The ice cream, which deserves its own paragraph

We have been known to walk over to Great Tew purely for a scoop on a warm afternoon, which is either a recommendation or a confession, possibly both. It is churned in house using local cream and milk, the flavours rotate, and whatever is on that day is worth trying. On the best afternoons we take a cone out onto the green, or carry a couple back across the fields, and it is enough to make the whole detour feel like the plan all along. The children have opinions on the rotation, and enforce them, and there are milkshakes for anyone who cannot narrow it down to a single scoop.

Making a morning of it in Great Tew

The nice thing about Great Tew is that the café is not the only reason to come. A few doors along, The Falkland Arms is the thatched village pub for a proper lunch or an evening pint, so between the two you can happily lose a whole day in one village. It is worth a wander round the Great Tew estate itself, and both sit less than a mile from Soho Farmhouse just down the lane. For the wider picture, our guide to eating and drinking in the area runs from village pubs to farm-to-table restaurants and everything between.

“Our default weekend routine: walk to Great Tew, brunch at Quince and Clover, ice cream on the way out. It hasn't got old yet.”

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Also nearby

• The Falkland Arms · Pub · Great Tew
• Eagles Fine Foods · Deli · Deddington
• Eat & drink guide · The area