By Sasha Moedt (The Cascade) – Email
Print Edition: February 20, 2013
34810 Clayburn Rd, Abbotsford, BC
(604) 853-4020
Hours: Tuesday to Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
The Clayburn Village Store & Tea Shop always evoked a sense of awe in me as a child. That’s because a good portion of the store is dedicated to candy. Jars and jars, row upon row, of jellies, marshmallows, hard candy, chocolates, lollipops and caramels. You name it, it’s there – all bright colours in pinks, purples, blues, in wrapping papers and swirled into canisters. There’s all sorts of specialty candies. What really caught my eye was the Harry Potter goodies like Bertie Bott’s Every Flavoured Beans (“They mean every flavour!” Ron Weasley said), sugar mice and Dumbledore’s sherbert lemons. But no cockroach clusters. I checked.
It’s like being in Honeydukes, and even today I’m in ecstasy.
I’ve always known there was a tea shop in there as well, but it was just recently that I sat down and took a look at the menu.
First of all, the atmosphere. The restaurant is blocked off from the view of the people buying candy by shelves lined with jars of candy. The flooring is wooden – not hardwood, per se, but wood that squeaks when you step on it. There is nothing modern in the decorations and atmosphere, and I mean this in a good way. The walls are decorated with old British memorabilia. Fresh flowers sit in little vases on each table, and the tables themselves are elegant and quaint. It’s the kind of place that makes you nostalgic for Britain in the early 1900s, even though you’ve never been to Britain.
The server let us sit wherever we liked, and gave us menus, printed on beige pieces of paper. Just being a small shop, the menu isn’t extensive, but there is a fair amount of selection. There is a soup of the day, sandwiches, savouries (including sausage rolls, quiches, and salads), cheese plates, desserts and pastries and beverages, including a specialty coffee list.
I am a soup person, so despite the fact that I don’t like ham, I ordered the soup of the day: chipotle black bean and ham. I took this risk easily because the first time I’d been, I ordered a carrot and orange soup on a whim, strange sounding as that was, and it was amazing. You can order in a cup or a bowl; the cup is a bit cheaper. I ordered the cup because I’m fiscally responsible, of course.
I also ordered a Cornish pastry. My partner ordered a turkey breast, described on the menu as “lightly smoked, lingonberry sauce, lettuce, and tomato,” and he added aged cheddar. If I were to order a sandwich, I’d have gotten the traditional Italian toasted panino with provolone cheese, pesto, tomato and choice of parma ham or Genoa salami, but whatever floats your boat, right?
I tried the soup first. I ordered it with bread on the side, but it turns out the bread comes in very small portions. But, oh man, the soup was good. The chipotle added a kick to a creamy, savoury soup. I am going to order the soup of the day every time I go from now on, even if it doesn’t sound like my cup of tea—ahem, soup—because they’re geniuses. Soup-lovers, take heed.
My Cornish pasty was delish as well. Cornish pasties are like a meal baked in pastry, which is definitely my style. The pastry on the outside was nice and thick and crusty. It was a good portion, and the inside was filled with meaty, potato-y and onion-y goodness.
My foodie-partner wouldn’t let me near his sandwich, for real, even though I told him I needed a research bite for this restaurant review. This may be because I used this excuse before, in a little fib. It works for the first few times, people. But his sandwich looked good – though, again, it wasn’t the biggest sandwich. It came with two slices of apples on the side, maybe to make up for that. My partner described the bread as “really soft.” The lingonberry sauce added a sweetness to the turkey (which was layered generously on the bread), the same way cranberry sauce does at Thanksgiving.
I definitely have a good experience at the Clayburn Village Tea Shop. The server was friendly, not in a “ready to order, hon?” diner way, but in a polite and courteous way. My only warning is the prices: the sandwich was $7.95, my soup was $4, and my pastry was $4.25. There’s no real student prices on the menu; the cheapest sandwich is $6.95 for a fairly plain sandwich, and there’s not much below that if you want a full meal. Considering the portions, prices aren’t fantastic – but considering the flavours, I’m going again.
Remember to walk around old Clayburn Village, it’s a lovely location. And get candy on your way out; it’s got to happen.
