Miss Marple's Tearooms

382 Mount Dandenong Tourist Road, Sassafras VIC 3787

Date visited: 6th September 2014

AS, MerlinFan and I made another drive up to the Dandenong Ranges again to visit the Rhododendron Gardens.  We stopped in Sassafras for lunch, and of course, the beautiful English cottage of Miss Marple's Tearooms caught our attention at once.  

We were told upon entering it how long the wait time would be - reasonable, so we sat and waited with many others, admiring the beautiful shelves of jams and rows of teapots (of different shapes and designs!).  We ended up waiting longer than the anticipated time, but oh well.  If we can wait 45 minutes for brunch in Melbourne, half an hour here wouldn't kill us.

MerlinFan and I were rather taken by the interior of the tearoom.  It was very reminiscent of the houses we visited on our trip to Stratford-Upon-Avon several years ago, opened the floodgates to nostalgia and good times.  

We got coffees each - AS had a Skinny Latte, MerlinFan had an Iced Coffee and I had a Flat White.  No coffee art :(  I got a bit of a start when I sipped my coffee - this was the hottest coffee I've had in a long time, burnt my tongue.  Other than that, it was fairly unremarkable.

Iced coffee, Latte, Flat white

AS had one of Miss Marple's famous fingers - she chose the Fresh chicken, cheese & asparagus fingers.  This was okay, however, slices of chicken would have been preferable over the rather monotonous texture here that was more of minced - almost ground - chicken.

Fresh chicken, cheese & asparagus fingers $14.50

MerlinFan chose the Welsh Rarebit Fingers.  MerlinFan felt this was a pretty ordinary rendition of cheese on toast, really.  Neither of us detected any of the eggs, Guinness, mustard or spices that was meant to have gone into this dish - I do love my cheese and toast, so we ended up exchanging dishes. 

Welsh rarebit fingers $13.50

My choice was the Cottage pie - there was an option of chicken or beef and I opted for the latter.  The tomato based beef filling was topped off with mashed potato.  Although hearty, I personally felt this was overall under seasoned, however MerlinFan likes anything with potato so she was happy to take mine instead.

Beef cottage pie $15

We were lured by the temptation of desserts that were going out to each table, so we chose two to share.  

Our first choice was Mr Stringer's sticky toffee pudding, served with pouring cream.  I would have to say dessert fared much better than our mains.  The pudding was warm, moist and rich, topped off with sticky toffee, cream and a sliced strawberry.  Yum.

Mr Stringer's sticky toffee pudding $14

Of course we couldn't say no to the traditional Trifle.  The serving was massive!  Layers of jelly, soaked sponge, custard and topped off with cream, nuts and strawberries.  We enjoyed this, although the deep sundae glass made it rather inconvenient (and messy) to try and get the jelly right at the bottom.

Trifle $14

Mrs Marple's Tearoom is obviously a popular spot in Sassafras that has quite a touristy feel with its attractive old English theme.  Portion sizes are large, food is pricey but honestly, rather underwhelming.  Did enjoy the desserts more, and our visit was still pretty fun just for the experience.


  

<a href="http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/71/1439038/restaurant/Melbourne/Miss-Marples-Tearoom-Sassafras"><img alt="Miss Marple&#x27;s Tearoom on Urbanspoon" src="http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/link/1439038/biglink.gif" style="border:none;width:200px;height:146px" /></a>