Second hand bookstores are becoming few and far between, so its surprising to find one in the back streets of St Helens. The easily seen ‘blue house’ is stacked floor to ceiling with shelves of pre-loved reading material for all genres; it’s amazing what you can find. When the weather warms there is picnic table style benches on the front lawn, otherwise cosy on up amongst the books. There’s a cluster of timber tables and chairs, and when I was there a table of gentlemen were playing cards. I am told scones are baked on Saturdays, and are snap frozen for the rest of the week. It doesn’t sound appealing, right? But this is where I am wrong – the large, creamy and slightly crispy scone is exquisite! The scone is heated up in the oven rather than microwaved, which makes all of the difference. The jam is fruit rich homemade raspberry jam – it doesn’t get better than this. To top it off the fresh cream is thickly whipped, and there are generous portions of both the jam and cream.

Scones:

Jam: 

Cream:

Tea: A huge variety of different brand tea bags served in a teapot.

Price: $$

Overall: Quiet and cosy, it’s the quintessential Tassie hidey-hole for when the weather is too bad to be outdoors, which for this mainlander, is often!

Location: 15 Pendrigh Pl, St Helens TAS 7216 Ph: 03 6376 2811

Reviewed November, 2017