Tag Archives: Habitat Café

A Ton Of Scones

Motorcyclists often refer to ‘doing a ton’, meaning 100mph, so this post is the scone equivalent. Not reviewing a particular scone but rather 100 scones; a ton of scones .. as a pie. Our last post from Liberty was our 100th so we thought it was time for some analysis. Bearing in mind our limited mathematical dexterity, 100 makes it easy to work out percentages. Our first post was Palmerston’s in Dunkeld almost exactly one year ago which works out at almost one scone every 4 days. How’s that for dedication, and amazingly, we are just as sylph-like as ever .. or at least Pat is.Pie chart illustrating anaysis of 100 scones

The Results:

  • 75% gained no accolade or categorisation other than they were just fairly ordinary or self service scones. That does not make them bad. In fact many of them were very good, but not good enough for an award. Notably the Biscuit and the Bingham Hotel just missed out on a topscone award.
     a sign at the Wee Blether, Kinlochard
    Wee Blether

    Annoyingly the Corinthian had superb scones but abysmal service, otherwise it would have had a topscone award. 1% of this category, the Buckhaven scone, wasn’t even a scone. Some, like the Wee Blether were just great fun.

  • 21% gained a topscone award. We think this is rather good but like the ordinary scones not all were equal. If we were to select our top three topscones it would be Fonab Castle, the Olympic Studios and the Dormy.
     a scone at Ardanaiseig Hotel
    Ardanaiseig

    The other 18 topscones were all excellent but not quite as good as these three. Some locations like Ackergill Tower and Ardanaiseig  were fabulous. Our most expensive scone was undoubtedly Claridges but what an experience!

  • 1% was classed as ‘foreign’. The Duke was based on information from our Iberian correspondent.
  • 2% was classed as ‘homemade’ … made by friends and not sold commercially. One, Dan’s was so good it got a topscone. The other was on Nicola Sturgeon making scones but we didn’t taste them so couldn’t give them an award, though we are sure they would have been first class.
  • 4% were classed as ‘weird’. This did not mean they were in any way bad. They were just weird. The ‘thunder and lightning’ scone at Mother Murphy’s was memorable as was the ‘bacon and cheese’ scone at Habitat.
  • 22% were self service scones. In itself this did not make them bad but none of them made topscone This was partly because it is about the whole experience and waiting in a queue is never as good as being waited on.
  • 8% were island scones … The Puffer on Easdale being the best.

    ERxternal view of the Puffer, Easdale
    The Puffer
  • 11% were English scones. Difficult to say if English scones are better than Scottish, they certainly have some odd ideas about the prioritisation of jam and cream. Might need further investigation.

A Dash of Politics: Our rants have probably got progressively more and more ranty as the year passed. Sincere apologies to all, but it makes us feel better!

Summary: All in all it has been a wonderfully enjoyable year. There are some places we won’t be rushing back to, either because they were too bad or too expensive. The vast majority, however, we would happily visit again .. which is great! _BIL4531Many thanks to our benefactors who have treated us to the odd scone here and there and thanks to our correspondents who have shared their scone stories with us. Thanks are also due to the places we have visited who, by and large, have enjoyed the reviews and given us lovely feedback. Will there be another ton? We shall see!

Habitat Café

You tend to think that every cafe/restaurant will have some sort of scone with which to provide the honest traveller a bit of sustenance. Not so, or at least not in Aberfeldy.

The search

We tried the Watermill first to no avail, then the Croft and both just shook their heads. The Croft is more of a restaurant so maybe it’s excusable there. We found it very disappointing, however, that the Watermill, which otherwise has a great café, could not cater to this simple request. Not to worry, we headed to the Habitat Café in the Square. Not only were we successful but were treated to a first time experience .. a cheese and bacon scone! Habitat03Now we have tasted a lot of scones but ‘cheese and bacon’ has never been one of them. As it turned out they do a different scone every day and it just so happened that today was the day for cheese and bacon.

It has to be said that some trepidation was involved in our approach to this scone. we were encouraged however when it turned up with just some butter .. no jam and cream ..phew! Needless to say, as cheese and bacon scones go, this was definitely the best we had tasted. More than that, however,it was one of the best scones we had tasted anywhere. It easily gets our topscone award for its light fluffy texture and sheer ludicrous inventiveness.

Elysian paradise

Bet the migrants waiting to cross the Channel have never tasted a cheese and bacon scone either. Do you think that is why they are trying so desperately? The media would have us believe that they all want to come to the UK because the UK is such a fantastic, wonderful, elysian paradise. Nothing could be further from the truth! Only a tiny minority thinks the UK is worth a try. Usually because they already speak English or have family here. The vast majority want to settle elsewhere in Europe. That’s because they have never heard of Aberfeldy, The Habitat Café and its scones .. sad!

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Useful link: things to do in Aberfeldy