Cozy Cafes and Perfect Pubs
During our time in York, we really didn’t eat out at restaurants a whole lot. In part because we love to cook and bake so much that we can eat restaurant-quality meals at home all the time. And in part because eating out in York (and the UK in general) is very expensive and just not affordable to us on our budget. We found it interesting that grocery shopping in York was insanely cheap, yet restaurants were so expensive. We went out occasionally for a treat, but it was rare for us!
On the flip side, we loved to get out to explore as many of the cute, cozy cafes and adorable, old little pubs around York as budget allowed. We would stop in for a tea/coffee, and sometimes a sweet treat at the various cafes and a pint or half pint at the pubs.
We definitely had a few favourite cafes! Our favourite is Gatehouse Coffee, at the barbican at Walmgate Bar. It’s the most unique setting for a café ever. Sitting out on the barbican walls or up on top of the gate when the weather is nice, or cozying up inside on the upper level when the weather is colder or rainy. Both were perfect in their own ways. This café is also outside of the touristy area and always quiet and easy to get a table at, which is a nice bonus. And the prices are far more affordable than most cafes. Unfortunately, their food selections are extremely limited. So, if we wanted a sweet treat with our drinks, we typically went elsewhere.
Our favourite for a café and a sweet treat was hands down The Old York Tea Room. It was in a cute, early 1300s building that used to be owned by the church originally. It’s gone through a lot of variety since those days, and less than a year ago opened as one of the best tea rooms I’ve ever been to. Not to mention, it’s owned and operated by the most amazing and lovely couple. Their treats were homemade and unreal. We even indulged in a breakfast here one morning, which was also delicious. It’s a small seating area on the upper level, with just five tables, and so tastefully decorated. It’s a place that just feels so much like home when you sit down up there.
We also had a few other fun and unique café experiences. The Perky Peacock was a coffee shop in an old guard tower at one end of Lendal Bridge where the bridge meets the medieval walls. It’s also a tiny little café, but so cute inside. This café regularly closed for the last 2 months of our time in York. The river floods a lot in the fall and winter. And when it does, the walkways to access the Perky Peacock are completely underwater and you can’t physically get to the café. Must make running a business difficult here, but they do manage to survive and even thrive. This place always seems to be very busy! Unlike Gatehouse Coffee, it’s right in the heart of the tourist district!
Plush is a café on Stonegate, right in the heart of a busy shopping street and tourist district. It looks pretty non-descript from the front. And in fact, I’d walked by and looked in the window before and thought the baking looked delicious but it didn’t look like there was anywhere to sit to drink your coffee. Thankfully, I had joined a lot of Facebook groups about things to do in York, news in York, etc when we got there. This place was mentioned time and time again when people were looking for somewhere unique to take their kids. They have three specific rooms that you can enjoy. One on the main level that was a little too retro/neon/artsy for us. But two on the upper level that were amazing! We never got the chance to go there and sit in the cushioned floor room, but we did love our experience in the garden room where the girls got to sit on swings rather than chairs. This room was stunning!
While not a place we typically sit in to eat at, given how extremely busy and expensive it is, one of my favourite places of all in York is Betty’s. I am utterly in love with their individual marzipan vanilla sponge cakes. They are utter heaven! We branched out and tried a bunch of their things this time since we were in town for a longer time. And pretty much everything was amazing. They had this amazing raspberry macaron with fresh cream and raspberries in it. So good. But my favourite will always be their marzipan sponge cakes. As often as I could justify, I would stop in to buy one to take home and have with a tea for a treat. The girls have also fallen in love with these, though Katia prefers the raspberry macaron a bit more.
There are other unique-looking cafes, but we didn’t go into all of them. And there are a ton of other more traditional cafes we went into for tea, coffee, or hot chocolate. There are a ton of artisan hot chocolate shops in York, given their history with chocolate. We definitely made sure to check many of these out, too. One of the yummiest hot chocolates I had was one at York Cocoa Works where they added apple pie spice to the hot chocolate. I would never have thought to add apple pie spice to hot chocolate, but it really worked! The girls and I all agreed it was our favourite of the three different types of hot chocolates we got there to try!
We also had our fair share of pints or half pints around York. There are so many old pubs in the town that are so atmospheric and beautiful inside. And the number of pubs that include the word Swan is impressive. In our pre-child days, Jon and I participated in a Pub Crawl challenge where you had to go to all the pubs that had a Swan in the name, order a beer, and get a stamp. After you completed your card, you got a free t-shirt and could enter it into a draw. This time, we didn’t do any pub crawling, but we definitely made sure to pop into as many of the cute old pubs as we could. In particular, these were our favourites:
- The Black Swan, which holds a special meaning to us since we had our wedding reception in here in 2011. It’s a former mayor’s home and has been a pub for hundreds of years. The ambiance is amazing, and we particularly love the huge fireplace inside the main room.
- Golden Fleece, which is supposed to be the most haunted pub in York. It’s at the end of the Shambles and always a staple stop in every Ghost Tour in York! The girls loved the clock that ran backwards at our table!
- The Old White Swan, which also holds a lot of memories for us with Jon’s deceased father from our wedding trip. It has a lot of different rooms and a really cute patio facing onto the street.
- Guy Fawkes Inn is adorable and has the best patio at the rear. It’s so cozy, with a large canopy so you can sit out there when it rains and heaters galore so you can sit out there when it’s cold. There were fluffy fur throws and blankets on the chairs and just felt cozy, even on a cool, November day (Remember, Remember the 5th of November!). Fun fact: Being that this was the birthplace of Guy Fawkes, the pub is actually prohibited from celebrating Guy Fawkes Day, as there was a formal decree after the failed Gunpowder Plot that anywhere that was associated personally with Guy Fawkes could not celebrate the day. That said, I’m pretty sure it was still the most packed pub in York on November 5th!
- The Slip Inn was our neighbourhood pub at the end of our street. Always nice to have a pub less than a block away! It was super cute inside and definitely a neighbourhood pub rather than something tourists would find. It was usually quite full of locals, which is always a good sign! We also saw they were in a book about the best pubs in England!
- House of Trembling Madness has two locations, but the smaller and original location on Stonegate was our favourite. We didn’t even know there was a little pub up on the upper level of this bottle shop until someone mentioned it to me one day. The pub reminded us of a hunting lodge, with various animal heads all over the walls. It was definitely a hidden gem we were happy to find!
- The Churchill, while not exactly a pub, gets an honourable mention. It’s a full hotel and restaurant and the courtyard out front has transparent pods where you can seat eight! We went here twice, the first time to cool off with a drink after a long hike and the second time we rented one pod out for two hours to cozy up with the heater and blankets inside. They make excellent pizza, by the way!
Of course, we went to quite a few more pubs than these. But these are the standout ones to us!
There were also quite a few wine bars, cocktail bars, etc in York. And we did go to two different wine bars and one cocktail bar. The cocktail bar, Dyls, was also in an old guard tower at the end of Skeldergate Bridge, right next to where we were staying. It had the most gorgeous patio, which we sat out on once earlier in our trip for a glass of wine. It was also regularly underwater during the river floods. However, unlike the Perky Peacock, Dyls had an entrance into the building from the bridge level, so that the entire place didn’t need to close during the floods. The rooms inside were small but adorable. Our last night in York we indulged in an overpriced cocktail in the upper tower room. The room was all green and just had one circular table with benches around it. There were tons of greenery hanging from the ceiling and we felt a little like we were in a greenhouse or aviary.
York has a lot of selections for their pubs, cafes, restaurants, and other similar types of establishments. If you’re looking for good food or drinks, York is definitely a place to experience!