Tracy's Cafe Bistro Clacton lunch and dessert food review

Tracy's Café Bistro, at 11 Pallister Road, is the top-rated restaurant out of 110 in the town according to TripAdvisor.

Out of a total of 96 reviews, the restaurant has been rated as excellent 91 times.

Outside: Tracy's Café Bistro (Image: Newsquest)

We decided to visit the café to see what all the fuss was about and see if the reviews matched the place.

When we arrived we found it was closing earlier than expected as the opening hours on TripAdvisor are a bit off.

The cafe if open from 10am to 3pm on Tuesday to Friday, 9am to 4pm on Saturday and closed on Sunday and Monday.

The café is right in the centre of the town and has a cosy atmosphere with a range of seating areas at the window as well as larger tables throughout the small restaurant.

Bar: the café is fully licensed so customers can enjoy alcohol on the premises (Image: Newsquest)

It is a fully licensed café which offers takeaways and eat-in.

I was greeted as I walked in and I scanned the menu, noticing a huge range of options for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Dinner options include mixed grill, hunters’ chicken, homemade beef chilli con carne, cod and chips, homemade beef lasagne and more.

They have a good range of options for vegetarians and vegans on the menu too.

The prices are all reasonable too and well under what you would expect for what you get.

Seating: plenty of places to sit inside the café (Image: Newsquest)

Hand-carved ham, egg and chips only costs £9.50 and comes with home-cooked ham, chips, two free-range eggs and peas.

Another bargain was Nikki’s homemade West Indian chicken which includes slow-cooked Jamaican spiced chicken with rice and peas and salad garnish for £10.

I went for a chicken and bacon toastie costing £8 and my sister chose a ham and cheese panini costing £7.

They were both cooked up freshly, made to order and each came with a handful of chips and salad.

Toast: the chicken and bacon toastie with chips (Image: Newsquest)

We also ordered a couple of sweet treats to try as from reading the reviews I could see their desserts were very popular.

We ordered a chocolate orange cheesecake, peanut butter cheesecake and a Toblerone cake.

We took our order to go as they were close to closing and we tucked into our food outside.

The quality of the food was very good and the portion size was as expected, a handful of chips was exactly what we got.

The toastie wasn’t the best I have ever had but it was very filling and exactly what was needed for a lunchtime meal.

Fresh: cheese and ham panini with chips (Image: Newsquest)

The panini was delicious however, with my sister commenting on the quality, saying it was really good and the chips were cooked perfectly.

We ate the desserts at home and I could see why many of the reviews raved about them.

The classic Toblerone cake was gorgeous, with lots of layers it tasted fresh and was delicious.

The cheesecakes were also very good, and the portion was too big to be eaten all at once.

The peanut butter flavour was in the peanut butter cups placed in the dessert but the actual cheesecake had a traditional vanilla cheesecake flavour.

Dessert: delicious cheesecakes and Toblerone cake (Image: Newsquest)

This was similar to the chocolate orange cheesecake, with most of the flavour coming from eating the chocolate orange wedge itself and not the flavour of the actual cheesecake.

Both were delicious and I wouldn’t say no to more in the future, that’s for sure.

Overall, I would say Tracy’s Café Bistro is a great place to go if you’re looking for yummy food with a homemade feel to it.

With the prices also being reasonable, this is a great spot right in the middle of Clacton.