1940s themed Four-Teas Tearoom opens in Falmouth

The Four-Teas Tearoom is a 1940s themed café offering breakfasts, ‘light luncheon’ and proper afternoon teas in Webber Street, as part of the existing Bygone Days Trading Co. vintage shop based in the former Women’s Institute hall.

Run by Lynda and Angie Mundy, it began trading this morning, with Second World War evacuee Di Lambert, who grew up in London during the war and now lives in Mawnan Smith, invited to officially open it.

All the meals served are made by Lyn, who has a degree in culinary art and uses the same philosophy as housewives on rations book, cooking chillis and soups.

These are supplemented by a board of ‘Black Market Specials’ using more luxurious ingredients that would only have been found during the time on the black market.

Angie said: “She has a massive passion for food history. She wanted to marry that with cooking and put them together to create this.

“She’s very proud of what she does and I’m very proud of her.”

The tearoom will be open 8.30am to 5pm Tuesday to Saturday and closing at 4pm on Sundays.

It will also host the occasional evening event, such as for Valentine’s Day.

A Housewife 49 Board encourages people to retell their memories from the era to be typed and pinned up, there is the chance to submit a recipe with the best each month served as a special and a competition to win a cream tea for two for anybody spending £5 in the adjoining shop.

Izzy Barnes serves an order from the ration book menu

Opened out of what used to be part of the vintage shop, there are plans to extend seating upstairs during the summer.

Describing the couple as “beyond wonderful,” Di, 89, said the tearoom brought back many memories for her.

She told the Packet: “I’ve very clear memories of the war. This is very evocative, especially the tins and posters.

“You remember these things without realising you’ve remembered them. It’s all vey familiar.

“Although I have to say, we didn’t have cakes like that!”

Di spent her childhood living in London. She was eight at the outbreak of the war and saw three of her four siblings evacuated, to what transpired to be South Africa.

“My parents took them to the station and didn’t know where they were going to go, until six weeks later they had a letter to say they had arrived in Cape Town. I didn’t see them again until 1948, when they were all grown up,” she recalled.

Her family lived near Hendon Aerodrome and to keep her safe her mother decided they should move – from number 24 in the street, to number 209.

In 1944 she herself was evacuated for six months, aged 13, during the period of ‘flying bombs’ before going on to live through austerity and rationing – even organising a wedding on ration books, in 1951.

She came to Cornwall with her husband Tony when he retired from the railways, 38 years ago.

Di herself has plenty of history with the building that the tearoom runs out of, having volunteered there when it was previously run as a café by the charity MIND.

She then got to know Lyn and Angie when they opened the 1940s vintage store and, as a self-confessed “avid collector” has even contributed one or two pieces to the décor – along with making all the Union Flag bunting that hangs from the ceiling.