The Lime’s Cafe on the Rufford Road / A164 is a classic roadside truck stop kind of joint. I would rather stop off somewhere like this for breakfast than any motorway generic service station.

On their website they say

“We’re an independent Cafe, located just off the A614 near Rufford Park. We’re proud to be the favourite for locals to meet friends for a breakfast, lunch or snack. We have plenty of variety on our menu including vegetarian options. Many walkers and cyclist pop in whilst using our large car park and we also offer outdoor seating in our lovely garden. Come see us today!”

Judging from the cars and trucks in the car park it is a very popular place to stop of at. The garden tables were full of people eating breakfasts but people were coming and going all the time so it looked like we would have no problem getting a table

Once inside we discovered that they did a ‘Breakfast Carvery’ and a proper truck stop one as well. The place was packed out with blokes from the trucks parked outside and families all piling up plates with as much breakfast fodder as they could.

BREAKFAST MENU

I got my plate and stood in line debating just how greedy I could be! It turned out that I was not the only one 🙂 Once at the trough I could see vats of sausage, bacon, beans, tomatoes, mushrooms, hash browns, eggs and black pudding. As soon as one emptied or started to look sparse a bloke wandered out from the kitchen with another tray to top them up.

You ain’t seen nothing until you have to step aside for a man carrying a bowl of 100’s of catering sausages and a tray of toast that would have kept me going for a month.

For £7.50 this was looking great value quantity wise, and with my Mum getting the OAP deal for £5.50 she was winning more that I was!

ADULT SIZED BREAKFAST CARVERY PLATE

I felt that I had let the breakfast scoffing team down a little when I got back to my table with my plateful. I had tried to get lots but also to keep the plate in order with my double sausage bridge to separate the beans from the egg.

For the record I had 4 bacon, 2 sausage, 2 eggs, 2 hash browns, mushrooms, black pudding, beans and 2 slices of toast. I could have gone back for more and I could have piled more on the plate but honestly I couldn’t have managed much more

This was a classic truck stop / greasy spoon breakfast effort, you have to admire the quantity and the speed at which they get the food out. We all know that we are not getting the top gourmet stuff on the plate and we all know what we are gonna get for the money and we love it too

I like the bacon it was nice and crisp, the mushrooms were decent quite plump and juicy. I quite enjoyed the black pudding and my eggs had a soft yolk to dip my toast in.

I struggled to eat the two sausages and perhaps should have looked deeper into the sausage vat for some crispy ones, these were a bit flaccid and soft. I did have two hash browns, a breakfast item that I normally decline, but these ones were ok with a bit of generic brown sauce.

The toast and beans, well they are as described you cannot really get them wrong

SMALL BREAKFAST CARVERY PLATE OAP/CHILD SPECIAL

The OAP style plate at the Limes Cafe was quite a bit smaller still looked decently covered with 2 bacon, 1 sausage, an egg, black pudding, beans, mushroom and toast.

It offered a better picture off the mushrooms and egg than my photo and made the sausage look better.

I reckon that was also good value for the £5.50 and if you so chose you could easily have piled more food onto that plate! 🙂

All in all this was a very decent feed at the Limes Cafe and washed down with a mug of tea I was set up for the days activities. I could say that I didn’t need to eat again for the rest of the day which was true, but I did eat again. I was stuffed though until about 7pm!

I am not sure that I would want to eat as much from this breakfast carvery again as it is just too much and you get carried away because you can.

Having said that we noticed that they also do a Roast Carvery and I would be quite tempted to stop by and have that one weekend just to see what it is like. The reports I have read so far online suggest that it is also a good feed for your money! It seems to be that kind of place.

It might have been no frills in essence but it was certainly popular and there were lots of happy people inside getting fed. I was quite amazed just how organised and well run the place was. Plenty of places could learn a lot just from watching these guys and gals at work

The Limes Cafe is located officially at Old Rufford Road, Newark, NG22 8TH it is situated near Bilsthorpe just past the junction of Mickledale lane and Inkersall Lane with the main road A164 / Old Rufford Road. Phone number 01623 411254

You can also check them out on their Facebook Page