Our Story...
Those local to the Beccles area might be able to remember when this beautiful, Grade II listed building wasn’t the busy, vibrant café you see today but perhaps remember it as Frank Fosters, the Gentleman’s Outfitters where you would buy school uniform and smart attire. The building, previously known as Camplings, was converted into a shop in 1922, with Frank Foster taking over in the late 1920's. However, more than two decades ago, Richard and Amanda Godfrey bought this spectacular building and in 1996, opened Twyfords Café. The name comes from the property's past, with it being formally known as Twyfords House.
Roll on twenty plus years later and Twyfords café remains a family run business and continues to grow with a passion for locally sourced food, quality ingredients and friendly customer service. Since turning over that open sign in 1996, we have expanded our operation in Beccles and created a mouth-watering bakery selection, hand-roasted coffee, a bean to bar chocolate range and tasty hand-crafted gelato!
With the café as our firm foundation, we then ventured into coffee roasting, with the enthusiasm and drive to find the best flavours. We began roasting our own coffee in small batches in 2013 under the new name of Harris & James. But this is only the start of Harris & James, with father and son duo Richard and Alex, those early days of coffee roasting planted the seeds of what was to follow. After visiting an exhibition in Paris, in 2015 and witnessing a small scale bean to bar chocolate process, from roasting the cacao beans to the finished bar of chocolate, we were inspired! On returning home, we used our coffee roasting experience and got to work preparing the cacao beans for grinding to make our fist batch of chocolate. Encouraged by our results, we became accredited chocolate makers, and after four years we had to find a bigger premises to house our new, larger equipment, so we could continue to hand craft products with passion and incredible attention to detail by our small team of expert chocolatiers, putting the chocolate back into chocolate, using less sugar and more cacao. Today, our passion for quality products and a devotion to sustainability is still what drives us. Our huge range from our bakery selection are all handmade, we use only the most decadent ingredients for you to indulge your craving and share with your friends, and in all aspects of the business we try to use local produce wherever possible.In amongst all of this baking, gelato making, chocolate making and coffee roasting craziness, we opened new Harris & James stores along the way. In each you’ll find the exact same quality H&J hand roasted coffee, award winning, handmade, bean to bar chocolate and amazing bakery selection. Plus last but certainly not least, our incredible Gelato Counter! Discover us in Aldeburgh, Cromer, Holt, Sheringham, Norwich and Southwold. But for now, kick back, order yourself something of our fantastic menu, with one of our lovely servers, and don’t forget to leave room for dessert! Mind you, you can always pick up a slice of heaven from our patisserie to take home with you.