Like many, she learned cookery from mum. Now Michelle Stewart home-cooks at Three Peas in a Pod, the Brighton Road cafe diagonally opposite KFC.

With 15 chairs inside, and a few out, there’s a friendly welcome and feel of exclusivity. The multiplying vegetarian and vegan options (plus hearty lamb lunches and trencherman breakfasts) reflect Surbiton’s changing tastes.

In a town awash with coffee, her cafe is both traditional and fresh.
“More and more people ask for vegetarian, so we always do three different meals for them, including vegetarian curries,” said the 52-year-old who learnt from “a little Irish lady who was a midwife for 25 years”.

Open seven days, 8.30am-3pm, breakfasts merge into lunch. Three Peas is bargain home cooking, from onion-filled Yorkshire puds to veggie cottage pie; chicken soup to pie’n’mash.
“I recently did a vegan course, and got ideas from that,” said the grandmother, who spends any leisure time riding horses.

Helped by Nicola and Jo (“my right-hand girl”), there are fresh flowers on the tables for her tribe of regulars. “I feel lucky; it’s a real community around here,” she said. She makes her marmalade and pesto, sources locally where possible (Garson Farm is a regular shop), and in January launches a supper club, with BYO, once Christmas menus are done.