Signs of Summer on Route 7

The Caddy Shack in Canaan announced today on Facebook that's it's open for the 2021 season. My favorite custom order from summer 2020 wasa foot-long with grilled peppers and onions. 

 

Falls Village Cuisine Comes to Salisbury

It's hard not to be smitten by Jacqueline Heriteau Hubbard, the gutsy cookbook and gardening writer who lives on Belden Street and serves tirelessly on the board of the D.M. Hunt Library. She has just opened the Country Bistro in Salisbury with her daughter, Holly Hunter Stonehill. Located behind the Salisbury Post Office and next to Johnnycake Books where Holly's Place (no relationship) used to be, the restaurant was off to a busy start on Unofficial Day #2. (The official opening is Saturday May 5.) All the tables were taken at 1 PM and mother and daughter were filling lots of to-go phone orders. They have brightened up the space, set reasonable prices and filled the display case up front with irresistible baked goods, including donuts and croissants. The coffee service is "tray chic"--your oversize cup arrives on an individual tray with its own creamer and sugar bowl. Soup-and-sandwich combinations are served on the same little platters. I hope Jacqui doesn't spend all her time in the kitchen as she does when she gives her legendary cocktail parties for the Hunt Library. As good as her cooking is, it's her inimitable hospitality and quirky charm that will make the Country Bistro a distinctive destination.
Hours: 8:00 AM - 5:30 PM Telephone: 860.435.9420

A Guilty Pleasure?

As a former New Yorker, I often get food cravings that cannot be easily satisfied in our neck of the woods (Vietnamese hot and sour soup, Shanghai-style juicy dumplings, tacos and burritos.) I also miss lox and bagels, which was the Sunday morning breakfast of my childhood. So I was pleased (but wary) when both Toymaker's and Mountainside added smoked salmon on a bagel to their menus (served with cream cheese, capers and red onion.) I am happy to report that they credibly satisfy my craving but I still miss Russ & Daughters on the Lower East Side.

Like Proust with his madeleines, I am overcome with sweet memories by this meal. But it's a guilty pleasure that is causing me tsuris. Is this breakfast a symbol of gentrification? Isn't Falls Village a sweet-potato-waffle and bacon-and-eggs kind-of town? Yes and no. Falls Village is changing and not everyone who has lived here for decades thinks that is a bad thing anymore. Are lox and bagels a symbol that the Old Guard and Young Turks can live (and dine) together in harmony? Well, as we heard sung so many times during FVCT's production of Cinderella, "Impossible things are happening every day." To wit: I had a very jolly lunch the other day at Mountainside with Faye and Pete Lawson and Mr. (Fred) Peterson. I am beginning to feel truly at home.