home > dining > usa > vermont > quechee

Quechee Inn at Marshland Farm – An unadventurous restaurant with a comfortingly haphazard sense of itself, this is a place perfect for those who like to think they’re eating something exciting and innovative, but in reality are getting something fairly prosaic that has simply been dressed up in diverting descriptions. It’s a rare dish that’s cooked as well as it could be, and the quality of the ingredients is sometimes suspect.

What’s more irritating are the persistent service issues. Some nights, it’s way too slow. Other nights, too rapid. Some waitstaff are chatty and witty, others seem to be in a walking coma. (And things can get stranger; once, during the height of anti-French mania during the run-up to the Iraq war, the host proudly proclaimed to us – without our urging – that he had purged the menu of French food terms. Except that “soup du jour,” “filet mignon,” “rosemary jus,” “chèvre,” and many other obviously French terms remained. From which I concluded: if you’re going to be stupidly racist, take care to not over-emphasize the first half of that characterization, or others will notice.)

The wine list is only barely interesting, and even that is a cyclical assessment. Prices, at least, are on the lower end, which is reasonable for a restaurant of this quality.

(Based on multiple visits over several years.)