Kat Food: Farmer's Diner revisited

As a New Jer­seyan, din­ers are near and dear to my heart. What’s bet­ter than greasy break­fast and a milk­shake? You can imag­ine my hor­ror then, when I was told that the much beloved Farmer’s Diner had closed. After a quick trip with friends to Quechee, Vt., and a talk with our wait­ress, it turns out that the diner wasn’t shut down for good but had re-opened under new man­age­ment.

Change isn’t al­ways a good thing.

Lo­cated in Quechee Gorge Vil­lage, the Farmer’s Diner is a farm-to-table restau­rant that prides it­self on local pro­duce, farm fresh meats and or­ganic in­gre­di­ents. All of that sounds great, and it is when ex­e­cuted prop­erly (think Found­ing Farm­ers in Wash­ing­ton, DC). Un­for­tu­nately, every­thing at this diner was, well, pretty or­di­nary.

The new own­ers re­con­structed the menu and com­mit­ted diner blas­phemy in leav­ing off a key break­fast sta­ple — corn beef hash. They still have other typ­i­cal menu items like omelets, steak and eggs, and pan­cakes (in­clud­ing sea­sonal pump­kin and apple cin­na­mon ones), but the ser­vice is slow and the food comes out cold. In their de­fense, they serve their pan­cakes with real maple syrup, which is re­spectable, es­pe­cially when Lou’s makes you pay extra for a minia­ture bot­tle of syrup. But sadly, this lit­tle treat doesn’t make up for the diner’s lack of at­mos­phere. It’s empty and dark with a short­age of meringue and cream pies in the food dis­plays and no hus­tle and bus­tle be­hind the counter.

One word to de­scribe the Farmer’s Diner? Un­der­whelm­ing.