The ritual with these folks is to come here once a stay
to feast on local fare and bask in the local folkways.
Bonnie wisely decided to wait for the slavering family
to clear out, so we were only four for dinner.

It's a dimly lit taverny place, bar on one side dominating
the front, two back rooms to accommodate overflow and
events. We got there at 6 something, and the place was
dead dead dead. The Internet suggests that service is
friendly. It is, enough, but it was slow slow slow. The
waitress didn't take drink orders until 15 minutes in,
a potential loss of revenue, and the drinks, not rocket
science, being a glass of house red, two Killianses, and
a Blue Moon, took 15 more at least, a potential loss of
customer satisfaction. Order-taking was almost half an
hour later, and another 15 before salads and such came
out. And then, wouldn't you know it, the mains appeared
almost immediately thereafter. All of this with a smile.

The salads were as far as I could tell unexceptionable
and came with rolls from a brown'n'serve tray and
breadsticks wrapped in cellophane. I asked for corn 
instead of salad, and it came a bit later, canned but
reheated in butter so as to be quite nice.

I had one of the daily blackboard specials, prime rib.
I asked as usual for the rarest piece in the house, no
jus, and the waitress had looked dubious and said, I'm
not sure there is any rare left, and Bonnie said, this is
upstate, there's never any rare. What came was bigger,
better, rarer, tenderer, and tastier than at the Prime
Rib Loft, which was by no means bad. It had been sous-vided
to 100-110 and then finished in the oven after being 
brushed with black paint of the Kitchen Bouquet genre.
It was maybe 20 oz boneless, and I took half back for later.
For my side, I asked for spaghetti, which hd perked up the
waitress just a bit. This was made-to-order but not al
dente angel hair with a puckery tomato sauce much improved
by a pat of butter from the bread basket.

The others had got fried scallops, decent in the 21st 
century way, i.e., kind of tasteless, still juicy so fried
pretty much right, out of a frozen bag; fried shrimp, also
frozen commercial product, much tastier but also much
weller done; and broiled haddock, which on one end was
a bit overcooked and on the other crispy to burnt, though
fresh enough. French fries all round for the ladies were
reported as good.

We passed on desserts, of which there were three, plain
cheesecake being the most appealing. Instead, we went back
for Jane's gingersnaps and chocolate chip cookies, quite
good, heirloom recipes from her grandmother or great-aunt
and the Nestle bag respectively.

By the time we left, near 9, the bar had filled up and
diners spilt over to one of the overflow rooms. Two
waiters also had augmented our tired old (our age) 
waitress, so service became very fast. Who knew.
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