Waybury Inn

By Douglas Anderson, Yankee Magazine

September/October 1999

EAST MIDDLEBURY is a small, out-of-the-way place that got its start 200 years ago because of a little geological luck. The Middlebury River collects itself here and comes pouring out of the Green Mountains, providing water power for mills that once produced everything from wood products to processed iron ore. Today, the mills are mostly gone but the feeling of a tightly knit community survives, in part because one great relic of East Middlebury's past is still very much with us: the 18 10 Waybury Inn.

If you have a sense of déja vu as you approach the Waybury it's because the exterior was used for the popular 1980s television series, "The Bob Newhart Show." For the show it was painted white; today, it's a more authentic shade of green.

This is a working inn with 14 lovely guest rooms and several dining areas. The main dining room is classic Vermont, with rustic ceiling beams, ladderback chairs, and flame-stitched wallpaper. An adjacent porch seats about 20 diners with great views of the old maples in the beautifully landscaped garden. A club room where Robert Frost liked to dine is now used mostly for receptions and special dinners.

Tucked into the back of the old building is The Pub, the epicenter of East Middlebury social life. I should know, because I live just a stone's throw from the Waybury and my wife and I are regulars here, along with perhaps a hundred other friends and neighbors. To borrow a line from another television show, this is a place where everybody knows your name, and if we don't know it when you arrive we'll probably know it by the time you leave.

The Pub is just what you want in a Vermont inn - the walls covered with old maps, horse bits, a moose head, and a wild boar; and in the winter the crackling stove and the camaraderie have defrosted many a cross-country skier. Gary Smith tends bar like the host of a party, introducing travelers to local folk and infusing the place with his own special charm.

It's all beautiful, historic, and friendly, but the primary reason to come to the Waybury is the food. Chef Donna Seibert calls it 11 unpretentious fine dining," and that pretty much captures it. You won't find trendy presentation here - no confetti, nothing arranged in a tower - and you certainly won't find terms you can't understand on the menu. And yet this is one of the best and most creative restaurants in the state.

Donna's debut as a chef was unexpected. Her parents owned the inn when she was a young girl. One day their cook left to tend to some private business, and mysteriously never returned. In desperation Betty Greene looked at her teenage daughter and said, "You can cook or wait tables.' Donna headed for the kitchen, and she's been there for 25 years.

Donna is joined in the kitchen by Christian Grollier, born and schooled in France and a veteran of French restaurants in Europe and Canada, and Matthew Pitz, a graduate of the New England Culinary Institute. This troika of chefs has put together two completely different menus one for the main dining room and another for the Pub - but it is characteristic of the Waybury that you can order from either menu no matter where you're sitting.

The Pub menu features an appealing mix of comfort food. Here you'll find Shepherd's Pie, Fish and Chips, Bangers and Mash, and more adventurous fare such as Pecan-Fried Calamari and Seafood Ravioli, most dishes falling in the $6-$8 range. There are more than 100 beers from all over the world to choose from, and four terrific salads. The Glen House Salad, which bears the original name of the inn, is a great example of this kitchen's creative style. A greenleaf and mesclun mix is tossed with dried apricots, cranberries, and toasted walnuts, and topped with a maple vinaigrette. The effect is fruity, chewy, slightly sweet, and entirely original.

OUR RECENT DINNER BEGAN, as all Waybury dinners do, with the kidney bean relish that has been served at the inn for as long as anyone can remember. It's a delicious, down-home kind of thing, jazzed up with a little curry. So many people have asked for the recipe through the years that it has been printed on a postcard to save time. (I'm not sure French chef Christian wholly approves of this tradition. He calls the relish " New England caviar," but do I detect a hint of sarcasm in his voice?)

For appetizers we had the artichoke heart gratinée, a blend of cheeses, artichoke, and fresh basil (from the inn's own herb garden) served with a crusty baguette. On a tip from several regulars we called for the black bean and corn cakes, a new offering which arrived as two huge cakes of black bean, yellow corn, jalapeño peppers, and cilantro. The cakes were delicious, but the accompanying salsa made the dish. What was going on in that salsa? After a little prodding, Donna gave us the secret: "Burn the oregano. I mean really burn it. That's what gives the salsa its smoky taste."

I always advise people to order scallops at the Waybury, although you can never be sure what you're going to get. Scallops are a specialty here, and yet they're prepared in a completely different way almost every day. (Donna says they might do 150 scallop recipes in a single year.) I've had them simple and complex, Thai-style and Tex-Mex. Once they even arrived in a banana-mango-coconut sauce that was out of this world.

Regulars repeatedly order the scallops with complete faith that they'll be delicious no matter how they're prepared. In fact, over 50 percent of the kitchen's business comes from the nightly specials menu, which tells me that patrons have come to trust these three chefs.

On the night of our recent meal my scallops were perfectly pan-seared, with shallots and shiitake mushrooms in a creamy peanut butter sauce. My wife, Debby, selected the beef tenderloin béarnaise, a melt-in-the-mouth slab of meat with a cool, tarragony sauce. Both dishes came with grilled vegetables and silky smooth garlic potatoes extruded from a piping bag.

Readers of this column will know that Debby always ends with crème brulée - I'm sure she could write a book on the subject and she has always measured all comers against the Waybury's, which to her is the definitive dessert. We took the opportunity to ask Donna how she does it. The mixture is strained three times in a fine mesh to filter out every last particle of cooked egg yolk. Then it sits for half an hour before going into the ramekin to allow air to seep out of it, thus giving the finished dish its exceptionally creamy and uniform texture.

Blueberries were in season, so I ordered the blueberry Strauss pie, appropriately crumbly and unfussy, served warm with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

As we live close by, we've discovered a rare pleasure that has generally been forgotten these days: the walk home after a good meal. You can take that extra bite - or order that extra drink - if you know you have a bit of a hike ahead of you. It aids digestion and clears the mind.

So I'll invite you to end your meal with a brief walk around our little village. At the very least, you might rock for a spell on the Waybury Inn's front porch, and imagine (it won't be too difficult) what this little Vermont hamlet was like a century ago.

The Waybury Inn, Route 125, East Middlebury, Vermont. Pub Menu, $8-$10; a la carte Dinner Menu, $10-$18. Reservations accepted. 802-388-4015. www.wayburyinn.com.