restaurant review: Moosewood

The primary reason we went to Ithaca, NY was to eat at the famous Moosewood Restaurant.  We, like so many others, have the cookbooks and have been enticed and inspired by their creative-without-being-complex, vegetable-filled recipes.  Understandably we had very high hopes for the restaurant which inspired 11 cookbooks.  Overall, we were disappointed.  How could the restaurant that has become a hippy, earth-crunchy cooking handbook be so bureaucratic and boring?  We arrived in Ithaca at 4, looking to grab some food, poke around a little and move on to NYC. While walking to find Moosewood, we came across an Apple Harvest Festival in full swing.  The streets in the center of town were filled with entertainers,  information booths, lovely wares and food vendors.  We walked around for a while enjoying the spirit of the place, hungry to be sure, but saving our stomachs for Moosewood.

We made it over to Moosewood at 5 only to be told by a less-than-welcoming hostess that we'd have to wait until 5:30, when dinner began, to be seated.  We were eager to get back on the road, but ultimately decided the mecca to Moosewood was important enough to warrant a still later arrival in NYC.  While we waited we noticed that the atmosphere was pretty run-of-the-mill.  Nothing you wouldn't see in a mid-range restaurant chain.

When we were seated, we perused the menu--it was a short read.  Iris and Chelsea in particular, were misted by the lack of choices given how many recipes they knew to be in existence.  While we can respect the choice for a simple menu, this one was beyond with only 2 appetizers, 2 soups, 4 entrés (only two "may be made vegan") period.  Oh and then 5 pages of wines and drinks (KLV among them!!).   Apparently their menu is rotating, which is wonderful if you have the luxury (and with the prices, we do mean luxury) of eating there on a regular basis.  With a menu like that, our choices were made for us, we decided to get the two vegan options: Southwestern Stew over Rice, Stuffed Delicata Squash and an appetizer: Tofulafels.  We played the system a little so they would not charge a fee (!) to split an entrés.

As for the food, it was EXCELLENT.  The Southwestern Stew delicately juggled the flavors and cooked-but-still-crispy tenderness of the likes of three colors of bell peppers, red potatoes, baby lima beans, corn, tomatoes and zucchini all flavored with present-but-not-overpowering cilantro and chili peppers.   The Stuffed Delicata was divine.  The half squash was sweet and tender and the mushrooms and leeks that stuffed it were perfectly complementary.  It was all topped off with a gentle tomato-roasted fennel sauce and served with a side of delectably marinated green beans.  In all the dishes the medley of flavors was amazing--each spice stood out as unique and in the same bite blended with the vegetables natural flavor.  The textures were perfect, each vegetable was gently cooked to it's own optimal tender crispness.   And the vegan chocolate cake?  set the whole meal over the edge.. .may even be better than McDougal's Zucchini Chocolate Cake.

the walk away lesson:  keep the cookbooks.