With all of the recent travel between Saratoga Springs and our home in NH, I got to tweak the routes a few times so I wasn’t driving past the same places all the time, and one of our returns trips had us taking State Highway 11 across the state instead of our more usual US-4 route. This took us right through Chester, VT right around a “late lunch” hour, which finally gave me an opportunity to stop and check out another perennial establishment on our “should visit sometime” list: Southern Pie Café.
Located right off Chester’s long, lens-shaped Common on the commercial row of restaurants, small shops, a yarn store, and the hotel, Southern Pie Café first came on our radar a few years ago on a trip west; we walked by, saw a nice hand-lettered list of today’s pies, and a nice little attractive storefront… and a locked door. They had closed at 1pm (at the time). Another time, we came through town, while Carol was yarn shopping I wandered down hoping to find a slice of pie… and they were sold out.
But finally this trip yielded some success. Arriving at 1pm, hoping to score a late lunch and a slice of pie, we were in luck. They were still open, they were still serving lunch, and, while we cut it close, they were still serving pie, albeit down to just two varieties. Apparently we aren’t the only ones craving pie. But before we had pie, we had to lunch; looking over the menu, I decided on their Route 103 Sandwich: curry chicken salad with celery, golden raisins, scallions, lettuce, and tomato. The resulting sandwich was quite good, and yes, if you’re looking at the photo, it was indeed that yellow, so apparently they really like turmeric. But this was everything I look for in a good curry chicken salad (or, as the Brits call it, Jubilee Chicken): tender chicken, some nicely diced scallion and celery, a light bit of golden raisin for sweetness, a light bit of mayo for moisture, and just enough curry powder to start to give it some zing. Served up on some nice sourdough, this was a great sandwich.
Carol, meanwhile, opted for the Depot Street: roast beef, Cabot cheddar, sauerkraut, and Russian sauce. A nicely still-rare roast beef and the not-too-sweet Russian sauce were great fillings, and the bread itself a nice, high-quality marble rye. Another winner.
But the star of the show was the pie. We both latched onto the same item in the display case, a Coconut Chess. Chess is one of my Carol and my own favorites, that Southern pie variant with filling of flour, butter, sugar, and eggs baked into a custard-like filling, and in this case topped with some nicely toasted coconut. Everything worked here: a good crust, a nice satisfying and rich, but not overly sweet custard, and just enough toast to the coconut to resemble a good macaroon. Overall, some great pie.
So yeah, our swing through Chester turned out quite good. We got some good lunch, and I was finally able to sample some of Southern Pie Café’s excellent pies. I’ll definitely come back.
