One quick restaurant spotlight and then I’m off to the Saturday farmer’s market. Upon moving in, our landlord left us a gift card to Sweetwaters Restaurant. While on the website, the food looked like a pretty average American cuisine, our experience of dinner was far from that. First off, all ingredients were local, so local in fact that we had to pay a local tax at the end (happy to do it for the quality of food). No kidding, even the butter for our bread was local, and so, so creamy.
My boyfriend got the Steak Frites, which was a char grilled flat iron steak with Gorgonzola Boursin. The steak tasted like it had a delicious balsamic reduction glaze, and my boyfriend fell in love with the cheese, while he usually never likes Gorgonzola or anything similar to the blue cheese family. I had the Tomato Basil Bow Tie Pasta. It was deliciously coated with a light tomato sauce and tossed in with summer squash, sundried tomatoes, basil, and locally made feta cheese. Again, the cheese was out of this world. While I normally enjoy feta cheese for it’s sharp taste, this cheese was more subtle, while the flavor came from a fullness of taste. To everyone who told me that I’ve never had cheese like local Vermont cheese, pat yourselves on the back because you were RIGHT.
Highlight of the meal? The cocktails. I had a Watermelon Sangria with lime and mint in it, followed by a Mango Serrano Margarita that had the kick of Serrano peppers at the end of every sip. The boyfriend enjoyed a Summer Shandy, which was a local beer topped with lemonade, followed by a Peach Manhattan, with char grilled peach infused bourbon. He loved the latter drink so much, we’re thinking about infusing our own bourbon with char grilled peaches… YUM!
Cleaving Leaveland 