The Homeplace

Exactly one week ago I had dinner at The Homeplace, a restaurant situated amidst the Blue Ridge Mountains in Catawba, Virginia. This wonderful old country house has a big porch with porch swing, a gazebo in a yard among beautiful shade trees, and sprawling land with a big creek, massive hills and valleys, all dotted with cattle. Once inside, you’re treated like family. In one room a group of older folks played country bluegrassy jazz. From there, expect to be led past the staircase to one of the other rooms where you’ll be seated for dinner.

It’s family style, here. That means pitchers, platters and bowls of food and drink placed on the table for you and the other members of your party to dive into. This is country-style home cooking. Everyone gets fried chicken, the second meat is then chosen, (we had country ham) and all the sides are the same: coleslaw, mashed potatoes, corn, green beans, pinto beans, homemade biscuits, out-of-this-world apple butter, pitchers of the sweetest lemonade, and unsweetened iced tea. Each night a different fruit cobbler with vanilla ice cream is served for dessert. Ours was blueberry, and as with everything that is served, it’s all-you-can-eat. Yes. Oh, and all that can be had for little more than the price of a NYC movie ticket. I recommend it to everyone.

(Pictured here is a photo [I played around with in Photoshop] which I took after dinner as we headed back to our car.)