The Bench Review

The Bench: Surprisingly good

Overall rating: 84

Food rating: 84

The Bench lists itself on its web page as "Vermont Comfort Food", which makes it an unusual restaurant to review on this blog. We were in Stowe for a ski trip and came here one night, and then came back the next night just to get drinks and small plates.

From the outside, it has a typical Stowe-overpriced-pub look -- not particularly inviting. Inside is quite different. It's spacious with lots of wood, an open kitchen with a large wood fire, and is set up nicely to accommodate families or people returning from the slopes.

The Bench seems to have opened about 18 months ago. Over two nights there we had several different drinks, all of which were excellent. These included a vodka and ginger beer concoction, a vodka drink with roasted pear liqueur, a take-off on a margarita, and a Whistle Pig bourbon variation on an old fashioned.

Maple butternut squash soup is a fairly common soup in Stowe, but this one was delicious and pretty different, with lots of unusual flavors, and topped with pumpkin seeds. A warm sweet potato salad was excellent, with feta melting from the warmth over kale and topped with additional sweet potato chips. Mussels fra diavolo was delicious as was scallops with a curried cauliflower puree. Asparagus wrapped in prosciutto was tasty. Buffalo wings were very good but not great. Also very good but not great were a lamb burger and the house hamburger. We did not eat any real main entrees, but they have them and they sound interesting.

A wood-fired served-in-the-pan chocolate chip cookie was an excellent dessert but too large for three of us.

The service was warm and welcoming, with the wait staff knowledgeable and helpful in making choices and accommodating requests. Prices were quite reasonable for Stowe.

All in all, this is a remarkably good restaurant for the price in Stowe, and we hope they maintain their quality, ambiance, and value in the future -- a hard thing to do in a tourist town.