Peekamoose Restaurant & Tap Room - Big Indian, NY

Right before New Year's, Dan and I borrowed my mom's car and drove upstate to Mt. Tremper for a mini vacation. We spent the night at the Lodge part of this place called the Emerson Resort, which turned out to be a bust! The promised Wi-Fi was non-existent and the front desk lady game me a lame excuse blaming semantics and the toiletries left in our bathroom were totally USED! Ew. We did have a very nice meal at the Peekamoose Restaurant & Tap Room, which was about a 20 minute drive up the same route the lodge was located and where I ran into an old co-worker!

I'll get the cons out of the way first:
- We had to wait at least 35 minutes past our reservation time to get seated, even though when we were brought to the dining room, at least a third of the tables were empty. We were also seated right by the door at an awkwardly placed table that seemed like an afterthought.
- Upstate water, EW! After taking one sip from my glass of tap, I had to break down and order a $6.50 bottle of Panna still water.

Now, onto the meal. I got a Cascazila from the Ithaca Beer Company. I forget what Dan ordered - maybe a Newcastle Brown? We got some delicious bread with scallion butter to begin. I love when bread comes on a board with a cutting knife. It was delicious, and as you can tell from the picture, very crumby.


We were then given an amuse bouche of a curried crab salad, which was perhaps a little over-dressed. It also could have used an edible vessel like an endive leaf, or is that too overdone at this point? I do love salads in endive leaves and isn't the point of an amuse something you can pick up and pop into your mouth? I'm probably wrong and just thinking of that poor chap Clay's fruit salad mess from the first episode of the most recent Top Chef.


To start with, the both of us ordered the 12 ingredient chopped salad. I could only make out the following ingredients for sure: romaine, tomatoes, olives - nicoise?, red onion, feta cheese, cucumber. I think there were also pine nuts and two types of sausage/meat. In deconstructing my plate at dinner, I think I figured out another ingredient or two, but now I can't remember.


Dan couldn't figure out a main to get, so he ordered two appetizers. The first was a trio of pan roasted sea scallops with slices of apples that sat on a puree of sweet potato. This could have easily been its own entree.


He also got the sweet potato gnocchi, which got added texture from being browned in a pan. The sweet and savory nuggets were served in a creamy (coconut milk, I think) but light broth and dotted with olives and pine nuts.


For my main, I went with the braised pork belly, which came with red wine braised red cabbage and creamy mashed potatoes. The cabbage by itself was too sweet, but once you started making bites with the pork and potatoes, it became an addictive combination.


We put forth an excellent effort. What you see left in my plate is some of the skin. I ate some of it, but I like my pig skin crispy.


Dessert was the weakest part of the meal. I really enjoyed the cardamom ice cream since it's not a flavor you see too often, but hated the puff pastry shell that held the braised half apple.