I have returned from my weeklong trip to Sturbridge, Massachusetts and I seem to have acquired an appreciation for Moxie, NECCO wafers, Birch beer and home fries.
I don’t really have that many food pictures as being new to this road food thing I kept forgetting to take pictures, I’ll make up for the lack of food pictures with a few scenic pictures and a lot of words: :P
What we got up to We hired a Ford Mustang Convertible for the week, it was a bit cold for the hood down but we didn’t fancy the Volvo S40 as we already drive Volvos back home. We managed to clock up just over 1500 miles over the week, which was a bit down on our last trip to New England. We had an excellent trip nonetheless, we travelled all over Massachusetts, and visited Vermont, Connecticut, New Hampshire and New York State and the weather was just perfect with blue skies everyday.
Here are a few of our activities:
Swedish car day, Lars Anderson museum, Brookline- this was a Saab and Volvo show, my partner is a Volvo enthusiast so he insisted on going to this, not really my thing so I had a quick walk around the cars and museum and we got some lunch from the food stand, he had a burger (as usual) and I had to go for an all beef hot dog which was tasty, then I left him to his thing.
Yankee Candle Village, S. Deerfield, MA- This is maybe a bit of a tourist trap, but I loved this place, ended up spending nearly 2 hours in the place and my wallet was $100 lighter.
Old Deerfield Village- I wish we’d stopped here for a walk around, as it was beautiful!
Old Sturbridge Village- pricey but interesting, $40, which was a two day entry, although we didn’t visit a second day as it tended to be rather busy.
Berkshires and the Mohawk Trail- We loved these areas soooooo much we visited them twice, absolutely stunning scenery.
The Food Here is a roundup of the places we ate at:
The Apple Barn Café, Brimfield, MA- We found this nice little spot the first day we were out and about and we ended up having breakfast here most of the week, they are open for breakfast and lunch but we were never around the area for lunch unfortunately. Here are a few pictures of the breakfasts we had here:
Those red potato home fries were perfect; I’m going to be having cravings for them now!
Piccadilly Pub, Sturbridge, MA- I really liked this place, it had a nice relaxed atmosphere (no rushing you out the door) and it was the cheapest meal we had plus it was right next door to our hotel. The server came armed with fresh warm popcorn the moment we sat down which I thought was a nice touch. I had the fried chicken tender dinner here with fries and honey BBQ sauce, and my partner had a bacon cheese angus burger, I really enjoyed this meal, it was very tasty and the portion size was great, even though I was full I was determined to make room for my first dessert of the trip so I ordered the Hershey’s chocolate lava melt which was a warm, gooey brownie with vanilla ice cream and whipped cream, it was heavenly and I have regrets about not finishing it now. I mentioned this was the cheapest meal, $26 for two mains, bottomless drinks and a dessert plus that great popcorn.
http://www.piccadillypub.com/menu.php?sec=0&sub=0 Annie’s Country Kitchen, Sturbridge, MA- This place seemed to be thee local breakfast joint, I had the eggs, bacon, sausage and home fries with pancakes and Darren went for a breakfast sandwich, this was good but not as tasty as the Apple Barn.
Bentley’s, Woodstock, VT- There isn’t many places to eat in Woodstock it seems, so we went to Bentley’s, my Carolina pulled pork sandwich wasn’t bad but I wasn’t too fussed on the sauce they had on it, the slaw, fries and meat itself was nice though, I ordered a root beer too but it didn’t taste one bit like root beer, it maybe was something to so with all the ice they’d dumped in the glass, their Hagen Daz milkshakes are to die for though. Overall I found this place a little overpriced for all it was.
http://www.bentleysrestaurant.com/index.htm Red Robin, Millbury, MA- This was Darren’s choice to go here, we were down shopping at Millbury and he liked the look of the place, I had a Whiskey River BBQ chicken burger with bottomless steak fries and he went for the Ragin Cajun chicken burger. I liked my burger, it was flavoursome and juicy and the portion size was good, however Darren wasn’t keen on his, he said he didn’t like the Cajun sauce his burger was marinated in. He did however enjoy his banana and peach milkshake and my smoothie was mighty good.
http://www.redrobin.com/ Yankee Candle, Mrs Claus’ Bakery, S.Deerfield, MA- this was good, we both had the breakfast sandwiches which were bacon, egg and cheese in a bagel or English muffin, we also had donuts, root beer and tea, really very tasty and it was wonderful to enjoy a meal beside a water fountain in the middle of a Christmas wonderland!
Garden State Diner- Newark airport, NJ- this is a cool little 50’s style diner in terminal C that I’m sure some of you may have encountered, we ate here the night we headed home, I took the blackened Texas chicken sandwich with fries and my partner had his usual bacon, cheeseburger, he had a strawberry milkshake and I had a root beer float. No complaints here, the meal was tasty and the drinks were real good too.
Breezelands Orchards, Warren, MA- we enjoyed fresh apples and cider here, both were delicious!
http://www.breezelandsorchards.com Ok I admit we ate at a few chains that mightn’t be the most popular around here:
Chicago Uno and Applebee’s- Both of these were kind of slow, the food seemed to take forever to come out plus Applebee’s got my order wrong and I got my replacement meal after my partner had already finished his, I didn’t get too annoyed though as the service was friendly and apparently they were down a few staff that night so I let them off with it. I really enjoyed the drinks in Uno’s, their smoothies were lovely. The food in both these establishments was just standard fare but it did us nicely as it was all we wanted anyway, so no complaints.
Friendly’s- Ok so I’m an ice cream addict and I know this is a chain but I kinda had to go for a sundae! We went here twice, I had a cookies & cream sundae and the second time a forbidden fudge brownie and my partner had the fruit & sherbet both times, we enjoyed these but I found the forbidden fudge a bit of a chocolate overload so never again with that one!
Overall I really enjoyed this trip, Massachusetts doesn’t seem as sleepy as Vermont and I’ve never seen soooo many Dunkin Donuts and McDonalds in such a small radius but it’s definitely a state I’d visit again! Darren says we’re off to the White Mountains in New Hampshire next, but I think I’ll wait a while before another trip as I’m still wrecked from this one!
