From Post Standard, Dining Out

By Yolanda Wright
September 22, 2005

Colgate Inn's Dining Room is top-drawer

If you grew up thinking that eating dinner in the dining room was something special, you're right on the mark at the handsomely refurbished landmark Colgate Inn in Hamilton.

The first phase of its major renovation was completed more than a year ago, with first-floor lobby, public rooms and The Dining Room making the 1925 landmark at the top of the village green worth a detour.

When three of us visited on a recent Saturday evening, we enjoyed the friendly, casual atmosphere and creative menu in The Dining Room, which manages to be something special with good food and super-attentive service, without being overwhelming.

Preserving old favorites in the spacious dining room, refurbishers have kept vintage chandeliers, handsome beamed ceiling and the familiar Payne Street mural. With the inn at the center, the painting stretches across an old brick fireplace.

Hardwood floors are accented with Oriental rugs, and shiny dark wood tables are topped with three white votive candles, white cloth napkins with heavy silver rings, water goblets and flatware.

The inn's dinner menu is relatively simple, with four appetizers ($7.95 to $9.95), two soups ($3.95), four salads ($3.50 to $4.50) and seven entrees ($13.95 to $23.95), including the chef's choice of seasonal vegetable. Servers describe evening specials, with prices.

We started with a chilled bottle of Walnut Crest Pinot Grigio ($21), kept in a floor cooler, and our waitress carefully poured refills. A basket of first-rate warm bread and rosettes of herb butter started serious feasting.

Easy to share, an appetizer of brie and pumpkin seeds en croute ($7.95) contained three small balls of creamy, zesty cheese in puff-pastry crusts circling a small mound of cooked mixed greens. Cranberry and apricot sauce offered sweet contrasts, and cheese puffs were tops. I couldn't taste the pumpkin seed but didn't miss it.

Hot, hearty and delicious, pumpkin and apple bisque ($3.95) looked and tasted like fall, with pureed pumpkin and Granny Smith apples spiked with sherry and finished with cream.

Generous and nicely presented in quarters, a roasted half chicken ($14.95) was an old-fashioned treat. The cranberry-apricot sauce we enjoyed with the appetizer-brie balls did double duty here with the chicken, which had plenty of flavor.

Good chive-mashed potatoes partnered the chicken, and each entree was served with three fresh asparagus stalks, which were undercooked.

Pistachio-crusted salmon ($17.95) pulled out all the stops with a 7-ounce fillet with roasted nuts and a topping of Pernod-bearnaise sauce. Risotto got into the act with Asiago cheese and chives.

An evening special of veal osso buco ($23.95) was everything it needed to be special - rich, fall-off-the-bone tender, loaded with flavor, delicious. Serving it with soft cheese polenta was inspired.

Other entree options were grilled strip steak ($21.95), linguine with clams and mussels ($15.95), 10-ounce pork chop ($18.95), grilled filet mignon ($23.95) and a vegetarian sun-dried tomato and asparagus risotto ($13.95).

Coffee ($2 each) accompanied house-made desserts ($4). We had two winners out of three and were not charged for the loser.

Twin treats were a flourless chocolate cake with raspberry sauce and warm Tollhouse pie, a Colgate Inn classic with vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce. Both were predictable old favorites.

Apple crisp, however, "in a flaky cinnamon crust" was served in a floppy phyllo case sneezed into a cup and filled mostly with topping rather than apples, creating crumbly extra-sweet bites.

We were offered a replacement but had already dined well and weren't even tempted by creme brulee.

Built in 1925, the inn today is owned by Colgate University and offers 46 guest rooms as well as three dining areas and a banquet facility. It is now managed by William Eberhardt's Dining Associates, which also operates other lodging and dining properties in Central New York. Eberhardt's son, Ben, is innkeeper and general manager of the Hamilton property.

The Dining Room takes reservations for parties of any number, and the Tap Room serves food from 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. seven days a week.

If you're an old fan of the Colgate Inn, you'll enjoy the renovations, and if you're a newcomer, you'll want to plan more than one visit.

Yolanda Wright's weekly "Dining Out" review is based on an unannounced, anonymous visit. An A-to-Z list of many of the reviews is available at www.syracuse.com/dining/.

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