Laurie W.
Yelp
In a word: awesome. This was our third visit to the Foster Harris House and each visit gets better!
As always, we were greeted promptly at the door (by Diane, this time) with John shortly behind. They are such lovely hosts. They gave us a quick tour (since we were return guests, we just needed a refresher) and led us to our room. This time, we stayed in the Mary Ellen Jenkins Room, which is the smallest room, but it's cozy. (Foster Harris has three rooms - I've stayed in the Suite, Meadow, and Mary Ellen Jenkins - Meadow's probably my favorite.) They offered us a glass of wine when we arrived, but we took a rain check since we were headed to the Inn at Little Washington for dinner later that night and wanted to keep our appetites in check.
After a restful night's sleep, we awoke ready for Foster Harris House's famous 4-course breakfast. Our breakfast began with dark chocolate scones, perfectly crispy and warm, accompanied by coffee (or tea if you wanted) and fresh orange juice. The next course was fresh fruit, yogurt, & granola parfait, and they thoughtfully remembered my husband's strawberry allergy so his was sans strawberries. Next came the 'main course' - puff pastry toopped with poached egg, tomato & avocado salsa, chipotle cream sauce, and "paradise bacon." Delish! the poached egg was cooked (and presented!) beautifully and the puff pastry just melted in your mouth. Last was dessert - lemon liebechen with berry coulis. As you can imagine, we were stuffed after this and ready to take on the day.
After exploring the area (there are tons of wineries and smaller towns within a reasonable driving distance, many of the wineries are close by) we returned to Foster Harris, where we took up our "rain check" glass of wine and got to meet a few other guests, who were charming and delightful and also share our love for wine! We must've talked with them for over an hour - I actually didn't realize how long until I looked at my watch and realized we had only 15 minutes to get ready for dinner.
First-time guests to Foster Harris may not know this, but John and Diane started serving dinners on Fridays & Saturdays at Foster Harris in the summer of 2013. We had the pleasure of joining them one evening after they'd just started so we decided with this visit to do it again. This particular Friday night, it was us and one other couple. (Note: the dinner is served in the same dining area as breakfast - it's a very cute area but definitely not restaurant like.) John's cooking at breakfast definitely translates over to dinner - we had a fabulous meal. The meal opened with a complimentary glass of Trump Blanc de Blancs flavored with a bit of Elderberry liquor. The first course was a seared sea scallop with forbidden rice and wild boar salami. The scallop was seared beautifully. Second course was a fennel soup - I was skeptical - but it was fresh and delicious, perfect for an early spring meal. The next course was a wild mushroom and truffle ravioli, which was excellent! Our next course was a lamb persillade with cauliflower and brussels sprouts (which I even ate!) - the lamb was cooked to a beautiful medium rare, so tender and delicious. (Also, we got the wine pairings - they were very generous and the refills we were offered were much appreciated.) Finally, the meal ended with a smoked chocolate souffle and wood ice cream (yes, homemade ice cream made from wood chips from a nearby distillery). Everything was just phenomenal. If you can when you visit, stay two nights to experience John's dinners - you won't be sorry (and you don't have to be a guest when you eat there).
We ended our trip with another amazing 4-course breakfast the next day and were sad to say goodbye to our hosts. We look forward to returning!