The Morning After, A Syrcls Brunch Review: Snowshed Lodge Cafeteria

Let’s face it, the last thing you want to do when you wake up from a long (and possibly regrettable) night out is to get out of bed & cook yourself something awesome to make yourself feel more human again. At least for people like me, who pretty much don’t cook at all, going out to brunch is pretty much your best friend. So that’s why I’m here: to share my tales of urban brunching— tales of caution, and/or tales of awesome.

This past weekend, I went on a group ski/snowboarding trip to Killington, VT. So, technically, this isn’t an “urban brunch” post, but I felt the need to share this. After all, sometimes, we take some things for granted living in major metropolitan cities.

It’s not that I was expecting a ski lodge cafeteria to seriously be up to the standards of a brunch at a restaurant, but I guess I just was expecting the food to be edible. To be fair, the bagel I had was okay. Though, honestly, how do you fuck up a bagel?

I miraculously stuck to a vegetarian diet this weekend, despite the fact that, if you’re a vegetarian and go skiing, it is virtually IMPOSSIBLE to find anything without meat of any kind. Everything is chili, steak, burgers, etc. etc. And for breakfast/brunch, everything was eggs, sausage, bacon, etc. Even the so-called “Mountain Muffin” was filled with meat. So this is why I opted for a bagel, a side of home fries, and an orange juice.

The prices were obviously a complete rip-off, which was to be expected at a resort, but honestly, the $3 I was forced to shell out for the worst so-called home fries in the history of humanity was possibly on par with getting mugged for $40 a few months ago— at least on a “why me?” level. When the girl at the counter was SCRAPING these flake remnants of what I can only assume were potatoes and bell peppers on to my plate, from one of those metal containers heated from underneath, I didn’t have the heart to tell her to stop. She was, for lack of a better descriptor, probably mentally challenged, so I felt kind of bad ordering her to do anything.

So I paid about $10 for the whole thing, though it was fairly obvious at that point that I would probably break my jaw if I attempted to chew one of these shredded, charred pieces of “home fries.” However, my roommate was unconvinced. He took my plate, slathered ketchup all over the place, took one bite, and looked like he was going to keel over. I was “for reals” legitimately concerned that he might’ve chipped a tooth. He then attempted to get my money back, which I think was a little excessive, but then again, I would go to great lengths to avoid food/server/cashier confrontations of that kind, because I’m kind of a pussy like that. Plus, I feel like you kind of take a risk when you buy food, and you just kind of have to be prepared for that stuff. I mean, it wasn’t the mentally challenged counter girl or Italian cashier’s fault that the quality of lodge food can sometimes be horrendous.

We didn’t get my money back, mostly because the cashier was Italian and didn’t really understand what my roommate was saying. I guess it could’ve been worse…I could’ve gotten bad meat. Right? At least that tainted peanut butter going around hasn’t made its way to me as far as I know.

Oh, also, there was this waffle hut I found the next day outside the lodge, more by the actual skiing area, that had amazing Belgian-style hand-held sugar waffles. I was about to not get one, because I was afraid it would make me late to return my skis. But I got it anyway… and never looked back. Moral of the story: ALWAYS get the waffle. Always.

Fun and semi-unrelated alcohol fact: there is a beer store just outside the Killington resort that sells nice ales. I got a LaChouffe ale that I had all to myself, because for some inexplicable reason, everyone was more interested in drinking Bud Light. But that’s another story. Whatevs, more for me!

Photos from the Internet