Since Seven Days held the first Vermont Restaurant Week in 2010, a spate of similar shindigs have sprung up around the region — including weeklong events in New Hampshire, Killington and now, Manchester.
This is clearly a welcome phenomenon for those of us who live to eat. Usually scheduled to coincide with slower times of year — i.e., mud season and stick season — restaurant weeks offer perfect windows during which to chow down at places hitherto unknown to the people of this area (to quote Frank Zappa).
At least a dozen restaurants are taking part in Manchester’s first Restaurant Week, offering three-course, prix-fixe meals that cost $20.12 at lunch (clever) and $30.12 for dinner. For those who’ve never ventured there, the town is a food mecca, a liminal zone where top Vermont ingredients collide with the polished, classical techniques expected by tourists from points south. As far as I can tell, stick season is the only reason that some of the dining rooms in Manchester appeared half-empty last night, at least from the road; the two meals (!) I ate there were both spectacular, albeit in different ways.
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