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**This review is purely about the Food/restaurant**
I knew there was a restaurant here and finally decided to try it out after hearing that it got a recommendation buy the Michelin Guide (NOT a Michelin Star), but I now believe that must have been solely for the hotel side of the business because the dining experience was very disappointing.
The way the farm portrays themselves, and prices things is as a fine dining restaurant, so I judged it as such. But it quickly became clear they simply lack the ability to provide that type of experience and need to do better setting expectations.
SERVICE- Not bad. Everyone was very friendly. Pacing was an issue though, there were big lulls between the amuse and 1st course, 1st and 2nd, then the main entree came very fast after the 2nd course. Wait staff rotated and one course was served by a kid who couldn’t remember what he was serving.
For the dessert course, the waitress quickly dropped it on the table and muttered the description mid-stride as she walked off.
There were also issues with a couple plates being dirty.
Everything is served family style which sounds fine at first, but in practice presents major issues. Depending on the day you go you will either be seated with your individual party or at a large communal table with other parties. In a small party of two it seems like they should just present individual plates, but they still serve 2 servings on a plate in the middle and you have to scope what you want to your own plate. The issue with this is that as a chef you are making the guest decide how the dish eats, and (especially with how unevenly everything was seasoned) they might taste the dish as you intended it to be.
If you go to the communal night, you have that issue plus the fact that you cannot control how much people from other parties take so if you are served last there will likely be missing food.
There were also inconsistencies with portion sizes between different tables.
FOOD: Overall, a SEVERE lack of seasoning on every course.
Bread- Bread service was a Zucchini bread muffin and sun-dried tomato butter. The muffin was dense, burnt on the bottom, and the butter wasn’t salted.
1st- It was just a salad. Nothing offensive or remarkable. The vinaigrette was very subtle, and there wasn’t enough. It also was supposed to have radishes and tomatoes but those were sparse as well.
2nd- Swordfish was cooked very well, but very under-seasoned. Ratatouille was also lacking salt and acid, and was cold.
3rd- Pork chop wasn’t brined, so no seasoning got past the flabby fat cap. Usually when pork is this overcooked, you at least have some crispy skin on the outside. The pesto was pretty good, but again lacked salt. The veggies were again not as hot as the protein, and haphazardly cut like a home cook. Broccolini was *completely* unseasoned and was an off putting color.
4th- Was supposed to be Blackberry shortcake, but changed to Peach without any warning. Good thing we had no allergies.
It was genuinely terrible. Peaches weren’t sweet, whipped cream had 0 sugar, and ratios between the bland fruit, bland cream, and stale (but at least sweetened) sponge cake were off. We literally took one bite and walked out since you have to pay in advance, and got ice cream instead (Cape May has a ton of great ice cream shops).
This also was not an isolated experience because I paid close attention to the plates of other tables and they all looked the same. The 4.6/5 clearly is only because of the farm itself and lodging.