Vermont Country Deli | Favorite Brattleboro, VT, Restaurants
Photo Credit : Courtesy of Vermont Country Deli
The biggest little city in southeastern Vermont, Brattleboro is home to a vibrant arts scene that includes the Vermont Jazz Center and the New England Center for Circus Arts. No matter whether you’re in town to take in a performance, browse the downtown shops, or the witness the iconic Strolling of the Heifers — or even if you are all bundled up for a day at the Harris Hill Ski Jump — you won’t want to leave without sampling at least one of our favorite Brattleboro, VT, restaurants.
Vermont Country Deli | Favorite Brattleboro, VT, Restaurants Photo Credit : Courtesy of Vermont Country Deli
From the fresh-baked muffins and pastries to the café con leche with Cuban espresso, Restless Rooster does breakfast right. All the classics are here, along with plenty of interesting twists like a spinach-bacon Benedict and jalapeno cornbread French toast.
The Chelsea Royal may be housed in a 1939 Worcester Lunch Car, but this is not your grandfather’s diner. The grass-fed beef is locally sourced, the chickens are raised in the backyard, and the produce comes from the diner’s own garden as well as others nearby. Breakfast is a great place to start, but they also serve lunch and dinner seven days a week, along with homemade ice cream. Named by NewEngland.com as one of the 15 Best Diners in New England.
This Main Street mainstay serves up edible goodness in the form of pastries, soups, unique salads, and sandwiches on artisan bread. Everything is made from scratch, with real butter and cream. There are specials every day, along with espresso drinks and locally roasted coffees. And the view of the Connecticut River is pretty delicious, too.
This gourmet-to-go market combines prepared comfort food with the feel of an old-time country store. Vermont Country Deli is your one-stop shop for strawberry jam, maple syrup, and other local specialty foods, as well as tasty sandwiches, pastries, soups and salads to power you through a busy Brattleboro day.
Specializing in healthy vegetarian and vegan cuisine, this community-supported restaurant lets you dine in for brunch, lunch, or dinner or take your food to go (along with a fresh juice smoothie). The veggie lasagna with cashew cheese is delicious. A 2017 Yankee Editors’ Pick for “Best Vegetarian.”
What started as a food truck and catering operation in nearby West Chesterfield has taken root in Brattleboro as the Porch Café. It serves breakfast and lunch, with offerings including the Beet the Chills breakfast bowl (eggs over easy, roasted beets, sweet potatoes, garlic, carrots, basil, and sriracha), sweet potato quesadillas, and a lemon-dill tuna melt.
At this eight-table, open-kitchen restaurant in a tiny 1925 Worcester dining car, organic food and locally sourced ingredients have been in vogue for more than three decades. Chef Michael Fuller has mastered the art of crafting a daily menu that manages to be both small and universally appealing at the same time. A 2010 Yankee Editors’ Pick for “Best Diner Car Dinners.”
Run by Brattleboro native Stephanie Bonin and her husband, Keith Arnold, Duo brings an elegant but simple farm-to-table experience to Main Street for brunch and dinner. The delectable dishes — which have included roasted Brussels sprouts with apple and walnut, and swordfish with crawfish étouffée — will have you planning your next visit while you’re still at the table.
A Brattleboro fixture for many years, Peter Havens has only gotten better under its current chef-owner, Zachary Corbin. Offering dinner every night except Mondays and Tuesdays, Peter Havens has 10 tables in the dining room and 10 stools at the bar, but on a beautiful summer evenings, the patio is the place to be. The menu is local and seasonal, and the wine list is deep.
The name of the restaurant is drawn from a traditional Mayan cooking method — and if authentic Mexican Mayan cuisine sounds like something you might enjoy, check out this family-owned gem hidden away in a nondescript building that proves that you can’t judge a book by its cover. A 2014 Yankee Editors’ Pick for “Best Taste of Old Mexico.”
Where are some of your favorite Brattleboro, VT, restaurants?
Associate Editor Joe Bills is Yankee’s fact-checker, query reader and the writer of several recurring departments. When he is not at Yankee, he is the co-owner of Escape Hatch Books in Jaffrey, NH.
