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Fine home cookin’ in Sherbrooke 
October 2008 - Bill Spurr, a features writer at The Chronicle Herald, freelanced this column.
I stopping for gas in Sheet Harbour, I asked how much farther it was to Sherbrooke.
"An hour or an hour and 15, ’pends how fast you drive," another
customer said, and who could argue with that? "There’s one corner so
sharp you can see yourself coming back the other way."
Smoked salmon strips on Caesar salad and garlic toast from the Sherbrooke Village Inn in Sherbrooke. (Peter Parsons / Staff)
An hour later I was in Sherbrooke for the first time, and after some
business four of us walked across to the Sherbrooke Village Inn for
lunch. The inn’s restaurant has two dining rooms, one small and one
medium, both with pine panelling on the walls and small, round wooden
tables covered by woven cloths. The restaurant was almost full, and I
had the feeling everyone else there knew each other.
The Sherbrooke Village Inn’s wine list includes five Jost products
and four imports, one each from Greece and Spain and two from
Australia. One of my dining companions speculated that the selection of
the imports may have been strongly influenced by a sale at the local
NSLC. And looking over the menu, I couldn’t even hazard a guess as to
what would go with Greek wine. The special drink here is a lemon gin
Collins iced tea for $4.25.
The restaurant, which specializes in seafood, is across the road
from the St. Mary’s River smokehouse, and two of the people in our
party ordered the smoked salmon caesar salad. Both were very pleased.
Large strips of salmon that’s been spiced and hot-smoked top a
caesar with a dressing that includes a "secret ingredient," and the
salad was large enough to make an entire lunch.
A club wrap made of tomato, bacon, cheese, lettuce and spiced
chicken and wrapped in a tortilla was pretty much what you’d expect.
I was going to order fish and chips, but when our waitress told me
the haddock is caught locally, then frozen, I changed my mind. What
made me go from fish and chips to perusing the Healthy Choices section
I couldn’t say, but I ordered oven-baked beans with brown bread.
The beans were a smaller variety than I had expected, but the sauce on them was great.
When I phoned later, I was told they are navy beans that are parboiled, then baked in molasses and brown sugar. "We advertise home cookin’, so we try to make everything home cookin,’ " the woman on the phone told me.
The brown bread was very good, if quite a bit fluffier than the
homemade brown bread I’m used to, but the baker had left for the day so
I couldn’t quiz her on that.
I liked my lunch, but when fish and chips were delivered to the
couple at the next table, it looked and smelled like I’d made a
mistake. The woman must have seen me looking because she said "Want
some?" I declined, but only after thinking about it.
For dessert, two of us had pumpkin pie, which I have to say was a
bit disappointing. Overly cold and not overly tasty, with a tough
crust, it showed definite signs of having been around too long.
Lunch for four, including one beer, four soft drinks, two desserts, tax and tip, was $79. I could see myself coming back.
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