Eatery - Gastrognome (CA)
54381 Ridgeview Dr, Idyllwild, CA 92549
Pricing - $/$$ | Dining - Casual | Cuisine - American
www.gastrognome.com
So Duc and I are out in Idyllwild for our anniversary weekend, and in a more intimate, smaller town like this, we've got just a handful of choices for restaurants. Our first visit was to the Gastrognome (by the way, I love all the little puns in this town!) during lunchtime, and we made a slight mistake in sitting outside as there were bugs everywhere. Oh well. The setting was nice though and the people just as polite.
We were first brought out their homemade bread with some butter. We rather liked the bread because it was thick and hearty with plenty of dough to put that melty butter on. Actually, it didn't even need the butter since it was so rich in itself.
Of our order, the baked French Onion bowl came out first which was a very large serving of French Onion soup with melted cheese and bread on top. It actually was very good, especially how much cheese was on top and because the bread was more of their homemade stuff. I usually have French onion soup that is way too salty but this one was just right. It was savory and plentiful with onions. The cheese was generous and melted well into the broth. It was delicious but the only issue we had was that it was nearly $9!
Once we had cleaned up the entire bowl of soup, I got my Lily Rock salad (spring mix, tomatoes, slivered almonds, and goat cheese) with olive oil and vinegar on the side to make my dressing. I was disappointed in this $7 dish since not all of the lettuce was fresh (some had wilted and were starting to degrade!). It was very plain to be honest and the goat cheese overwhelmed the other ingredients.
Duc got the Gnome Dip, a sandwich made with thinly sliced sirloin steak pan seared with white onions and served with large potato wedges and au jus for dipping. Was it good? Yes. Was it anything special? Not particularly. The wedges weren't too impressive and though I liked the bread on the sandwich, I don't think that it deserved its $14 earmark. The steak was a bit tough too and generally flavorless without being dipped. Our bill for the lunch came out to about $40 which we both saw as way too much for a small lunch of just okay food. I'll give them a little more credit though because the staff was nice.
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