Bramble & Brine at The Buttery
When it first opened decades ago, the Buttery (since its closing and resurrection in 2021, adding “Bramble & Brine,” the former Rehoboth Beach eatery) introduced to downtown Lewes a beach-elegant form of high-end dining in a circa-1894 Victorian home, creating at the time, appointment dining where dressing-up for a culinary-inspired evening was not out of the question. The dining room is, according to the new owner, ‘whimsically’ elegant (read: quirky), but the service is less than elegant, invoking on our last visit an often robustly debated restaurant service query of when is it appropriate to auction servings? Diners ordering at a chain restaurant have no expectation that the non-professional server will remember who ordered what, so, when, for example, four plates of mains arrive on a tray, it is common for the runner or server to inquire of the table, for instance, “who ordered the chicken parm?,” and then similarly auction the rest of the dishes to those claiming their respective food bounty. But at a high-end restaurant like Bramble & Brine, auctioning dishes from the kitchen delivered by runners who did not take the order is not acceptable, especially given that the point-of-sale ticket system nominates every ticket by seat number; that is, the kitchen knows who ordered what, but the server did not take enough care or pay enough attention to review the ticket and hand the numbered dish to the numbered seat (or, perhaps, the server in such a high-end restaurant could just remember who ordered what). Auctioning with a POS system is simply lazy, and displays a lack of caring or organization; indeed, what if two from the same party ordered the same dish but at a different temperature; are the patrons obligated to take first bites to ensure the successful auction? With the sophisticated dining and heritage of Bramble & Brine, auctioning dishes is, well, less than Victorian. Bramble & Brine also loses credibility by pricing dishes according to “MP.” The menu provided during our last visit was dated “May 2024,” meaning it was printed that day or week of our May 2024 visit, and could easily reflect the actual food item price. What was the wholesale price of New York strip steak the day or so before the verbally-conveyed $90 “MP” was announced for the 12 oz. version on the evening we visited? We took a hard pass. Restaurants are free, of course, to charge whatever its patrons and the market will bear, but bearing high prices comes with it an expectation of service and quality, and, with such discouragement, Bramble & Brine failed to meet that expectation.
On our last visit, duck frites was fine even if the frites were soggy with duck juices; B&B’s renowned meatloaf wellington (celebrated because it perhaps is the only restaurant bold enough to serve or even call something meatloaf) is not your grandmother’s variety, but only marginally better. Appetizers, as pricy as they are, perhaps saved the experience, especially beet tartine, a dish well-suited to be enjoyed at a Parisian café, even if the server curiously inquired whether we understood what it was before accepting the order. Many patrons who visit B&B rightfully raise as an annoyance delicate portions masked by generous sides relative to price, and the wine list more than spans your wallet, as do the pricy cocktails – B&B is not an inexpensive Lewes night out. B&B offers private dining in old rooms, outdoor seating on the porch, and different areas to enjoy antique-style furnishings, with the elegance of the rooms adding to your dining pleasure, that is, before the bill arrives. The owner also helms La Fable, Houston & White Co., and Dalmata, and is a veteran restaurant presence in Rehoboth Beach and Lewes, often roaming the restaurant floors to check on patrons. The overall team is professional, yet, still, given its standing, ambience, seasonally-changing menu, and its overall status in the local restaurant community, the experience at B&B does not match its now meandering reputation, rendering Bramble & Brine among the most disappointing restaurants in Delmarva.
