Vickers Restaurant
192 East Welsh Pool Road
Exton, Pennsylvania
(610) 363-7998
https://www.vickersrestaurant.com
Because of their proximity and certain ambient & culinary similarities – both reside in picturesque 200-year-old structures and sport mirror image menus – Vickers and the Kimberton Inn (mentioned in the review immediately below) often prompt a spirited game of “compare & contrast” among their respective clientele. And a goodly number, I was recently surprised to learn, prefer Vickers – I am not one of them.
For while their outdoor patio is nicely appointed and extremely pleasant, the food in my opinion, tends to fall short of the mark. The Harvest Salad (pictured) – roasted beets, sunflower seeds, feta cheese, and red wine vinaigrette – sounded absolutely delicious. Unfortunately, the promised red wine vinaigrette was pretty much conspicuous by its absence, rendering the assorted greens and their accompaniments annoyingly dry and rather tasteless.
The entrées didn’t fare much better… For starters, both my Grouper – a special of the evening – and my dining partner’s Pecan Chicken were adorned with significant portions of the very same vegetables: broccoli and carrots, which filled in a good deal of on the plate and provided a splash of color… but added precious little in the way of flavor. Copious piles of the very same generic veggies on several different platings is never a good sign… but it does speak volumes about the kitchen’s lack of creativity.
The chicken – exceedingly moist & tender – was actually quite good. The pecan crust provided a nice contrasting crunch and the apricot glaze a sweet but not cloying reward. My grouper (pictured), however, was another matter entirely. The fillet was paired with two jumbo shrimp… and neither was terribly exciting. In addition to the generic vegetables, it was pillowed on a seabed of what the menu described as “herb risotto,” which was something of a misnomer, as it had infinitely more in common with rice pilaf and was basically tasteless.
Speaking of lack of flavor… nothing quite matched the “bland leading the bland” dill cucumber sauce drowning the grouper. This could have been such an exciting dish – somewhat akin to the splendid sautéed halibut I enjoyed at the Kimberton Inn, for instance – but it simply had nothing to offer. And priced at $38.00, it was an exercise in financial as well as gastronomic futility.
Dessert, namely the extraordinarily delicious Bourbon Vanilla Bread Pudding (pictured), was, without question, the highlight of our evening at table… Unfortunately, the kitchen’s other offerings failed to demonstrate the same level of excellence.
Bon Appétit!
Be Safe
TAD
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