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This past weekend we finished up our WV road trips. I’ve now set foot in all 55 of West Virginia’s counties. We still need to circle back and get a picture by the Mineral County sign, but it’s close so no worries there.
The first day of our journey was straight forward enough – a short stop at the John Henry statue in Talcott, lunch at the Chestnut in Hinton, and then on to the New River Gorge and Hawks Nest State Park.
The John Henry statue and Hawks Nest were neat, and I’ll share those experiences with you next week, but this week I want to focus on the Chestnut.
We stopped by the Chestnut on a whim during one of our trips two years ago and enjoyed it so much, we decided to stop back on this trip.
Nestled on the lower street of a riverside town, the Chestnut Revival is a coffee shop and former B & B. While a muted lilac teacup sign beckons outside, inside the atmosphere is surprisingly vivid. This is entirely due to the personality of owner/manager Verona.
Everything in the Chestnut has clearly been touched and influenced by Verona – from the mis-matched tables and chairs to the unique combinations of flavors in the food.
It is an eclectic shop to say the least. The walls are covered in local artists’ work, family photos, masks, Mardi Gras beads, and an entire wall of signatures from pleased customers. I’m completely convinced that you could spend an hour there and still not take everything in.
Verona greeted us like old friends (spend 20 minutes there and you’ll quickly become old friends), and she remembered us from our last visit. I’m not sure what I enjoyed more – our visit with Verona or the food and drink! Her tea selection was quite impressive, and she made me her custom spin on a London Fog.
The reason we decided to stop back in the first place though was the food, and we were not disappointed! I had a turkey bacon on ciabatta, Mama had a BLT on sourdough bread, and Daddy had a French Dip. I stole some of his dip for my own sandwich, and it was divine. She also gave us a sample of her mushroom soup which was yuuuumy! Did I mention that she makes her own mayonnaise?
We sat and chatted and sipped our lavender rose iced tea and then finished our meal off by splitting a house specialty – a giant salted caramel chocolate chip M&M cookie.
Mama said we almost need to make a yearly pilgrimage to the Chestnut, and I most definitely agree!