Horsefeathers
94 North Broadway
Tarrytown, NY 10591 (Map it!)
Attendees: Reid, Shelley, Jeffrey, Sylvia
The Case: Horsefeathers v. the Westchester Breakfast Club
The Venue: Route 9 in Tarrytown
The Facts: I’ve driven by Horsefeathers more times than I can count. I always noticed it was there, given the memorable name, but have never actually been inside. Frankly, it was much less like a restaurant and much more like a bar and grill than I anticipated. The food met that standard.
Things actually started off well. Horsefeathers provides its brunch customers with a complimentary bread and pastry basket that was quite good. Specifically, there were these little apple cinnamon “sandwiches” that were especially tasty, and the cranberry muffins weren’t half bad either.
Unfortunately, the basket was definitely the highlight of the meal. I ordered a steak sandwich with two fried eggs. The steak, despite being done to medium, was exceedingly dry and chewy. They did absolutely nothing to the bread to improve the dish; not toast it, or add garlic, or anything. And the fried eggs were fried eggs.
The Verdict: Meh in the first degree.
Happy Halloween, fellow breakfasters! In honor of the holiday, we wanted to do something spooky for breakfast. Well, we means me. And the spookiest I could think of was to dine somewhere in Sleepy Hollow, home of the Headless Horseman. Ooooohhhhh, how spooooooky! Unfortunately, the WBC has already been to the Horseman restaurant in Sleepy Hollow, so I chose the next best thing: Horsefeathers in neighboring Tarrytown.
Horsefeathers offers a Sunday brunch beginning at 11:30. The restaurant is half bar, half dining area, all dimly lit and all wood-paneled. We were shown to a booth in the back of the restaurant. The only reason we got a large booth is because we originally thought we would be a party of six. Fortunately the staff let us stay at our booth and didn’t make us move to a table for four when we informed them that we would just be four after all.
As we reviewed the menu we were brought a basket that contained a visually appealing and pleasant smelling assortment of breads and pastries including some slices of toasted brioche, some cornbread, several small cranberry-orange muffins, and some yummy apple-cinnamon bread strips.
Unfortunately, the bread basket proved to be the high point of the meal.
The menu was broken down into “starters”, “eggs and stuff” (which had a large variety of egg dishes, and some other stuff, including waffles), burgers, and some questionably classfied “light fare.” (Apparently 1/2 a rack of baby back ribs is considered light fare because, after all, it’s only half a rack.) Wanting to try something somewhat different, I chose the egg quesadilla, which was to come with scrambled eggs, bacon, cheese, and spinach. The waitress asked if I would like sweet potato home fries with my quesadilla. Why not. Something orange on Halloween seemed appropriate.
The wait time was fair, although it was a problem that the coffee and tea ordered by some members arrived mere seconds before our meals. The first thing I noticed about my breakfast quesadilla was that there was no sauce of any kind accompanying it. I would have expected a little cup of salsa perhaps, or maybe a scoop of guacamole. Considering that Sylvia’s omelette was served with some avocado slices on top, it doesn’t seem a stretch of the imagination to serve some guac with something called a quesadilla. But there was nothing. The next thing I noticed was the glistening of the sweet potato home fries. I don’t mean glistening in a good way. Basically, here was something that was once a sweet potato, and still tasted somewhat like a sweet potato, but that had been simmered in so much oil as to render it mostly unappetizing. The quesadilla was fine, and only fine. It was a bit skimpy on the eggs, there didn’t seem to be much cheese, and the spinach seemed like frozen creamed spinach. The quesadilla lacked any kind of seasoning. Midway through I was desparate for some more flavor, so I finally reached for the ketchup.
For $14, I had expected more and was left disappointed and still kind of hungry.
It was a beautifully brisk and sunny Halloween day, so after our meal I suggested a walk through downtown Tarrytown to help us work off all that grease we had consumed. Our walk led us to Main Street Sweets. I was in search of pumpkin ice cream, and here, at least, I was not disappointed. Their homemade pumpkin pie ice cream was a little slice of frozen pumpkin goodness that actually tasted like pumpkin pie. The small cup that I ordered was perhaps the most generous small I’ve ever seen, and for $2 and change it didn’t break my budget. In honor of Halloween I asked for some candy corn to top my ice cream, which may not have been my best idea. One too many pieces of hard candy corn left my tummy feeling a little funny. The pumpkin pie ice cream was flavorful enough that I should have enjoyed it on its own, without any extras. Now I know for next time.
So, to sum up the WBC’s Halloween foods in order of goodness: 1) that bread basket (delicious and free!); 2) pumpkin pie ice cream from Main Street Sweets (generous portion for a reasonable price); 3) my actual breakfast.
WBC Halloween special takes us to good ole sleepy hollow, home of the headless horseman! We visit HorseFeathers! I started the day with skepticism, since last I checked, horses did no have feathers. Maybe this place will prove that old cliché wrong. Maybe I will be presented with a horse that indeed has feathers.
What did I order you ask? Well, in honor of Patrick not being there, I got the crab Benedict, which was two poached eggs over some crab and an English muffin. On the side was Horse Feathers’s signature sweet potato hash. Well, how was it you ask? Unimpressive. The eggs were over cooked. I like my yokes to be at least a little runny, but these yokes were hard cooked. The crab seemed like the frozen stuff just heated up with no attempt at making them appetizing. The sweet poe hash was also strange. I feel like we should stop calling them sweet potatoes. People will just assume that they can be made into anything regular potatoes can be made into, and that’s just not true. Lets just keep to the name “yams”.
All in all, the place wasn’t worth the visit. It is over priced and the food wasn’t all too good. It wasn’t at all terrible, but it wasn’t at all good. Oh well.
I would characterize Horsefeathers as a throw back to what Sleepy Hollow/Tarrytown once was back in the day. The interior is old, cramped, has lots of wood furniture. And dark. But strangely comforting.
We were to be a party of six, and the six person booth would have probably fit 6 people, but cozily. Unfortunately, our last two guests could not make it, so we spread out a bit.
The complimentary basket of pastries that we started off with was very good. It was similar to the type of basket we paid $12 for at The Cookshop. It had two types of mini muffins, two scones, some cornbread, a few slices of a toasted baguette, and some pieces of an apple cinnamon thing. It was all really good. Especially the apple cinnamon thing. I had just run with the puppy that morning, and had not had the chance to eat yet, so that basket did the trick to tide me over until our brunches arrived.
I ordered the avocado, tomato, and mushroom omelette. It normally has American cheese in it, but I asked for it sans cheese. It came with toast (wheat), and sweet potato home fries. I was excited. From what I remembered from a past visit, they had great sweet potato fries.
The plate of food presented was huge. It was a lot of food. The omelette was okay. The filling was so chunky that the omelette fell apart very easily, and it was difficult to get all the ingredients together for one bite. At points it just felt like I was eating a mushroom and cherry tomato mix with a side of eggs cooked like an omelette. The avocado was sliced and presented on top of the omelette. The sweet potato home fries were a bit of a disappointment. It wasn’t crispy at all and kind of just tasted like a pile of sweet potato mush. I love sweet potatoes, so I kept eating them, but I would have liked them crisped up a bit. The jam options for the toast were a very yummy orange marmalade and what I believe was a grape jam, complete with grape guts, which is the way I like it! It was really good. Just wish I had the appropriate knife to spread it on my bread.
The czar says: If you’re in the mood for good old greasy American comfort food, then it’s a nice place to go, except be prepared to pay more than what the food is actually worth. Maybe that’s why that basket of pastries is complimentary. They built it into the prices of the entrees!
Sidenote: After breakfast, we took a walk down to Main Street, Tarrytown to visit Main Street Sweets. It was dessert time! I got a sample bowl, which is 5 mini scoops of 5 different flavors of ice cream. I tried the pumpkin pie, oreo bomb, banana, nutella and the spooky hollow. They were all super delicious, especially the pumpkin pie and oreo bomb. The nutella was the only semi disappointing one. There wasn’t enough nutella. The czar says go….whenever, with whomever. They do ice cream very well!
Kate
December 3, 2010 at 7:58 am
Is your upside photo some sort of subtle comment on the overall Horsefeather’s experience?
Mike
December 4, 2010 at 3:10 pm
Hmm, didn’t know they were open for breakfast. We used to hang out there in the evenings with friends of ours from Tarrytown…circa 1995. Good place for drinks and pub grub, from what I recall.