Country Inn

The Carroll County Board of Zoning Appeals has ruled that the Winchester Country Inn at 430 S. Bishop St. in Westminster may provide catering services for banquets, weddings, receptions and other one-day events not open to the public.The inn, operated by Target Inc., opened in 1986 and has successfully offered catering services occasionally, the board wrote in its decision."Winchester Country Inn and the services provided by Target are exceptional and are of great benefit to the public," the board wrote.

Harford County Restaurant Week starts Monday. Restaurants participating in the dining promotion, which continues through June 16, are offering three-course dinners for $20.11, or less. A few wineries are participating with special tastings. There are some familiar names among the participants -- Sean Bolan's, the Dark Horse Saloon, Liberatore's, Chiapparelli's , MaGerks and Silver Spring Mining Co . Some are homegrown Harford restaurants that have added locations in Baltimore City and Baltimore County.

The deteriorating Aigburth Vale mansion in Towson may be on the verge of regaining its former grandeur, as Baltimore County officials ponder a pair of proposals to restore the historic property.Last week, after months of seeking buyers for the 1868 villa, a county committee narrowed its search to the two possibilities -- one that would turn the house into a country inn; the other for offices after renovation by builders and preservationists.A committee of government representatives and community members will meet Jan. 22 to discuss the finalists' plans.

Quality. Consistency. And an excellent staff. These are the three ingredients Josef Gohring, owner of Josef’s Country Inn in Fallston, believes are necessary to create a successful restaurant and he should know—his establishment was recently voted “Best Classic Restaurant” in Harford County. Born in Germany, Josef has been in the restaurant business since he was 15 years old. “People always come back to basics,” he says. “You have to have a great staff, quality in food and consistency.

The magic of our evening at Antrim 1844 started miles before we arrived at the gracious brick mansion in Taneytown. As we passed farms and meadows on a country road, our moods changed. Stress seemed to slip away. We were on a dining adventure.Dorothy and Richard Mollett have turned the 23-acre former plantation in Carroll County into a country inn with 15 guest rooms and a restaurant serving an elaborate, five-course dinner nightly. There were a few uneven moments during our evening at Antrim, but they did not stand out -- not even at $55 a person.

It didn't take long for Steve Kurzweil and his chef, Bruce Studler, to realize that dishes like duck with glazed cherries and spiced pecans weren't going to fly at their new restaurant in Reisterstown.Last November, a year and a half after they bought the Forest Inn at auction and opened it as Reisters Desire, they changed the name to Reisters Country Inn and changed the menu from New American to casual American. In the process they lowered prices. All of this worked very well with the restaurant's knotty pine and Tiffany lamp interior.

Harford County Restaurant Week starts Monday. Restaurants participating in the dining promotion, which continues through June 16, are offering three-course dinners for $20.11, or less. A few wineries are participating with special tastings. There are some familiar names among the participants -- Sean Bolan's, the Dark Horse Saloon, Liberatore's, Chiapparelli's , MaGerks and Silver Spring Mining Co . Some are homegrown Harford restaurants that have added locations in Baltimore City and Baltimore County.

* Item: Country Inn Specialties Cereal* What you get: About 10 half-cup servings* Cost: About $5* Preparation time: Pour and serve* Review: When we have overnight guests, I feel terrible if I'm not home in the morning to cook breakfast. But sometimes that's the way it works out. So I was intrigued by Post's new Country Inn Specialties cereal blends. The blends aren't cheap, but they are a far cry from cornflakes. We tried the Green Gables Inn mix, and I have to confess that it was so good I found myself eating it right out of the bag. The cereal, based on a recipe from the California inn, features dried apples and cranberries, raisins, granola and tiny palmier pastries (like little almond-flavored cookies)

The owner of the Westminster Inn and Bowling Brook Country Inn wants to expand his business by opening a conference center at the country inn in Middleburg.F. Mark Gross proposes a three-story, 30-bedroom center at Bowling Brook Farm at 6000 Middleburg Road, a 225-acre former horse farm."Bowling Brook is a very beautiful setting, the type of peaceful setting that lends itself to getting away from day-to-day business," he said.Mr. Gross needs approval from the Carroll County Board of Zoning appeals to build the center.

The owners of a country inn in Middleburg have asked county officials to amend the zoning ordinance to allow them to provide catering and facilities for banquets, weddings and other social events.Charles M. Preston, a Westminster attorney who represents the owners of the Bowling Brook Country Inn, requested the amendment, said Solveig Smith, Carroll's zoning administrator. The 19th-century manor house is located on 225 acres off Middleburg Road in Middleburg.Under existing law, country inns and bed and breakfasts can serve meals only to overnight customers, Ms. Smith said.

A new eating place has quietly opened in Timonium and - surprise! - unlike most restaurants that have opened in the area recently, it's not part of a chain. Bluestone (11 W. Aylesbury Road) is hard to characterize. Co-owner Dan McCarthy describes the eclectic atmosphere of the 10,000-square-foot restaurant as "spirited," and says the place is named Bluestone because "we liked the sound of it." The food is hard to characterize, too. The dinner menu includes bayou jambalaya, Asian butterfly shrimp, salmon strudel, Tunisian chicken stew and churrasco steak.

More than 50 residents went to a Howard County Board of Appeals hearing last night to voice their opinions on a proposal to turn a historic Savage home into a country inn. At 10 p.m., the board was still hearing the petitioner's testimony -- it had not gotten to the opposition -- and it seemed unlikely the board would vote. The next hearing is scheduled for July 11. Susan Betts, owner of the Joshua Barney House on Savage-Guilford Road, has applied for a special exception to convert the two-story brick home into an inn. The inn would accommodate overnight guests and would be available for gatherings of no more than 50 people.

* Item: Country Inn Specialties Cereal* What you get: About 10 half-cup servings* Cost: About $5* Preparation time: Pour and serve* Review: When we have overnight guests, I feel terrible if I'm not home in the morning to cook breakfast. But sometimes that's the way it works out. So I was intrigued by Post's new Country Inn Specialties cereal blends. The blends aren't cheap, but they are a far cry from cornflakes. We tried the Green Gables Inn mix, and I have to confess that it was so good I found myself eating it right out of the bag. The cereal, based on a recipe from the California inn, features dried apples and cranberries, raisins, granola and tiny palmier pastries (like little almond-flavored cookies)

It didn't take long for Steve Kurzweil and his chef, Bruce Studler, to realize that dishes like duck with glazed cherries and spiced pecans weren't going to fly at their new restaurant in Reisterstown.Last November, a year and a half after they bought the Forest Inn at auction and opened it as Reisters Desire, they changed the name to Reisters Country Inn and changed the menu from New American to casual American. In the process they lowered prices. All of this worked very well with the restaurant's knotty pine and Tiffany lamp interior.

When most people travel abroad, they fall in love with and buy little mementos to bring home - a sweater, a figurine, an "I fell for Niagara" shot glass. But when a Swiss couple visited friends on the Eastern Shore during a three-week American vacation in the fall of 1993, they fell in love with a house.A big, three-story house listed on the National Register of Historic Places that lay on the empty Mount Vernon road between Princess Anne and the town of Mount Vernon - in other words, a great big renovation project in just about the middle of nowhere.

The magic of our evening at Antrim 1844 started miles before we arrived at the gracious brick mansion in Taneytown. As we passed farms and meadows on a country road, our moods changed. Stress seemed to slip away. We were on a dining adventure.Dorothy and Richard Mollett have turned the 23-acre former plantation in Carroll County into a country inn with 15 guest rooms and a restaurant serving an elaborate, five-course dinner nightly. There were a few uneven moments during our evening at Antrim, but they did not stand out -- not even at $55 a person.

More than 50 residents went to a Howard County Board of Appeals hearing last night to voice their opinions on a proposal to turn a historic Savage home into a country inn. At 10 p.m., the board was still hearing the petitioner's testimony -- it had not gotten to the opposition -- and it seemed unlikely the board would vote. The next hearing is scheduled for July 11. Susan Betts, owner of the Joshua Barney House on Savage-Guilford Road, has applied for a special exception to convert the two-story brick home into an inn. The inn would accommodate overnight guests and would be available for gatherings of no more than 50 people.

For those who prefer the back roads, T. J. Harvey of Southbury, Conn., arranges self-driving tours through the New England countryside, with overnight stops at country inns. He calls it shunpiking, a word that has its origins in the Colonial era, when travelers sometimes took lengthy detours to avoid paying tolls to property owners.According to the client's needs, Mr. Harvey devises an itinerary and writes a guidebook specifically for the trip, tailored to such interests as antiquing, outlet shopping or visiting historic sites.

After months of weighing proposals for deteriorating Aigburth Vale in Towson, a committee of county and community representatives last week agreed that the historic mansion should be renovated into offices.If County Executive C. A. Dutch Ruppersberger and the County Council approve, local builder Martin P. Azola will be awarded the three-acre property with the once-grand villa. His plan beat a proposal by Ronald and Anne Pomykala to turn the 1868 estate into a country inn.The Pomykalas, owners of Gramercy Mansion bed and breakfast in Stevenson, wanted to open a 17-room inn with a restaurant at the site on Aigburth Road near Towson High School.

The deteriorating Aigburth Vale mansion in Towson may be on the verge of regaining its former grandeur, as Baltimore County officials ponder a pair of proposals to restore the historic property.Last week, after months of seeking buyers for the 1868 villa, a county committee narrowed its search to the two possibilities -- one that would turn the house into a country inn; the other for offices after renovation by builders and preservationists.A committee of government representatives and community members will meet Jan. 22 to discuss the finalists' plans.