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Friday, April 21, 2000
By Woodene Merriman, Post-Gazette Dining Critic
Romeo, Romeo, where art thou? Juliet, Macbeth, Othello and Hamlet, too, and yon Cassius, you with the lean and hungry look ...
Somehow, we expected to see you all here at Shakespeare's Restaurant and Pub.
His Honor is particularly disappointed not to see the comely wenches of Shakespeare's day carrying in great joints of meat.
Don't get me wrong. The waitresses are comely enough, but they're dressed in modern knitted shirts and black trousers. And the menu has suggestions like gyro wraps and Cajun chicken. Surely Shakespeare and friends never feasted on foods like this.
The building is the major attraction here at Shakespeare's, which is inside a big gray stone medieval-style castle that is also the clubhouse for the Olde Stonewall Golf Course, outside Ellwood City. The restaurant opened in December and has been attracting people from Youngstown, Beaver Falls, and Pittsburgh's South Hills, as well as those who live nearby.
It's most impressive. Huge stones, so big that some of them could be brought only one-to-a-truck from the Medusa Quarry in West Pittsburgh, form the low walls curving around the property. From the parking area in front of the castle, diners walk up a wide staircase, cross a wooden-plank drawbridge and moat, and enter through heavy, 15-foot doors.
Inside, there are a couple of knights in shining armor (well, at least the shining armor is there), tapestries, swords, shields and lots of dark wood, all in the theme of the Shakespearean period (1500-1600). It's a handsome interior; Shakespeare would be proud.
But the food, modern as it is, is also an attraction. The big, 140-seat restaurant is on the main floor of the castle. Richard Hvizdak of Pittsburgh, who owns the Olde Stonewall Golf Club, brought in Sean Fitzpatrick, formerly of the Stone Mansion outside Sewickley, as general manager, and Don Bell, who had cooked at Nemacolin Woodlands, as chef.
The menu they devised is not particularly unusual, and certainly not medieval, but the prices are lower than I would have expected in these surroundings. Better yet, most everything we've tried has been quite good.
Some examples: Prime rib of beef, one of the restaurant's top sellers, is $14.95 for the Juliet or 12-ounce cut, and $17.95 for the Romeo or 16-ounce cut. (This is the only reference to Shakespeare characters on the menu.) The prime rib, like other entrees, is served with a cup of the soup du jour or a house salad, potato or rice, a vegetable of the day and dinner rolls.
Maryland crab cakes, with soup or salad and a vegetable, are $8.50 at lunch. Crabmeat-stuffed shrimp on angel hair pasta, accompanied by soup or salad and rolls, is $14.95 at dinner. Both are popular menu items, according to manager Fitzpatrick.
Always on the lookout for something different as well as good, H.H. and I are having the chicken Madeira and grilled mako shark.
The grilled boneless chicken breast, topped with sauteed portobello mushrooms and green peppers in a Madeira wine demi-glace, is tender and juicy. Ditto for the grilled mako shark, and bravo to the chef for not overcooking the fish and chicken, as so many restaurants do. The Indonesian "ketjap" on top of the shark is too sweet for my taste, however, and the vegetable of the day -- squash with onions -- is too soft. Too long on the steam table, perhaps? The "smashed herb redskin potatoes," however, are just fine.
The house salad is made of crisp greens (no iceberg), cucumber, tomato, red onions and carrots, and the house dressing, roasted garlic red wine vinaigrette, was a good choice.
That old faithful, French onion soup, is on the menu every day, along with a soup of the day. Today that's sweet potato soup, which sounded more interesting, but was very thick and a little too sweet.
It's a pleasant, high-ceilinged room, with dark paneling, chairs with tapestry-like upholstery, and booths like battle stations along the walls. It's busy tonight, as it was when we were here for lunch, but it is not noisy.
The lunch menu has a long list of sandwiches, several salads, entrees and pastas. Especially good is the vegetable pita, or grilled vegetables arranged open face on a pita shell, and covered with zucchini, other squash, green peppers and other vegetables. It has a thick, roasted garlic-tahini dressing drizzled on top.
A popular luncheon choice is chicken puff pastry -- really creamed chicken with a puff pastry topper. Our serving was a little shy on chunks of chicken, and had no potatoes or peas in the thick sauce, as the menu promised.
Fitzpatrick says he is deliberately keeping the menu far-ranging, to appeal to both the golf club members and the public. If you prefer, you can have a burger and fries for dinner, instead of filet bearnaise and all the fixings.
To start, desserts and rolls were supplied by vendors, but, with the hiring of a pastry chef, that is changing. Fitzpatrick expects eventually to have breads as well as desserts made in-house. The wine list is evolving, too. So far it's a basic list, with a selection of reds and whites priced at $18 to $36. The 1998 Hess Collection chardonnay, for example, is $26. A glass of wine is $4.
Lunch and dinner guests are encouraged to look around the castle, surely the most unusual restaurant setting for many miles around. Next to the restaurant on the main floor is a big bar and lounge, with large windows overlooking the golf course. Upstairs there is a grand hall, where -- with an active imagination -- you might look out and see Hamlet on the ramparts looking for his father's ghost.
Shakespeare's Restaurant and Pub
Directions from Pittsburgh International Airport: Follow signs for Route 60 North about 25 miles to exit 17, Ellwood City. Off exit, follow signs to 351. Follow 351 east 6.6 miles through Ellwood City to Route 65 South. Follow 65 South 2.1 miles. Club entrance is on right. Restaurant supplies directions from north, south, east and west also.
1495 Mercer Road, Ellwood City
724-752-4653
Hours: Lunch, Monday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.; dinner, Monday-Thursday, 4-10 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 4-11 p.m.; Sunday, noon-8:30 p.m. On Easter Sunday, brunch will be served in the Grand Hall from noon to 5 p.m. Reservations are necessary.The basics: Lunches, $4.95-$8.95; dinners, $10.95-$19.95; parking lot; full bar and basic wine list; children's menu; major credit cards; wheelchair accessible; no reservations, except for groups of six or more or on special occasions (such as the Easter Sunday brunch).The last word: 3 stars