Vegan Dining at the Omni Homestead Resort – a review

When my husband asked me to accompany him on a business trip last weekend to the charming Omni Homestead Resort in the mountains of southwestern Virginia, my thoughts revolved around relaxation at the spa — complete with a massage, facial, and thermal pools.  I loved the thought of some much-needed R&R.  I had absolutely no idea that there would be vegan menus involved.

People visit The Omni Homestead Resort for many reasons: its incomparable luxury, full-service spa, golf course, scenic location, legendary hot springs, friendly service, fine dining, and more. We certainly knew about all of those amenities, but vegan menus were not even on our radar screen.

Finding Vegan Food on the Road

Most of the time when we travel, we feel fortunate to find a vegan or vegetarian option (or perhaps two) on restaurant menus. And sometimes we are able to entice a willing chef to fix a special, off-the-menu meal for us. It’s rare that we find much more than that, unless the restaurant makes a special point of being veggie-friendly. As far as I could tell upon arriving at The Omni Homestead Resort, such was not the case there.

Although the resort has several restaurants, it doesn’t seem as though any of them are particularly marketed as being veggie friendly. The restaurant descriptions on the website mention “crisp, clean flavors prepared in layers that reflect the nature and quality of the fresh ingredients from the resort’s natural surroundings.”  Or “a farm-to-table approach with a hand-picked selection of the best regional and prime meats.”  It’s not that we don’t appreciate getting fresh food from local sources.  But the restaurant descriptions that I found do not mention vegetarian or vegan options.  And The Homestead’s restaurants do not show up on Happycow, my favorite go-to website for good, veggie-friendly places to eat. In fact, a search on that platform revealed zero options within a 25-mile radius of The Homestead.

And so it was that we expected the usual, “we’ll-make-do” situation. Thus, upon arrival, we stopped at the Concierge’s desk to ask which of the resort’s restaurants would be our best choice (i.e., most able to remove meat or dairy from its dishes upon request). We were astounded when the Concierge asked if we might like to see the vegan menus for Jefferson’s Restaurant and The Dining Room. Vegan menus!! Of course we wanted to see them.  And after a quick perusal, we headed over to Jefferson’s Restaurant for lunch, thinking that we would visit The Dining Room for dinner.

A Vegan Lunch at Jefferson’s Restaurant

Jefferson’s has a lovely deck overlooking the lawn, and we thought that sitting outside was the obvious choice for enjoying a warm spring afternoon. The deck is comfortably furnished with white tables, wicker chairs, and bright, blue-green cushions.  Added to those amenities is the beautiful view.

Jefferson’s is marketed on the Homestead’s website as being “A Modern American Grill with the Best in Regional Meat.” On the surface, it is not a place that I would have expected to find a vegan menu. But when asked, the waitress did in fact bring us the vegan menu, which contained two starters, two entrees, two sides, and one dessert. It was a veritable bounty of choices. Looking at the “regular” lunch menu, I did find a Local Squash Parpardelle, which reportedly contains squash, wild mushrooms, and ricotta salata.  So on the surface that dish on the regular menu appears to be vegetarian, though it is not marked as such — and many a vegetarian or vegan has been fooled by inclusion of chicken stock in a dish that otherwise appears to be safe. At any rate, without the vegan menu we apparently would have had slim pickings.

So, with the vegan menu in hand, we ordered the Beets & Mountain Greens salad to share as a starter. Besides the beets and greens, it also contained bourbon pickled grapes, pecans, fire carrots, vegan cheese, and lemon verbena vinaigrette. We were impressed by the presence of both golden and red beets, and we liked everything about the salad. However, next time we would have asked for the dressing on the side, as we prefer to apply it with a lighter hand.

For entrees, we ordered two different dishes, with the intent that each of us would sample both.  The first entree that we ordered was called Roasted Vegetables.  The dish also contained toasted farro, braised greens, and tomato fondue. We enjoyed this dish but thought it was misnamed. It contained only one roasted vegetable (squash) that we could identify, and the dish was predominantly the toasted farro, with just a handful of squash cubes on top. Still, the dish had a nice, chewy texture and a rich, tomato flavor.

The other entree that we ordered was the Cauliflower Steak with Jerk Rub.  The dish also contained corn, wilted greens, and red quinoa coconut risotto (plus some of the roasted squash that was scattered on top of the farro dish). The spiciness of the cauliflower was nicely matched with the sweetness of the quinoa coconut risotto. This was our favorite dish, although we truly liked everything we ordered (and cleaned all of the plates).

We were tempted to try the Strawberry Shortcake Dessert, reportedly containing gluten-free vanilla sponge, strawberry cream, and strawberry compote, but we didn’t have room for it after the generously-sized starter and entrees.

An Elegant Vegan Meal at The Dining Room

The Dining Room at the Omni Homestead Resort is very elegant, to say the least. When we arrived for dinner, we found the headwaiter in a handsome tuxedo and the waitstaff dressed up in black tie. The restaurant was definitely built to impress — with a vaulted ceiling, a dance floor lined on one side with floor-to-ceiling columns, snowy white tablecloths, romantic oil lamps, and an ebony grand piano. On the evening that we dined there, a stylish, three-piece band played jazzy, easy-listening tunes.

Our waiter provided us with the vegan menu upon request. To our surprise and delight, the menu was completely different from the one we’d been given at Jefferson’s Restaurant during lunch. This menu offered three starters, two entrees, and one dessert. After ordering, we were given a basket of rolls (sadly, all of them were made with refined flour), but at least the waiter brought olive oil when we asked for something besides butter. My husband ordered the Royal Caesar salad to start, which he expected to include vegan caviar, croutons, and soy cheese. When the salad was served with Parmesan crisps and something that looked convincingly liked shaved Parmesan, we began to wonder if a mistake had been made. Sure enough, a glance at the regular menu showed that it also contained a “Royal Caesar salad,” which was supposed to include caviar, croutons, and Parmesan cheese.  Given how busy things get in a restaurant kitchen, it’s probably unwise to give the Exact Same Name to both the regular and the vegan version of a salad.  Just sayin’, because we know that the mix up has happened at least once — i.e., at our table.  The photo on the right shows the non-vegan version that our waiter brought to our table, including the Parm crisps and real caviar.  When we became suspicious and asked our waiter about the apparent Parm crisps, he confirmed with the kitchen that they were indeed real cheese, though surprisingly he did not offer to replace the salad with the vegan version we had ordered.  By then my husband had unwittingly dived into and nearly finished the salad, so we did not request the vegan replacement.

The entrees on the vegan menu were: 1)  Lemon Miso Tofu with sweet potato, Brussels sprouts, and citrus coconut cream; and 2) Curry Carrot with crispy grits, baby cabbage, wild radish, and red currant jus.  Not being in the mood for a spicy curry dish, we both ordered the tofu. Each serving contained three generous rectangles of tofu, served on a bed of diced sweet potato and flanked by roasted carrots and Brussels sprouts. The tofu rectangles were nicely crisp, with a delicious citrusy sauce on top. It was excellent.

After finishing our entrees, we decided to split the dessert: Raspberry-Cherry Ganache with macerated wild cherries, chocolate tuiles, and vegan cream.  The dessert was beautifully plated and almost looked too good to eat (*almost*). The three chocolate “tiles” were topped with delicious, assorted berries and were accompanied by a generous dollop of cream. We happily ate it all and scraped the plate clean.

The Bottom Line

With the wide variety of vegan options offered by Jefferson’s Restaurant and The Dining Room, it would be possible for a vegan to eat at the resort all weekend and not have to order the same thing twice. The bottom line is that the Omni Homestead Resort provides great vegan food and should be proclaiming it far and wide. On account of the fact that my husband and I had to ask for the vegan menu each time, we wonder if it would have been offered if we’d been unaware of it and tried to order off the regular menu by asking for the removal of meat or dairy from a dish. Would the waiters have figured out our dietary restrictions and offered us the vegan menu? We’re not sure. And even though the vegan menu can be found on the resort’s website by surfing the subheadings under Dining, why doesn’t the hotel make their extensive provisions for vegans more prominent?  Perhaps the hotel could add a statement to the resort and/or restaurant descriptions to say that “we provide an exceptional dining experience for guests with all types of dietary restrictions, including those who are vegan and vegetarian.”

As another idea, the vegan menus could be posted under glass outside the restaurant doors, right alongside the regular menus. Homestead Resort, you’ve got a good thing going, and you should shout it from the rooftops! While we vegans are still a small part of the population, we’re a rapidly growing demographic, and I believe you should be letting more of us know that we’ll be very well fed if we stay at The Omni Homestead Resort.