Restaurants in West Chester

At Northbrook MarketPlace, guests can enter a restored 1850s fieldstone barn with bright-red wood siding and picturesque white wooden frames to browse the market and grab dishes made from fresh, sustainable ingredients. Chefs fire up tender brisket in the smokehouse, make sandwiches to order, and pluck signature apple-cider donuts from trees. Diners can also nosh on daily hot-meal specials, including chicken pot pies and fish 'n' chips, then slide forks into the flaky crust of the daily pie while sitting inside the marketplace, outside in the courtyard, or at home. For those who want a more leisurely meal, the Chef's Table, which was named Philadelphia magazine's Best Private Dining Table in 2009, proffers an hours-long culinary experience in which patrons devour local, gourmet fare from a tasting menu designed by head chef Rob Boone. The week's BYOB feasts include the Chef's Table banquet; Family Nights, which feed visiting households and peckish minivans with an Italian buffet; and brunch, which mollifies maws with homemade granola and barbecue sliders.

Chef Stephen Guiseppe relishes a good countdown. In the kitchen of Cedar Hollow Inn, he often improvises his daily specials an hour before the menu goes live, crafting modern American meals to complement his pre-existing plates. These entrees add a gourmet twist to traditional comfort food and pub fare—the buttermilk fried chicken still boasts a topping of country gravy, but it also arrives with blue-cheese-braised kale, and the pan-roasted rainbow trout is dressed in the surprising tang of a vanilla-citrus glaze. Though Chef Stephen doesn't shy from robust helpings of meat—the menu offers lobster, filet mignon, duck, and pork belly—he also pioneers small plates. The bar features duck quesadillas and lamb sliders as alternatives to traditional countertop eats, such as chewable drink coasters.

Cedar Hollow Inn balances its contemporary menu with a historical locale. The building, which was constructed in the mid 1800s, resembles a rustic mansion, lined with wide, gridded windows that fill the archways of the sun porch. Guests can dine there, in the dining room, or at the bar, where trivia and Name That Tune competitions encourage competitive chatter on Tuesday and Sunday. Live music plays in the evenings on Thursday–Saturday, enticing guests to remain after their meals and sample one of many rotating craft beers.

Jasmine Restaurant’s chefs cull culinary influences from different corners of Asia: the menu catalogs Japanese, Thai, and Vietnamese recipes. From the Japanese portion of the menu they prepare sushi and sashimi, crafting specialty rolls such as the Jasmine stuffed with lobster claw, avocado, cucumber, and spicy mayo. They even add a little Latin flair by preparing the Samba roll with salmon, jalapeños, and mozzarella cheese. Along with the sushi, the kitchen team plates korean barbecue short ribs, pad thai, and charbroiled lemongrass chicken to round out the Asian fusion menu. Soothing music accompanies the soft clink of forks and knives as they slice into wok-cooked filet-mignon entrees in the dining area. There, wooden tables sit beneath hanging lights, and beaded curtains offer a jangly threshold to another dining area, a lounge, or a parallel universe in which Japanese food is all hamburgers.

Drawing on his culinary background working in East Coast bistros and stately hotel kitchens, Mile High Steak & Seafood’s Executive Chef David Robinson crafts a rotating menu of upscale steakhouse cuisine. Robinson, a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, refuses to cut corners with his ingredients, going so far as to fly in fresh seafood and grass skirts overnight from the Honolulu Fish Company. He only chooses aged certified Angus beef for his steak-centric entrees, and he revs up traditional sandwiches and appetizers on the bar menu with high-end items such as shaved prime rib, artisan cheeses, and lobster. These gourmet bites pair palatably one of the bar’s signature cocktails or glasses of wine.

Even in his down time, Robinson keeps his culinary skills sharp, coordinating charity events for the Chester County SPCA and the Brandywine Hospital Strawberry Festival. But even with his busy schedule and impressive resumé, he’s still thankful for landing his “dream job” at Mile High Steak & Seafood.

Simpson House Tea Room sets the tone for its Victorian delicacies from the moment guests first glimpse the stately structure. The shrub-flanked walkway, the white wooden farmhouse with the sprawling wraparound porch, emerald shutters, and red roof appear untouched since being built in the 1890s. Inside, high-backed wooden chairs, bow-adorned teapots, and tiered platters surround steaming pots of 100 varieties of loose-leaf tea, a large variety of sandwiches including cream-cheese-and-olive, and scones with homemade lemon curd. With a variety of delightfully fussy services, the teahouse embraces teatime's lineage as the perfect treat for ladies who lunch—welcoming bridal and baby showers—and as the only way to tame a wild teddy bear.

While scanning the pages of Nooddi-Thai Chef's eclectic and lengthy menu amid the eatery's oceanic murals, eyes are forced to stop at words that stand out against the traditional "dumpling," "curry," and "satay." The kitchen staff's specialties cause these double takes on a daily basis, as they introduce eccentric proteins such as wild boar in a garlic red curry sauce or sautéed alligator in an aromatic herb sauce. In addition to their Thai classics, the cooks assemble flavors from across Asia, including those in Vietnamese pho, Japanese yakisoba, and Indonesian mee goreng.