The Kittle House Inn — Restaurant in Town of New Castle

I went to Crabtree Kittle House for Sunday brunch for my birthday this year, and I’m saddened to say I was shockingly disappointed. I had never been to the restaurant before, and was very excited to finally dine at one of the most awarded farm-to-table establishments in Westchester County. I invited friends who drove up from NYC to have brunch at the well-regarded restaurant to show off what Westchester had to offer. I am sorry to say I was embarrassed by the experience.

The carriage house and grounds themselves were beautiful, and the stars in this review are mostly for the ambience and rustic charm of the historical estate. However, the food and service left much to be desired. The first course of the four-course bottomless brunch was brought to the table automatically by a runner. It was a sampling of bagels, muffins and fruit served with a portion size of cream cheese that would be enough for maybe one bagel. We were a party of seven, and had to continually ask the servers for another portion of cream cheese so there would be enough to go around, but they continued to bring out a small dollop and got annoyed that we kept asking for enough for the table! The bagels were warmed, but as soon as they cooled down they were hard as a rock and tough, indicative that they were either microwaved or not fresh.

Our waiter was less than attentive, and needed to be flagged down several times to take our orders. The second course was probably the best: we had creamy burrata with heirloom tomatoes and the lobster bisque. The third course was by far the worst: one of our guests had a Belgian waffle that was ice cold to the touch, and I had eggs benedict that was lackluster, under-seasoned and skimpy on hollandaise sauce. We ordered two sides of parmesan truffle fries, and one order was perfect and the other order was missing the parmesan cheese and truffle oil (?!) so just regular fries.

By the time my party realized we’d all be paying over $50 for hard bagels, cold waffles and bland eggs, we decided to at least take advantage of the “bottomless” part of the brunch. We kept flagging down a waiter for another round of drinks, because no one ever approached the table unprovoked to ask how we were doing , and he said “you need another mimosa… or three?” Um, talk about rude, condescending and passive aggressive. It’s not like we were getting lit up as frat boys, but brunch drinks are the best part of brunch, no need to have an attitude about it. Additionally, many of the champagne flutes were visibly dirty when they were brought to the table, with lipstick on the rims and food crud on the foot of the glasses. I scanned the restaurant for any sort of management to talk to, but there was none to be found. Just very young, aloof hostesses and bored-looking and inattentive waitstaff.

Finally, for dessert, my friends had secretly informed the waiters it was my birthday. They brought out a piece of cheesecake with my name in chocolate and a candle in it, which was very nice, but they did not wait for all of my guests to return from the bathroom before doing so. On top of that, it was one of the saddest birthday songs I’ve ever experienced, reminiscent of a Gregorian chant (no kidding).

I was surprised how a restaurant with glowing reviews and so many accolades could be so disappointing. Maybe their B-team was working this brunch shift. I hope to have a better experience if I ever decide to return so the place could maybe live up to...

On Nov. 30, 2021, I sent the following email to the management of Crabtree’s Kittle House Inn:

“Dear Sir/Madam:

“We stayed at the Kittle House Inn in room 1B on the evenings of 11/25/21-11/27/21. It was a place to sleep while visiting our daughter’s family for the Thanksgiving holiday. On the night of 11/27, we returned to our room about 10:00 PM for our normal 10:30 bedtime. When we entered the room, we were astounded by the thunderous noise. It seemed we were directly over the party room and a very lively event was in progress. The extremely loud music--especially the persistent, thumping bass—was rattling the window panes and blinds. We had to talk loudly to each other. It was uncomfortable just being in the room, let alone trying to sleep. Had we been there when the party started, we would have had to leave.

"I tried calling the desk through the room phone to complain, but no one answered. I called on an outside line with my cell phone and got a recording asking me to leave a message. I walked over to the office and spoke with the man behind the desk. He assured me that the music would stop at 11:00 and told me to call him if I needed to speak with him again.

“Eleven o’clock came and went with the room still shaking. I repeated my earlier calls to the desk with the same frustrating results. At 11:10, I called the New Castle police hoping they might be able to do something. They were not able to. We tried sleeping, but that was impossible—I put a pillow over my head to no avail. Finally, at 11:30, the din ceased, although we were too angry to get right to sleep.

“What you want more than anything else from a hotel room is a peaceful sleep at your bedtime. Your website says, “For a peaceful getaway…look no further than our…cozy rooms….12 en-suite guest rooms reflect our dedication to excellent hospitality with all the comforts and amenities of home.” That was certainly not our experience, yet our room was among the more expensive hotel/motel accommodations in the NYC suburbs. We most assuredly did not get our money’s worth.

“You should have told us that a loud party had been scheduled or at least that we were directly above the party room and might suffer if it were booked for an event. We would have had a chance to find other accommodations. Had we known what we were in for, we would never have taken such an awful room.”

Kittle House management’s response after a week: Nothing. Not a word. No apology, no explanation, no offer of even token recompense. Nada.

The room had other major shortcomings, although none could compare to the outrage detailed above. The associated restaurant has a reputation as a fine dining establishment (we never ate dinner there), so we expected the attached inn to be of comparable quality, maybe like a high-end bed & breakfast. Instead, the room was more like a low-end motel such as Motel 6 or Knight’s Inn, and not a good one. The room was old but not at all quaint and the bathroom especially was outdated. There was no desk for writing or to set up a computer. Wi-Fi was spotty. Two lights didn’t work. (Instead of the inner-spring mattresses common in hotels, our room had a foam mattress, which some people may like but others will not.) The breakfast was skimpy—no Danish or donuts, no eggs one morning and only hardboiled eggs the next, no breakfast meats, cold food only.

You couldn’t pay us enough to go back to the...

Someone in management is asleep at the wheel here, or perhaps just coasting? For as charming a place as this appeared to be online, in reality there were far too many service failures to believe this is truly a 3 star hotel.  Around 2:30am on a Saturday night, there was a lot of loud thumping and banging.  Upon investigation, an employee was found in a second floor room who explained he was setting up for brunch the next day.  When I mentioned that, ahem, this was an inn and people were trying to sleep, he only replied that he needed another 10 minutes (turned out to be half an hour). Despite the setup for paid brunch in the wee hours, the included continental breakfast doesn't start till 8:30am, which is bad for early risers who want to get out and about exploring the area.  Dinner at the restaurant the night before saw a space that was overcrowded with tables in 3 different rooms but the doors to each were wide open so the noise level made it difficult to have a conversation.  The servers were not in communication with each other, with different staff showing up in the beginning to take an order and then disappearing after the food was served.  Despite noting on the reservation that we had a vegan in our party, no mention was made about choices when we sat down and we had to coach the servers to talk to the chef as we were being told that items that were vegetarian were vegan which we suspected was not the case. With the restaurant and event spaces full, the nearby small bathrooms quickly deteriorated but I'll spare the toe-curling details. Wifi service didn't work that night and we were merely told it had gone down and they'd tried a reset. On checking into our room, there was an old wine bucket and used glasses on the desk and the carpet was threadbare and the stairway carpet was old and dirty. They don't seem to suffer for lack of business, but perhaps the churn from NY weekenders means  an unending supply of first-timers so they don't need to worry about repeat business.  Bottom line though is steer clear of both the Inn and restaurant; although the food was good, the service and noise made it not...