The Gorge Eatery — Restaurant in Weissport

We were so impressed with this place! Delicious, thoughtfully-crafted, locally sourced food, at unbelievably low prices. We were visiting from NJ, where food of this quality costs far more. Our last dinner in PA, we tried the Bleu Chicken Sandwich (🤯) and American Burger, 1/2 orders of fries & what THEY consider to be "tots". But these were no basic, tiny, ordinary tots... these mega tots were densely packed golf balls of seasoned, shredded potatoes, deep fried to perfection. Insane. (THIS is why they offer half orders, makes sense now!) The chicken was cooked perfectly and incredibly juicy, with perfectly matched layers of flavors. (My friend ordered this & insisted I try a bite, even though I don't care for some of the toppings. I couldn't stop raving about how delicious it really was.) I chose the American Burger. I've never tasted beef like this! I'm assuming it was extremely local, and that's what made it so flavorful and delicious. But I should've started by reviewing the rolls. These (has to be homemade) egg twist rolls were next level. Incredibly thick (like my burger), buttered, possibly seasoned with garlic (we weren't 100% sure, but would absolutely enjoy garlic bread made with these) and toasted to golden perfection! I mean, come on... bread should be not allowed to taste that good!😉 (I'm gluten intolerant, but THIS was well worth it!) There was so much food in these 4 perfectly packed, hand labeled (thank you for that!) boxes, that I could only eat 1/2 of my burger, 1 fresh cut fry and HALF of 1 king sized tot for my dinner! (The other 1/2 made for the perfect late-night "snack" after the double feature at the Mahoning Drive-In.🩷) My only disappointment came when I realized I had forgotten to order dessert! (I was incredibly curious what a "butter cake w/raspberry drizzle" was.) The only solution 😉 was to order it Sunday morning, along with 2 more burgers for that night's dinner. And I'm so grateful I did! Now, the "raspberry drizzle" had been replaced with this incredible, blueberry sauce(?), chock full of perfectly ripe, fresh blueberries. (I didn't know they'd be using real fruit, so the switch actually saved me, as I'm highly allergic to fresh/real raspberries.) Now for the coup de grace, the "butter cake". Since this was so thoughtfully packaged, I was able to carefully heat the cake to the perfect temp, making it as light, moist & fluffy as it probably is when served. This thing was/is incredible! Imagine a large homemade butter cookie, inflated to 3" of dense, yet fluffy, cakey goodness, covered with fresh, warm blueberry sauce! Some of the sauce gets absorbed and infused into the cake, leaving perfectly ripe blueberries perched onto every incredible bite! Extremely rich, definitely shareable, for a couple of days, even! The young women I spoke with when picking up our orders (Saturday evening & Sunday morning) were all very pleasant, kind and professional, so I'm confident the rest of the staff is as well, had we chosen to eat there. This was the perfect end to our visit, second only to the shockingly great time we had, all weekend at the Mahoning Drive-In (highly recommend them as well!). The Gorg would fit in perfectly here in Lambertville NJ, if they ever consider expanding! 😉🤞🏻 We will absolutely be back, everytime we're back for another event at the Drive-In! I had only 1 complaint, and that was with the online ordering service. Aside from the fruit discrepancy on the butter cake, ordering the American burgers, was really confusing. Before adding the burger to my order, a list of toppings that didn't come with it popped up, with only the option to remove them (ie "no cheddar"). And I wasn't able to add/remove the actual listed toppings, like pickled onions, nor could I add anything additional, like ketchup, extra tomatoes, or plastic cutlery. There wasn't even a space to add...

This is my first Google review and instead of starting from scratch, I used a review I posted elsewhere. I just felt the need to put this out there. It was an absolute bummer and the fact that I was taking my mom out on mother’s day weekend and that she had the absolute worst dish just made it even worse. I will try to convey my level of extreme disappointment in this place as best I can. I'm not a huge fan of giving scathing reviews but this place left me seething with anger. As far as decor and setting, the place is fine. Similar to The Cannery in Forty Fort but that's where the similarities end. Our server was nice and the drinks were good. We started with a beet salad and coconut shrimp appetizers. The salad was well dressed though a bit light on the beets but a good enough salad. The coconut shrimp was weird. It's was a healthy version (not deep fried) and I liked the bits of fresh coconut but otherwise it was bland and a measly portion. My friend had a burger and fries for dinner and thought it was fine. My dish was the pork piccata with sun dried tomato spetzle. When the dish was placed on the table I was crestfallen. It was one small slice of pork and literally two forkfuls of spetzel. Flavor wise it was good but the portion was ridiculously small. I guess this is supposed to be "fine dining" but is NOT on par with fine dining. More like a meager diner special. I mean I know I need to lose a bit of weight but this was just way too small. But my mother's dish was the one that sent me over the moon. I was taking her out for Mother's Day and her meal was absolutely terrible and completely unacceptable. She got steak and a hasselback potato. The steak was ordered medium and you couldn't cut or chew it. It looked like 3 or four knots of beef. Very small portion and it was inedible. The potato wasn't cooked completely, basically raw. I had my friend also try it to be sure I wasn't just being btchy. No butter, oil or spice. Just a plain, dry, half raw potato sliced hassle back style. I was beside myself. I very rarely complain in restaurants though if I'm unhappy I'll be a bit passive aggressive about it. This had me full on pssed. Our server was a perfectly nice young woman and I expressed my extreme dissatisfaction with the meal. She offered to see if she could comp it but I ate my meal and I wasn't looking good for a free ride. But again my mother's meal was inedible. When she came back she said she felt she had to give us something and she took 3 dollars off (for the freakin potato...I mean seriously?!?) She did offer us a free dessert but I wasn't interested. The management should have offered an apology or came out to speak with us. We got nothing. The people behind us had the steak dinner and I could see there was some concern over it. When we were leaving my mom was walking over to ask them about their meal but I pulled her away. $122! without tip for this! Ugh. We tipped the waitress $20 cash but I refused to tip more than that. It was a hard pill to swallow. On our way out, my friend overheard another patron complaining to a server or manager saying her meal was terrible. Awful! Just an awful experience and a real bummer for my mom. I guess this place shines more for its bar favorites like cheese curds and chicken nachos. Wish we would have known this before forking over 150 bucks. Sad. Fine dining...

I REALLY want to love the Hofford Mill and the Gorge, but I just can't.

My grandmother worked at the mill decades ago. I can't state enough how admirable and necessary this venture is, and how much I want to support the place. To see a blighted building in Weissport get revitalized into a cool post-industrial space is fantastic, and much needed in the community. The Hofford Mill is a golden opportunity to serve both the locals and the summer tourism crowd.

Inside, the old socks on the wall, paired with retained industrial elements and tons of greenery, give the place a busy but unique and enjoyable vibe. The bar is well-configured, and the restaurant has ample seating. One of our tables was a repurposed sewing machine -- very cool.

We've been to the Mill four or five times over the past several years, with our most recent visit being in July 2023. The past three times we've visited, it has just felt as though the staff was generally annoyed with our presence and it's created an unpleasant service atmosphere. A list a few instances:

-First visit: wife has a dairy allergy. Server indicated that every dinner is "composed carefully and served as-is" and that substitutions weren't an option, nor was there an ingredient list guarantee. She got a salad. To their credit, the menu in July 23rd had clear dietary markings that weren't there before.

-Second visit: good. We came at a slow time and ate outside. Fried chicken was good (didn't see on the menu in July 23rd) and drinks have been good at each visit.

-Latest visit: we just wanted to stop in for drinks and apps. Showing up without a reservation was met with admonishment and they had to "see what they could do". We sat at a two-top without issue.

Our one ordered app, corn fritters, had a noticeable hair in it. We did not send it back; I get that these things happen. We were actually more frustrated by what happened after -- we wanted to move to the now-opened-up bar to get another drink before leaving. Bartender, visibly frustrated, said that it would take "a long time" and that the server shouldn't have "allowed us" over to the bar. We ultimately just left without ordering another drink.

The Gorge has a front-of-house problem. The location is good, the mission is noble, and the pricing is fair in the post-COVID restaurant world. But this restaurant is simply nowhere near good enough to treat customers like a nuisance. The dining menu is fine but it's not good enough for how seriously it presents itself. I don't know if it's just a barebones staff stretched too thin, but it's hard to justify patronizing a place that is consistently annoyed that you're...