Vermont

Farm To Table Taken Very Seriously At The Restaurant At Hill Farm In Southern Vermont

Published

2 years ago

July 30, 2024

For fresh vegetables, all head chef Austin Poulin has to do at The Restaurant at Hill Farms is go … [+] right outside his kitchen.

Hill Farm

When most restaurants are described as farm to table in New York City, the farms that produce vegetables, poultry or meat are usually located in Rockland, Putnam and Dutchess counties from 30 to 60 miles away. When The Restaurant at Hill Farm in Sunderland, Vt. discusses the same concept, its vegetable farm, producing a slew of home-made produce, is situated outside the kitchen’s door, a stone’s throw from its stoves and burners.

The Restaurant at Hill Farm has an inviting atmosphere that includes a chef’s table, where patrons can watch head chef Austin Poulin prepare his meals, a bar area with separate stools, and an outside dining patio, where patrons can smell the vegetables. And Poulin has excellent culinary credentials since he cooked for noted chef Dan Barber at Blue Hill at Stone Barns in Westchester, serving as fish and meat cook for two years.

The restaurant is situated at Hill Farm, an inn with a main house with 7 rooms, a 1790 House with 5 rooms, and two cottages with 3 bedrooms each, perfect for families, with another inn across the road with 10 bedrooms, and a campus with 70 acres including 3 alpacas.

Located in Proximity to Manchester Vt.

The Restaurant at Hill Farm is located nearby Manchester, Vt, a quintessential jewel of a town that contains numerous inns including the upscale Equinox Resort and the Inn at Manchester, restaurants such as Mystic Restaurant and Silver Fork and serves as the headquarters of Orvis, the fly fishing, clothing, dry goods and travel company.

Because the eatery is located at inn, Poulin says most of its guests dine at least once at the restaurant. It also has a strong local following, which helps it withstand the slower months in winter, with heavy traffic during peak summer months, between tourists and locals.

Its goal in having the vegetable patch next door is to “implement a farm to table ideology across our whole menu, using Vermont and our surrounding resources to highlight local products,” explains Poulin. For example, of late it has been highlighting snap peas, purple-sprouting broccoli and home-grown lettuce.

A farm to table eatery in Southern Vermont, connected to an inn, is bringing the vegetable farm directly to the restaurant.

The Farm Is Right Near the Kitchen

He says many guests like to know where their food emanates from, so the garden is used “as an educational tool to peak guests’ interest and get them to ask questions about different varieties we are growing or using in the kitchen.”

For meat, poultry and fish, he taps local suppliers such as Sweet Pickins Farm that raises chicken and duck, buys beef from Woodlawn Farmstead in Pawlet, Vt, and fish from Wood Mountain Fish, such as striped bass.

Most of its entrees cost $40 to $45 each, which seems steep for southern Vermont or more appropriate to NYC’s Upper East Side. He says that many of its entrees could easy be shared and feed two to three guests.

In charge of the farm at The Restaurant at Hill Farm is Pablo Elliott, a graduate of Vassar College who served as one of its first interns at the Poughkeepsie Farm Project which started on Vassar’s land. He says guests can also wander over to the vegetable farm, outside of the restaurant, to “see something that may end up on their plate,” bringing the farm to the guest.

Lots of Vegetables In Its Farm Area

Indeed, it produces a slew of home-grown vegetables including squash, broccolini, potatoes, greens, tomatoes, cucumbers, onions and garlic. He usually harvests the fields twice a week.

By bringing these vegetables directly into the kitchen the day they are harvested, “nothing is lost in the shipping, which is usually quality and flavor,” Elliott cites.

But the meat in the kitchen at Restaurant at Hill Farm must be acquired from nearby suppliers, so why not add cows? Elliott replies that “animals could be added, but as these projects become larger, they become more expensive. The vegetable garden plot keeps things simple.”

He considers the vegetable patch more a “guest amenity” than a cost savings venture. Costs are curtailed by having a “part-time farmer, under half acre total production and minimal labor costs,” he cites.

The night this reporter dined at The Restaurant at Hill Farms, there were only three entrees on the menu including the half-chicken, striped bass and pork chops, with numerous appetizers and small plates including pizza, fried chicken wings, charred snap peas, pita and hummus. The half-chicken with a spinach yogurt sauce was delicious.

And at the chef’s table, a couple from Scarsdale who were self-described “foodies,” grazed through the menu, ordering pizza and appetizers and were thrilled with the results.

Why keep the menu streamlined? Poulin replies that “We have an extremely small team here so in order for us to provide the best quality service and food, we keep it small.”

The restaurant is not open for lunch and is only open Wednesday through Sunday, 4 to 9 p.m., the usual hour when many Vermont restaurants close.

Reaction from one guest on Yelp was extremely positive. Aaron from San Jose, Calif, said the menu had “everything from pizza cooked in their woodfire oven to fresh caught wild bass or oyster mushroom risotto.” He called the interior “cozy and intimate with high ceilings and a lot of wooden beams,” and he added there were many local craft beers on the menu.

His only drawback was he found it a bit warm inside because of how the wood-fired pizza oven blended with the July heat.

Asked about its future, Poulin replies that it’s working on starting some culinary classes for next year and providing education on its farm to table approaches. And while there are no plans to add chickens immediately, he admits that “I’d welcome the opportunity.”

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Vermont

Hour-by-hour: When to expect showers & thunderstorms Tuesday in Vermont, New York

Published

9 hours ago

April 14, 2026

Press Room

The most widespread storm coverage will occur between 2-8 PM Tuesday, April 14

Timeline: When to expect showers & thunderstorms Tuesday in Vermont, New York

The most widespread storm coverage will occur between 2-8 PM Tuesday, April 14

NBC5 meteorologists expect strong to locally severe thunderstorms Tuesday afternoon into the evening for Vermont and northern New York.Watch the video to see when showers, downpours, and storms are most likely near your town.

BURLINGTON, Vt. —

NBC5 meteorologists expect strong to locally severe thunderstorms Tuesday afternoon into the evening for Vermont and northern New York.

Watch the video to see when showers, downpours, and storms are most likely near your town.

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Vermont

Noah Kahan, Vermont consumers and venues voice support for ticket resale limits

Published

21 hours ago

April 13, 2026

Press Room

A movement to limit the resale price of concert and event tickets is growing in Vermont.Last Thursday, renowned Vermont singer Noah Kahan submitted a video to a state Senate committee voicing his support of H.512. The bill passed the House last month. “This bill is a critical step in eliminating predatory resale behaviors and offering promoters a great solution for exchanging and reselling tickets in a safe marketplace,” the Strafford native said to lawmakers.The bill would limit the resale of tickets to 110% of the value they were originally purchased at. Other Vermonter’s testified that day and said they found themselves purchasing tickets online, not from the event’s venue or artist. They said the price was way above the original rate. “Now I was not just mad at myself, but I was mad at this person who did it to me,” Marina Cole of Wheelock told lawmakers. In 2024, the National Association of Ticket Brokers told NBC 5 that they were against price caps, which this bill is currently pursuing.”We have really good businesspeople who are doing the right thing,” Executive Director Gary Adler said at the time. The bill, as passed by the House, would charge the Vermont Attorney General’s Office with enforcing the resale cap. The office would have the authority to conduct audits, issue penalties and revoke a reseller’s license. Resale licenses would be a new requirement under the current bill. “I suspect the enforcement won’t be easy,” executive director of the Champlain Valley Exposition Tim Shea said Monday. “But it’s something we’re looking to follow and advocate for the right ticket buyer.”Shea said the Expo has been approached by consumers who have faced high resale prices and even some cases of ticket fraud through online reselling. He believes the legislation would help avoid those issues and keep revenues for Vermont venues and artists within the state. “When tickets are marked up to the level, they are that money’s going out of Vermont. It’s not staying here. It’s not going to the promoter. It’s not going to the concessioners on the ground,” Shea said. The bill is currently being reviewed by the Senate Committee on Economic Development, Housing, and General Affairs.

MONTPELIER, Vt. —

A movement to limit the resale price of concert and event tickets is growing in Vermont.

Last Thursday, renowned Vermont singer Noah Kahan submitted a video to a state Senate committee voicing his support of H.512. The bill passed the House last month.

“This bill is a critical step in eliminating predatory resale behaviors and offering promoters a great solution for exchanging and reselling tickets in a safe marketplace,” the Strafford native said to lawmakers.

The bill would limit the resale of tickets to 110% of the value they were originally purchased at. Other Vermonter’s testified that day and said they found themselves purchasing tickets online, not from the event’s venue or artist. They said the price was way above the original rate.

“Now I was not just mad at myself, but I was mad at this person who did it to me,” Marina Cole of Wheelock told lawmakers.

In 2024, the National Association of Ticket Brokers told NBC 5 that they were against price caps, which this bill is currently pursuing.

“We have really good businesspeople who are doing the right thing,” Executive Director Gary Adler said at the time.

The bill, as passed by the House, would charge the Vermont Attorney General’s Office with enforcing the resale cap.

The office would have the authority to conduct audits, issue penalties and revoke a reseller’s license. Resale licenses would be a new requirement under the current bill.

“I suspect the enforcement won’t be easy,” executive director of the Champlain Valley Exposition Tim Shea said Monday. “But it’s something we’re looking to follow and advocate for the right ticket buyer.”

Shea said the Expo has been approached by consumers who have faced high resale prices and even some cases of ticket fraud through online reselling. He believes the legislation would help avoid those issues and keep revenues for Vermont venues and artists within the state.

“When tickets are marked up to the level, they are that money’s going out of Vermont. It’s not staying here. It’s not going to the promoter. It’s not going to the concessioners on the ground,” Shea said.

The bill is currently being reviewed by the Senate Committee on Economic Development, Housing, and General Affairs.

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Vermont

Meet the 95-year-old Vermont herbarium volunteer who had a fern named for her

Published

1 day ago

April 13, 2026

Press Room

Meet the 95-year-old Vermont herbarium volunteer who had a fern named for her

BURLINGTON, Vt. (InvestigateTV) — For 28 years, Hilda White has shown up at the University of Vermont’s Pringle Herbarium to do a job most people have never heard of: mounting plants.

Now 95 years old, White has carefully preserved more than 50,000 plant specimens — pressing and affixing them to archival paper so they can be studied and referenced for generations to come.

“If I mount the plants, the plants will be around for hundreds of years, barring any unforeseen accidents or anything,” White said.

Birthday gift unlike any other

For her 95th birthday, the herbarium gave her a gift unlike any other: a newly discovered fern, found in Colombia in 2023, was officially named for her.

The plant — a Christmas fern — was discovered by Wes Testo, now the director of the Pringle Herbarium collection, during a research trip to South America.

“I was walking through the forest there, and I saw this just spectacular fern,” Testo said. “I knew immediately it was something I hadn’t seen before.”

After further research confirmed it was a species new to science, Testo and his colleagues decided to name it for White: Polystichum hildae.

“Oh, I was absolutely blown away,” White said when she learned of the honor.

“You can’t imagine, I cried all afternoon.”

‘Library for plants’

White’s work at the herbarium is kind of a library for plants.

“I can’t draw, but this is my artistic outlet,” she said.

Testo said White’s contributions have been essential to the research conducted in the collection, which now houses 400,000 plant specimens in a single room.

“Hilda mounted a huge amount of the specimens you see here,” Testo said. “Her contributions are absolutely essential to the research we do here.”

The collection’s survival is not something White or Testo take for granted. In 2017, a fire broke out at Torrey Hall, where the collection was housed at the time. Testo was in South America doing research when he received word.

“All I could see from an email in Colombia — the roof on fire. I thought my whole Ph.D. was going up in flames along with the whole collection here,” Testo said.

White was on her way into work when the fire broke out. Staff and volunteers, including White, worked to restore and remount the damaged plants. The collection has since been relocated to the Jeffords Building.