Get Ready To Loosen Your Belt At This Maryland Amish Buffet Packed With Comfort Food
Fried chicken is only the opening act when lunch comes with a craft village waiting outside.
There is a stop in Maryland that can turn a buffet run into a full afternoon.
The plates lean old-school, with gravy, noodles, mashed potatoes, cobbler, and the kind of comfort food that makes second helpings tempting.
The setting gives the meal extra personality without stealing the spotlight.
Once dessert is handled, handmade goods and working artisans give the outing another reason to linger.
You may arrive focused on lunch, but the fun twist is leaving with a favorite craft, a full stomach, and plans to come back.
A Stagecoach Stop With Seconds
Some restaurants have a history lesson on the menu, but Penn Alps Restaurant & Craft Shop serves one with every meal. The building began life around 1818 as the Little Crossings Inn.
Stagecoaches once followed the National Road through this mountain crossing, and the old inn provided a place for travelers to rest. Three of its original rooms remain part of the restaurant today, surrounded by additions that have expanded the building over time.
Its neighbors make the history especially tangible. Stanton’s Mill dates to 1797, while the nearby Casselman Bridge was built in 1813.
The bridge’s stone arch was the largest single span of its kind in the United States when constructed. It is undergoing restoration, so pedestrian access to the bridge remains restricted.
The Penn Alps project began in 1957 with a mission to support Appalachian crafts and culture.
The craft shop followed in 1958, and the restaurant opened in 1959. That combination still gives this corner of western Maryland a distinctive identity.
The restaurant stands at 125 Casselman Road, close to Interstate 68 and the historic National Road.
Fried Chicken Fit For Royalty
Golden fried chicken is a centerpiece of the Saturday and Sunday country buffets. It shares the line with roast beef, ham, and a changing feature dish, giving diners several directions to take their plates.
Mashed potatoes with gravy are a natural companion to the meat selections. Noodles, green beans, and corn complete the familiar country-style lineup.
The appeal comes from food that belongs together, whether the plate holds a little of each or a generous helping of one favorite.
Buffet service begins at 11 a.m. on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday and continues until closing. The lineup changes with the day, so the weekend roast beef selection and Friday seafood dishes are worth keeping separate when making plans.
For anyone drawn to traditional Pennsylvania Dutch cooking, the influence is part of the restaurant’s history. Its nonprofit founders included Amish and Mennonite members with German ancestry, a connection reflected in several dishes.
A first plate of chicken, potatoes, and vegetables leaves the noodles and dessert for another round. There is no need to fit the entire buffet onto one plate.
More Than Fifty Choices Across The Bars
The soup, salad, and dessert bars make the main buffet feel considerably bigger. Together, these stations offer more than 50 choices, rather than 50 different salads alone.
Start with crisp greens and vegetables, then add one of the dressing options.
Penn Alps White House and Red House dressings appear alongside familiar choices such as ranch, Italian, and Thousand Island. The range makes a simple salad customizable without turning it into the main event.
Soup gives the lighter selections a heartier side. German Vegetable Soup is a regular menu item, joined by a homemade soup of the day. For a cool afternoon in Maryland’s mountains, a bowl can be an appealing beginning before the main course.
Fruit and dessert selections add still more variety to the bars. The restaurant also offers the soup, salad, and dessert combination as a meal on its own, so ordering a large entrée is not essential.
The result is unusually flexible for a country restaurant: a quick soup-and-salad lunch or a leisurely buffet meal can happen in the same dining room.
Friday Nights Taste Like Seafood
Friday changes the buffet’s focus from roast beef to fish and shellfish. Penn Alps serves baked haddock, fried cod, shrimp, clam strips, and steamed mussels alongside its familiar country dishes.
There are several textures to work through. Haddock provides a baked option, while breaded seafood offers a crisp alternative.
Steamed mussels add a different choice altogether, making this a notably varied seafood spread for a mountain restaurant.
The Friday buffet starts at 11 a.m. and runs through the evening. It is a lunch or dinner option, so the menu does not require a special late-night visit.
Fried chicken and ham remain part of the Friday selection. Macaroni and cheese, mashed potatoes with gravy, green beans, and corn supply the side dishes, which means a plate can mix seafood and traditional comfort food.
The soup, salad, and dessert bars are included as well. A serving of fish followed by a bowl of soup or a spoonful of dessert makes an entirely different meal from the Saturday and Sunday roast-beef buffet.
Country Classics Beyond The Buffet
The buffet is only a weekend attraction. On other days, the regular menu gives Penn Alps a different rhythm, with plated meals rather than repeated trips to the serving line.
Consider the cabbage rolls, filled with seasoned ground beef and rice and served with tomato sauce.
Roast pork comes with sauerkraut, while the smoked sausage special pairs home-fried potatoes with buttered corn. These dishes carry the Central European influence that runs through the restaurant’s cooking.
The roast turkey entrée includes stuffing, cranberry sauce, and gravy.
There is also an open-faced sandwich with a choice of roast beef or turkey, accompanied by mashed potatoes and gravy. It is a straightforward option for anyone who came with a particular comfort-food craving.
Sandwich choices extend to a Reuben with corned beef, Swiss cheese, sauerkraut, and Thousand Island dressing. A chickpea burger provides a meatless choice, and salads, soups, and sides broaden the menu further.
The restaurant generally opens at 11 a.m., with seasonal closing hours that vary. Weekday dining offers a chance to enjoy the historic rooms while choosing a single main dish.
Cozy Rooms With Old Souls
Six dining rooms spread through the building, and each one has its own personality. Three of them are preserved parts of the original log stagecoach stop.
The Alpine Room has a historic fireplace that becomes a focal point during colder months.
Other spaces retain the atmosphere of the old inn, with the Dunbar Room and upstairs Livengood Room among the rooms connected to its nineteenth-century history.
For a gathering, the layout offers options beyond a standard restaurant table. The upstairs Great Hall is the largest meeting space and can seat up to 150 people.
Smaller rooms accommodate family occasions or group meals in a more contained setting.
The mixture of log-era spaces and later additions is part of the appeal. It gives this Maryland restaurant the feeling of several chapters of local history under one roof, rather than a dining room built to imitate the past.
A casual buffet lunch and a planned group celebration can take place within the same historic complex. The food may draw people in, but the rooms give them another detail to remember.
Cobbler Worth Every Extra Notch
Blackberry cobbler deserves its own fan club. At Penn Alps, it has a place on the regular dessert menu, with ice cream available alongside it.
The cobbler is baked golden brown, and the fruit filling gives it a different character from the restaurant’s cakes and puddings. It is a good choice for anyone who prefers a dessert built around berries rather than chocolate.
Oatmeal cake is another house-recipe specialty. Dutch chocolate cake offers a richer alternative, while nut brown pudding includes walnuts and raisins. Those selections give the dessert menu more variety than a single pie or scoop of ice cream.
The buffet includes a dessert bar, too, although its selections may vary. That is worth distinguishing from the individually listed desserts, especially when a particular cobbler is the reason for the stop.
A generous dinner followed by blackberry cobbler makes a fitting end to a country meal. For a smaller outing, dessert can be ordered after a sandwich or one of the regular entrées without committing to the buffet.
Crafts, Carvers, And Clever Hands
Full bellies need a stroll, and the craft complex gives the afternoon a second focus. The Penn Alps craft shop occupies the restaurant property and has helped regional artisans market their work since 1958.
Over the decades, more than 2,500 makers have sold crafts through the shop. Its connection with traditional handiwork is central to the organization’s purpose, supporting people who work in wood, fiber, clay, and other materials.
Next door, Spruce Forest Artisan Village brings those traditions into working studios. Restored log cabins and vintage frame buildings hold artisans practicing basket making, pottery, weaving, bird carving, and other crafts.
Some of the structures date back to the eighteenth century, giving the studios architectural interest of their own.
The village is generally open from May through October, Monday through Saturday, with individual studio schedules varying.
Special events may take place at other times. Admission to the village is free, making it an easy companion to lunch when studios are open.
A stop at Penn Alps brings together two sides of western Maryland: generous country cooking indoors and generations of careful handwork just outside.
