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  Valley EscapesHillbrook Inn Offers Retreat Close to Home By Maggie Wolff Peterson Chef Christine Hale traveled the culinary world, only to end up at home. As executive chef of Hillbrook Inn, Hale occupies a kitchen far smaller than the teaching kitchens in which she studied at the Cordon Bleu in Paris, and the commercial kitchens of the Hyatt Hotels in which she trained. But those, as well as the kitchens of the Pennsylvania Institute of Culinary Arts and La Varenne in France, were stops along the way for Hale, who was born in Morgantown. Now she is at Hillbrook, a nearly hidden Tudor inn on 17 acres along the Summit Point Road, south of Charles Town. "I went to the grade school across the road, South Jefferson," Hale said. "I worked here when I was going to Shepherd College." At first, she was "waiting tables and tending bar," she said. Hale became executive chef in 1991. The building has been an inn since 1985, with owners Carissa and Christopher Zanella taking over in 2004. "My husband and I used to do banquets," Zanella said. "I wanted a place for people to come and relax, where we would be able to do everything."  A quilter, Carissa Zanella
also wanted to make a place for other quilters to gather, where they could learn new techniques in a vacation setting.Upon buying the inn, the Zanellas painted the exterior, revamped the gardens and added patios. An outbuilding that was used for guest rooms, then later for an art and antiques studio, was repurposed as a place for quilting demonstrations and classes. Called Hillbrook Studio, it deals in longarm quilting machines on which stitchers can sew mechanically or hand-guided, with computerized patterns. The website hillbrookquilting.com offers information on classes, events and shows for quilters. Elsewhere, the inn property is dotted with secluded spots, including a rope hammock strung between trees by a small creek, a tree swing, an oversized chessboard worked into a side lawn and a semi-circular patio nearly obscured from the main house. Additionally, several of the rooms have private patios, including four cottage rooms separate from the main facility. Each of these is named for a season and carries a color theme throughout handpainted wall treatments and faux-finished fireplaces. Len and Jan Clayton, who celebrated their 32nd anniversary at the inn, found the Fall room interesting enough to keep them from the movies they selected from the inn's library. "We got two tapes and never put them in," Len Clayton said. Arriving before dinnertime, the Claytons were served filet mignon, based on food choices that Hale requests of every guest. "I don't present a menu to choose from," she said. Instead, Hale creates meals around diners' preferences, and what's fresh and seasonal. "I design the menu daily," she said. Five-course meals begin with appetizers, then a soup course and fish or pasta. Next comes the entree, then a salad to cleanse the palate. Finally, fruit and cheese, and dessert appear. And although she is classically trained, Hale does not confine herself to solely to French preparations. "With me designing the menu, you're apt to see flavors from all over the world," she said  Built in the 1920s,
the inn cascades down the limestone ridge on which it sits. Rooms occupy 15 levels, some reached by ascending narrow,
uneven stairs that connect one nook to another. High, timbered ceilings allowed the original owner to install a
pipe organ in his bedroom."They were a little eccentric," Hale said. What is today the Bullskin Tavern was originally a three-car garage. A contemporary, rear dining porch reveals original hand-cut logs from the first building on the site, a cabin dating from the 1700s that was on property owned by the family of George Washington, then known as Bullskin Plantation. One sitting room contains gift items for sale, including silver serving pieces and flatware, glass cordial cups, jewelry and imported toiletries. On the dining porch, a daily newspaper awaits breakfast guests. Morning meals are prepared by Rebecca Paulovich, Carissa Zanella's aunt, and offer two courses. First, fruit. "It depends on the season," Hale said. "In the fall, we do baked apples or something warm. It's always a variety of the nicest fruit." Then comes a breakfast entrée, perhaps a quiche with roasted grape tomatoes or mini-omelettes with cheddar and creamed spinach, and homemade muffins. If quilters are onsite for training, a three-course lunch begins with soup or an appetizer, then a selection of entrée items. "It's a sampling of everything," Hale said. "It has salad and cheese and fruit, meats and vegetables. Then comes dessert. And spouses are invited. "The husbands go explore while the wives are quilting, then they come over for lunch," Hale said.  Hale is currently at
work on a series of cookbooks based on inn meals, with a book for each course. Eventually, the series will be contained
as a boxed set. Based on recommendations from the inn staff, Hale started the series with dessert.Photographs for the books are complete, and writing continues. Putting exact recipes on paper has been the hardest part. "I don't really use recipes," Hale confessed. "I had to work them out and write them down." The inn is a natural destination for special events and specializes in weddings that can accommodate up to 120 guests. On holidays including Valentine's Day and New Year's Eve, the 18 guestrooms are usually full. But the inn runs a sale in wintertime, called Countdown and Snug Up/Count Up and Snug Down, in which rooms sell for a dollar a night, times the number of nights before or past New Year's Eve. For example, rooms on December 30, or on January 1, go for one dollar. And while meals are included with regular room rates, they're extra during the sale. Another special rate, the Procrastinator's Rate, is $149 per night and includes breakfast, based on room availability -- for those who wait until the last minute to book. "You can always get a deal here," Hale said. |
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