Someone once said Ridgefield’s history could be written in terms of cakes and ale, cutlets and cocktails. Indeed, since 1950, some 200 restaurants have dished up delights in Ridgefield. In 1995, the town had 42 of them, one restaurant for every 523 residents. Certainly, a big slice of Ridgefield’s 20th Century fame lay in dining, but much of the notoriety stemmed from a quintet of top-flight inns.
While 19th and early 20th Century hostelries provided nice accommodations, they were not known for their food. That began to change around 1928 when Col. Louis Conley decided he wanted a country inn with Manhattan-quality fare. The Colonel could afford it — he owned the vast Outpost Nurseries covering over 1,500 acres of Ridgefield and Danbury. The result was the Outpost Inn on Danbury Road.
Despite the Depression, the inn thrived. Outpost offered the only upscale dining in town, and boasted sophisticated accommodations on 28 beautiful acres, including the Conley-built pond the inn overlooked. Many leaders in business, politics, and the arts patronized Outpost — First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt drove herself from Hyde Park to lunch there.
The main building was erected in 1816 by Albin Jennings as a home for his bride and himself. Jennings later built the Big Shop, today home of two of Ridgefield’s popular modern restaurants, Luc’s and TerraSole.
While Outpost had modern dining areas, its 19th Century rooms drew customers seeking elegance. “I remember the Japanese room, with its imported silk panels; the blue crystal sconces in the Sheraton dining room; the lovely entrance hall, with its graceful stairway. The antiques throughout, were carefully chosen by my father, who loved scouting them out.” Elise Conley Cox, the colonel’s daughter, told us in 1974. “Lily Pons had a beautiful dinner party there one evening — and wore a stunning gown!”
The inn featured an unusual tap room whose bar was made of transparent glass blocks, on the walls were murals of Outpost Nurseries scenes, and the floor bore a map of Connecticut. The bar didn’t draw drinkers of modest means. In 1940, a Manhattan or martini cost 55 cents — about $12 in 2024 dollars. A glass of champagne was $1.25 — $28 today.
World War II’s end brought the beginning of new interest in haute cuisine. In 1947, an Army veteran opened Stonehenge Inn off Route 7, naming it after the landmark he’d admired while serving in England. Victor Gilbert made Stonehenge a go-to destination. Judy Garland, Elizabeth Taylor, sundry Rockefellers, and even Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia all
dined there.
In 1965, Albert Stockli, executive chef at the Four Seasons in Manhattan and an early farm-to-table advocate, bought Stonehenge and raised its level of food service to the point where Holiday magazine named it the best restaurant of any kind in all of Connecticut.
Meanwhile, in 1948, Col. Conley’s old home, high on a Bennett’s Farm Road hill with grand views of the countryside, became the magnificent Fox Hill Inn. It offered both luxurious accommodations (actress Tallulah Bankhead liked to rest there) and such fine French cuisine as Braised Sweetbreads Eugenie, at $5.50 ($65 today), Game Hen Smitane with Wild Rice, $6.50 ($76), and Poulet Roti en Cocotte (for two), $11.50 ($135).
Like Stonehenge, Fox Hill was just off Route 7 which, before the Interstates, was a major tourist and antiquers route. For many travelers, lunch or dinner at either inn was a high point of a journey.
Ridgefield village was also a tourist destination. While The Elms Inn on Main Street opened in the 1870s, it wasn’t famed for its food until after 1951 when Giancarlo “John” Scala, an Italian-born veteran of some of Manhattan’s best kitchens, introduced upscale dining. Elms fans included Robert Redford and Paul Newman; even Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin dined there. Lyricist Noël Regney, the Ridgefielder who wrote the holiday hit, Do You Hear What I Hear, would frequently play piano, sing, and converse with patrons late into the evening.
The Elms, Stonehenge, Fox Hill, and Outpost eventually succumbed to changing times and tastes. Only one of the quintet remains today.
In 1938, Chris and Page Kane turned the West Lane home of diplomat George Pratt Ingersoll into The Kane Inn. After the war subsequent owners, including Paris-trained chef Walter Tode, introduced French cuisine to woo sophisticated diners. In 1951, Tode was named one of the top 10 chefs in the world, and his Tode’s Inn offered what one reviewer called “elegant, intimate opulence.” It was also a setting for humorist Max Wilk’s 1960 novel, Don’t Raise the Bridge, Lower the River, satirizing suburban life.
Like other top restaurants, the Inn at Ridgefield, as it was long known, had a dress code. As recently as the 1980s, male diners had to wear jackets and ties in the dining rooms. The owners even kept a closet of spares for men who showed up unjacketed or untied. After a long stint as Bernard’s, the venerable inn is now The Benjamin, serving “uniquely American, French-inspired” dishes. No jacket or tie required.
Today, though scores of restaurants serve breakfasts, lunches and dinners to hungry Ridgefielders, none are fast-food chains. Perhaps the town’s heritage of fine inn dining has influenced modern diners to demand good food that comes from a kitchen, not a factory.
