Squid Eats: Miso Hungry

Vermont is a great place to go for a scenic drive.  It's something we did quite a lot when we first moved here 20 years ago, less so as other responsibilities took over our lives.  Recently, we found a nice excuse for a car tour.  Miso Hungry is a local Japanese comfort food chain with locations at several ski resorts and also a food truck.

As we are not downhill skiers, we don't spend a lot of time at the resorts.  Even so, they can be fun places to hang out, even during the off-season.  They're quieter during the summer, of course, but not dead.  Many of the food establishments stay open, including Miso Hungry.

We started at Miso Ramen at Jay Peak, the most popular Vermont resort for Canadians as it's right on the border.  Miso Ramen serves the public out of a reclaimed ski gondola.  I got Roasted Sesame Shoyu Ramen, very tasty.  We all got bubble tea, too.

We saw a fox on our way out of the resort:

Next stop, Miso Toh Kome at Spruce Peak in Stowe.  Because of the mountains and otherwise hilly terrain, straight lines from one place to the next don't really exist in Vermont.  Every route is one of several indirect choices along windy, meandering roads.  One can take the known path but sometimes it's fun to leave it up to Google.  I would have expected the default to be through Smuggler's Notch, a narrow and breathtaking path through the mountains, closed in the winter months.  But instead, the app took us around it on roads I didn't know before.  Good family fun.

Stowe, by reputation, favors the European crowd.  It's probably the ritziest of the ski towns.  Miso Toh Kome specializes in onigiri, Japanese rice balls (discussed here).  Here, service is provided out of the little huts one often sees on a Japanese train platform, fitting for me as I think of onigiri as train food.  I got the Cha-Shu Pork Belly Onigiri - lovely.  A little gooey with the sauce but lovely.

The other two locations are also both called Miso Tok Kome, one at Bolton Valley and one at Sugarbush.  Maybe we'll hit those on a future driving adventure.

We did take Smuggler's Notch on the way home.