Lee — Local restaurants will be serving up good grub along with enticing discounts next week as the town embarks on its first annual Lee Restaurant Week, March 30 to April 5.
Cooked up by Rebecca Clerget, who co-owns Main Street staples Cafe Triskele and appetito, and Lee Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Kathy DeVarennes, the co-chairpersons cite the event as a “win-win” for the community and its restaurants and merchants who generally see the early spring as a slow time for patronage.
“Our Board of Directors was looking for another way to promote Lee,” DeVarennes said of the project.
Here is how it works: Patrons start off by getting a stamp card from any of the 17 local restaurants involved. Each time they visit a participating eatery, that card is stamped. Once four stamps from different restaurants are accumulated, the card is entered into a drawing to win a themed gift basket that includes products, gift cards, and other goodies from local businesses.
DeVarennes said the owners or managers of each restaurant involved chose how they wanted to celebrate the event, with some eateries—including appetito and Cafe Triskele—offering dining specials, such as $35 three-course meals. Let’s Do Lunch is presenting its lobster roll combo as a special, but patrons aren’t required to buy the special to get their cards stamped, she said.
For Clerget, the project is a way for “some really talented folks in Lee” to show off their strengths. She was inspired by restaurant weeks in Washington, D.C., her former home.
“A lot of the restaurants that were typically out of bounds or out of reach, as far as menu prices go, would have a $35 menu for three courses and they would run it lunch and dinner,” she said of the twice yearly program. “It’s just a great way for folks to try new places or places that they’ve always wanted to go.”
Clerget also serves on the Chamber’s Board of Directors. “The hope is for more local tourism that week, pulling in from Berkshire County [or] Hudson, N.Y., those areas and a little east of here,” she said. “Hopefully it will just energize folks to come out during our slowest time of the year. A lot of restaurants struggle through March and April.”
Mint – Lakeside Indian Dining & Bar was added to the program this week, joining 51 Park Restaurant & Tavern, Agaves Mexican Grill, Alpamayo Peruvian Cuisine, appetito Pizza & Gelato, Bliss Crumb & Coffee, Burmese Bowl, Café Triskele, Jalisco Cantina, Lee’s Corner Kitchen, Let’s Do Lunch, Locker Room Sports Pub, Morgan House Inn & Restaurant, Roses Restaurant, Salmon Run Fish House, Starving Artist Creperie & Café, and The Station Gastropub & Lounge.
Work on the project began in December, with Clerget “amazed” at the large scale of restaurants ponying up for the venture. She credited DeVarennes as the catalyst for the successful response.
“Try to visit as many places as you can,” Clerget advises.
