West Glacier MT: Belton Chalet

I enjoyed a wonderful dinner experience at the Belton Chalet in West Glacier. The chalet was originally built by The Great Northern Railway, themed for Switzerland. The railroad was a pioneer in theming its resort establishments, it turns out. The Alpine theme of the original establishment is lovingly preserved. The service is just as gracious as I expect was the case at the turn of the twentieth century.

I started with a delicious soup, creamy but not too heavy.

Here is my main course, a rainbow trout. It had a more pinkish skin than I am used to, which seems to be common among Montana trout; perhaps the color is due to the minerlas in the water. The sauce was raspberry and peach. Below was a polenta patty with nicely rich greens.

For dessert, I ordered blueberry pie in a jar with huckleberry ice cream. The crust was perfectly cooked, nice and brown. Blueberries were wonderfully delicate in both taste and texture. Just sweet enough, not overcooked so they retained their shape and texture. I wasn’t sure how the ice cream would work but it was similarly subtle; the fruit flavor came thorugh without overpowering either the cream or the pie.

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