©2006 The Chestnut Hill Local

Executive chef Meg Votta, an Ambler native, prepares the barbecue items at ‘Chillin and Grillin.’
Former Hill restaurateur now ‘Grillin’ and Chillin’
by LEN LEAR

Richard and Allison Allman are the owners of the 19-year-old Joseph Ambler Inn. Richard formerly owned The Depot in Chestnut Hill, and his mom, Mary Fretz, owned 21 West. (Photos by Len Lear)

Every year at this time, restaurants offering outdoor dining are as popular as eight-week-old tiger cubs in a zoo. The problem is that not all outdoor dining restaurants are created equal.

For example, we recently ate at Estia at 1407 Locust St. in center city, where several tables of outdoor diners were literally subjected to the relentless assault of automobile and bus noise and exhaust fumes as well as cigarette smoke emitted by passing pedestrians. In Old City, al fresco dining is practically ubiquitous despite these omnipresent, unhealthy conditions. I don’t think this is what most diners visualize when they anticipate an outdoor dining experience.

At the other extreme, however, is the sylvan setting at the Joseph Ambler Inn that is worthy of a poem by Wordsworth. The bucolic property at 1005 Horsham Rd. In North Wales, near the end of the Route 309 Expressway — a 10-to-15 minute ride from Chestnut Hill — is a virtual picture postcard.

From the 85-seat outdoor dining area with a retractable awning (so diners can still eat outdoors if it rains), decorated with votive candles, one looks out on a 12-acre expanse of extraordinary rustic beauty. Floral displays, verdant gardens, trees and lawns perform their visual alchemy without a bus or SUV in sight.

For those who are epicurious, the Joseph Ambler Inn has just introduced ‘Grillin’ and Chillin’ on Friday nights. It is essentially a barbecue feast conducted by executive chef Meg Votta, an Ambler native and culinary juggler who never seems to drop a ball. (“When we checked Meg’s references from the last two restaurants where she worked,” said owner Richard Allman, “both places said we were very lucky to have her.”)

Executive chef Meg Votta, an Ambler native, prepares the barbecue items at ‘Chillin and Grillin.’

For a little historical perspective, a skilled wheelwright named Joseph Ambler built the original fieldstone house on the estate in 1734. In the centuries to follow, many other buildings were constructed, including a tenant cottage and stone bank-barn. In 1983 Chestnut Hill restaurateur Richard Allman purchased the entire complex and opened 15 guestrooms in the farmhouse and cottage.

In 1987 Allman opened the restaurant/bar, the Joseph Ambler Inn, in the 1820s’ stone bank-barn with exposed stone walls and random-width hardwood floors, along with 13 more guestrooms. In 1997 10 more overnight rooms were opened in another building, the Thomas Wilson House, and in 2003 15 guest suites and two conference/dining rooms were added in yet another building.

For many years prior to purchasing the Joseph Ambler complex, Allman owned and operated The Depot in Chestnut Hill, where Starbucks and A Taste of Philly are now located. For several years Allman’s mother, Mary Fretz, owned 21 West, then the most upscale restaurant in Chestnut Hill. Mary, now 87 and living in San Diego, is in good health, according to Richard.

The Joseph Ambler Inn’s regular dinner menu is basically upscale American cuisine. Appetizers, from $6 to $14, include jumbo shrimp cocktail, lobster and lump crab cake, Caesar salad and oysters on the half-shell. Entrees, from $19 to $32, include trout stuffed with shrimp, pan-sautéed flounder, herb-roasted game hen, baby back ribs, filet mignon with a port wine cream sauce and grilled rack of lamb. There is also an extensive wine list.

The inspiration for the Friday night ‘Chillin’ and Grillin’ option came to the Allmans while dining at an outstanding restaurant in the Florida Keys, Little Palm Island, “one of the most beautiful settings on earth.”

While in the Keys, they also saw a gorgeous wooden boat with a couple fishing from it. “The lady turned around,” Richard recalled, “and said, ‘Richard Allman, what are you doing here?’ It turned out to be Dale Fetterolf, who used to live in Flourtown. How’s that for a coincidence? She said, ‘The 68-footer is ours. We charter it out.’ The boat was called ‘Tireless’ because it was built by the Firestone Tire family in 1948.”

At the Friday night ‘Grillin’ and Chillin,’ one can choose burgers ($9.50), grilled chicken sandwiches ($8.50), all served with homemade barbecued chips and slaw; or three “small bites”(for $14.95), such as shrimp skewers with mango sauce; chicken skewers with Thai peanut sauce; Teriyaki spare ribs, etc., and/or entrees such as grilled ribeye steak with a bourbon barbecue ($26) and mahi-mahi with pineapple tamarind ($23), all accompanied by grilled vegetables, potato salad and grilled focaccia bread. The ribeye steak and Teriyaki spare ribs were particularly tasty. Two really exceptional wines-by-the-glass were the Belvedere Chardonnay and Avalon Cabernet Sauvignon. I would gladly purchase a case of both if I could locate them (so far, no luck).

“I still visit Chestnut Hill,” said Richard, “and a lot of Chestnut Hill people still make the harrowing ride up Route 309, taking their life in their hands (said with tongue-in-cheek) to get here ... I still go to the Barry Blum Antique Store; I still get cheese for the restaurant from the Chestnut Hill Cheese Shop, and I still see Bruce Robertson quite a bit.”

Allman is aided in the running of the Joseph Ambler Inn by his wife of nine years, Allison, the director of operations. “We are a good-cop, bad-cop team,” said Richard, who met Allison when she was a customer of his at The Depot. “She runs the business end of things, and I keep things looking the way they do. I’m basically the full-time gardener.”

‘Chillin’ and Grillin’ will be available every Friday night this summer except this Friday, July 14. For more information or reservations, call 215-362-7500 or visit www.josephamblerinn.com.