Peekamoose, Andes Hotel, Spruceton Inn — Mountain Destination Dining

## Destination Dining Some Catskills restaurants are worth the drive from wherever you're staying. Not the obvious Phoenicia-or-Woodstock neighborhood options, but specific kitchens that anchor weekends by themselves. Three of them, in rough order by how remote they feel. ## Peekamoose (Big Indian) Rt 28 in Big Indian, between Phoenicia and Margaretville. Peekamoose is one of the longest-running serious kitchens in the Catskills. Devin Mills opened it in 2004 and has held consistent quality since; the menu is contemporary American with a technical hand and good use of regional producers. The dining room is woodstove-warm, modest in scale, and reliably fills on weekends. What works: the kitchen. Peekamoose's consistency is the reason people book it as a destination from Woodstock or Phoenicia; the restaurant is a drive in any direction, and the drive is part of the weekend rather than an obstacle. Reservations are required on weekends and strongly recommended mid-week. The bar seats a few, walk-in, and is the workable back-up when the dining room is booked. How cannabis fits: not at the restaurant itself. Peekamoose is a private venue with its own rules; consumption is off-site. The drive home from Peekamoose to Phoenicia (20 minutes) or Woodstock (35 minutes) is the no-consumption interval. An edible at the cabin after. ## The Andes Hotel (Andes) Main Street, Andes. The Andes Hotel is one of the oldest continuously-operating hotels in Delaware County (the building dates to the mid-19th century; the hotel operation has run off and on throughout that period). The current kitchen operates a serious modern-American menu with an unpretentious dining room, a proper bar, and a handful of rooms upstairs for guests staying over. What works: the full package. Dinner and a room above the restaurant; breakfast the next morning; a walk to the Hawk + Hive gallery a block away; the whole weekend routes through one building. For a no-driving-after-dinner weekend, the Andes Hotel is the cleanest solution. Andes is 20 minutes from Margaretville (see the [Margaretville anchor guide](/blog/margaretville-catskills-western-crossroads)). The western-Catskills frame works: Lively Harvest as the dispensary stop, Andes Hotel as the dinner + room, Hawk + Hive in the morning, drive home. How cannabis fits: the Hotel's rules are moderate-to-conservative; tinctures and edibles in-room generally fine; indoor smoke out. For the restaurant itself, consumption is off-site. ## Spruceton Inn (West Kill) Spruceton Road, at the head of the West Kill valley in Greene County. Not a full destination-dining restaurant the way Peekamoose is (the Spruceton Inn runs a small bar with a limited kitchen that holds up under the weekend load), but the Inn makes the list because the drive itself is part of the experience. Spruceton Road dead-ends in state forest at the base of West Kill Mountain; the Inn sits in the last village before the road runs out. The setting does half the work. What works: the bar as a destination. Sitting at Spruceton Inn's bar on a Friday night at 8 PM is a specific experience: small town, cabin weekend, the mountains at the end of the road. The kitchen is simpler than Peekamoose's or the Andes Hotel's, but that is not why you are there. How cannabis fits: the Inn has nine rooms, and room-level consumption of tinctures and edibles is typically fine; outdoor vape by discretion; indoor smoke out. Ask at check-in. See the [cabin-stay guide](/blog/cannabis-friendly-cabin-stays-catskills-guide). ## How to Sequence These For a three-restaurant weekend that uses all three: - **Friday night** — Spruceton Inn for dinner and the room. Quiet arrival. - **Saturday** — morning at West Kill or the Diamond Notch Trail, breakfast at Mama's Boy or the Phoenicia Diner on the way out, afternoon at Peekamoose (late lunch or early dinner), back to the rental. - **Sunday** — drive west to Andes for lunch or brunch at the Andes Hotel, walk through the village, Hawk + Hive, drive home. This is a three-county weekend (Greene, Ulster, Delaware) but manageable with a single rental somewhere central like Phoenicia or Mt. Tremper. ## The Editorial Point The three restaurants share a specific character: small, confidently-run, non-pretentious kitchens in towns the critical press rarely names. Peekamoose has run for two decades; the Andes Hotel has been a dining anchor in Andes for much of its lifetime; Spruceton Inn's bar has made the end of a dead-end road a plausible weekend destination. They're restaurants, not brand campaigns. Consumer-cannabis framing for this kind of dining: dinner is a clear-headed experience. Tinctures and edibles come out at the cabin after. Wine with dinner is the category cannabis is not trying to replace in this context; the after-dinner hour is where cannabis fits the weekend. ## Compliance, Quickly - **21+ only**, licensed shops only. Verify via OCM QR code at [cannabis.ny.gov](https://cannabis.ny.gov). - **No consumption at any of the three restaurants** — all private venues. - **No consumption on the drive between venues** — driver or passenger. - **Room rules apply** at the Andes Hotel and Spruceton Inn; ask at check-in. - **Start low, go slow** on edibles, at the cabin or in-room, in the evening only. ## Where to Go Next - [The Catskills cannabis weekend itinerary](/blog/catskills-cannabis-weekend-itinerary-2-day) - [The Phoenicia Diner and the post-trail breakfast circuit](/blog/phoenicia-diner-catskills-post-trail-breakfast-circuit) - [Cannabis-friendly cabin stays in the Catskills](/blog/cannabis-friendly-cabin-stays-catskills-guide) - [Margaretville western-Catskills crossroads](/blog/margaretville-catskills-western-crossroads) - [Best bar in every Catskills town](/blog/best-bar-every-catskills-town) **This is editorial, not legal advice.**