Don't expect five-star dining (with one exception) or a great variety, but the food is well prepared, the servers are cheerful, and the dining rooms are mostly big, convivial gathering places.
- Jenny Lake Lodge Dining Room, (tel. 307/733-4647): This place gets my five-star award: Dine where presidents have dined on five-course meals featuring such delicacies as smoked sturgeon ravioli. Breakfast and dinner are included in the price of a room; nonguests can call for reservations, but it's not cheap.
- Signal Mountain Lodge, (tel. 307/543-2831): Trapper Grill and Deadman's Bar here make good casual meals (including mountainous plates of nachos in the latter), with a view of Jackson Lake and the Tetons or, in the lounge, a view of one of the few televisions in the park. Peaks offers finer dining, with a largely organic menu.
The Best Places To Eat Outside The Park
This is food so good that you won't mind spending $15 to $30 for entrees.
- In Jackson, Wyoming: Rendezvous Bistro (tel. 307/739-1100) offers steaks, seafood, and game dishes with creative twists, not to mention the perfect balance of chic and casual. Mornings, though, you'll find me at Nora's Fish Creek Inn (tel. 307/733-8288), in nearby Wilson, with a bottomless cup of coffee and a huge plate of huevos rancheros.
- In Cody, Wyoming: Cassie's Supper Club (tel. 307/527-5500) is a brothel turned cowboy eatery, plating up some of the best steaks in the Rockies. After dinner, country bands hold court over the bustling dance floor.
- In West Yellowstone, Montana: Sydney's Mountain Bistro (tel. 406/646-7660) offers an intimate setting, an excellent wine list, and a menu that balances seafood and vegetarian fare with beef, poultry, and pork. Entrees such as sweet-chile salmon and a porterhouse pork chop with butternut squash make this my pick for a special meal at the west entrance to Yellowstone.
