How tiny Ellsworth became a fine-dining destination

For years, food writers from the big magazines kept showing up in Ellsworth — a village of a few hundred people in the far corner of Antrim County, the kind of place you reach on purpose or not at all. They came for dinner. Specifically, they came for the Rowe Inn.

Wes Westhoven took over the little restaurant in 1972 and aimed absurdly high for the setting. He once called northern Michigan a “culinary wasteland” back then, and he set out to fix it one plate at a time: French-country cooking, fresh flowers on the table, baby vegetables and local ingredients before “farm to table” was a phrase anyone used. The Rowe earned write-ups in Gourmet, Food & Wine, and Wine Spectator — national attention almost no village this size ever gets for its supper.

The wine cellar became its own legend. Tucked in the basement, it grew into one of the deepest collections in the region, the sort of place a visiting writer would call his favorite spot in all of northern Michigan and mean it. People drove hours for a bottle they couldn’t find anywhere else, then stayed for the duck.

Ellsworth got so good at this that for a while it had two destination restaurants. A cook who’d learned the trade in Westhoven’s kitchen opened Tapawingo, a lakeside spot down the road that drew its own raves and a New York Times mention. Tapawingo closed in 2008, which left the Rowe as the last of the pioneers — still going past forty years, an unlikely milestone in a business where most places fold inside three. Not bad for a town with one blinking light and a reputation, in certain circles, for the best dinner north of nowhere.