So I am trying to be more refl ective as I sit down to one of his creations – pork chop with apples and smoked butter – and consider my surroundings. It's a gorgeous, quiet summer evening. The sound of a waterfall – it's actually a small dam – runs quietly in the background.
The patio looks over a small off shoot of Lake George. The pork chops and the accompanying watermelon caprese salad are light and mild, very colorful. This is not pub grub you shovel down with a pitcher of booze.
This is a meal to be savored. I feel like I'm having dinner at a friend's backyard patio. In fact, this used to be a house, once upon a time.
The converted Victorian home was first built in 1895, and was renovated for dining by Bon Vie's predecessor, Bistro 54. Now it's Bon Vie, one of a handful of farm-to-table restaurants in NWI that makes for an intimate, informative dining experience. "We wanted something diff erent for the area," owner Laurie Farver-Busch told me.
"You don't see a lot of farm-to-table restaurants anymore, I feel like. We want customers to experience the taste of the good life." It's fun, but it's not easy, Cicala tells me, to put that together.
Bon Vie's menu changes week to week, as Cicala runs around nearly 24/7 to local farms and markets to gather ingredients. Each locale in NWI has its own niche, Cicala explained; this past week he went to Johnson's Farm Produce for rhubarb and blueberries, then Griffith for heirloom tomatoes, then to Crown Point to pick up pork .
