Category: Closed

Editor’s Note: The Greshville Inn is now closed. A new location for Plaza Azteca opened in the space in the summer of 2021 but closed in 2025. The space is currently empty.

It’s a rare occasion when I don’t have a restaurant in mind for the weekly review. Usually it’s planned out days, if not more than a week, ahead of time.

But this week was different. We were headed to Boyertown to the Boyertown Museum of Historic Vehicles. The town’s Oktoberfest celebration was being held on the same day, and many of the town’s restaurants were closing their doors to participate.

We went to Boyertown with no plan, driving out St. Lawrence Avenue and continuing along the Boyertown Pike (Route 562). I made note of all the restaurants we passed on our way, just in case we couldn’t find something downtown.

As much as I wanted to try all of the stands at Oktoberfest, I really wanted a sit-down meal for my review. So after walking out empty-handed, we hopped back in the car, headed about a mile west of town and pulled into the parking lot at the Greshville Inn.

TripAdvisor had listed the Greshville Inn as the No. 2 restaurant in the Boyertown area. The parking lot was mostly empty. Inside, there were two ladies sitting at a booth and guy at the bar. The rest of the dining area was empty.

But the Greshville Inn is more of a dinner and drinks place than a lunch stop so we were not all that surprised.

We were led into the dining room to a table for two that sat next to a large aquarium, with two oversized goldfish and one silvery fish whose scales were losing their luster.

The trio provided our entertainment during the meal, especially the larger of the goldfish who spent the entire time digging around the bottom of the tank, sucking stones and spitting them back out against the glass.

On its website, the Greshville Inn says that it is “proud to offer the largest American home cooked cuisine selection available in the greater Boyertown, PA region.”

It’s a mouthful, and a little deceiving. The dinner menu isn’t very large at all: two chicken dinners, three steaks, a veal Oscar, four seafood dishes and an array of appetizers and sandwiches. The lunch menu added another handful of options though three of them were crossed out.

One of the sandwich selections was the hard-carved roast beef. It sounded too good to pass up.

The toasted roll was overstuffed with meat and sliced in half. A small cup of au jus was set in the center for dipping, and the plate was flanked by a pile of fries.

It was excellently done. The beef was cooked perfectly. The au jus gave it a softer texture that made it easier to put down. And the fries were great as well.

Julie’s meal didn’t stray far from me as she opted for the prime rib French dip. Served on an Italian roll, the meat wasn’t packed in as tight. The addition of melted Swiss cheese gave it a richer flavor and the use of prime rib meat gave the sandwich a richer flavor.  It was an excellent—and filling—sandwich in its own right.

It took a little while for our bill to arrive. The only waitress on staff was doubling as the bartender. And while no one else came into the dining room while we were there, the stools had begun filling up for the college football games.

Our total was only $22 for two sandwiches that were hearty enough to hold us over for the rest of the day.

The Greshville Inn may not have been my first choice on this day, but it ended up being a great meal. Sometimes your second choice turns out pretty good.

BCE Rating
Food: Good
Service: Fair
Ambiance: Fair
Price: Reasonable

Greshville Inn
1013 Reading Ave
Boyertown, PA 19512

Editor’s Note: The Cafe at Maple Springs closed in 2017. The space is now home to Annamarie’s on Main.

Like all good Dutchmen, I am always looking for a good deal. So when I was able to get a $100 Restaurant.com voucher for $10, I couldn’t pass it up.

Unfortunately, Restaurant.com’s inventory is very limited. Three years later, I’ve only used one coupon, that was at Christine’s Creekside Inn.

But I made myself a promise that I would use it this year, so I went on a spending spree and picked up a variety of certificates to use throughout the summer.

One of those that I picked up was for $25 off at the Cafe at Maple Springs. Looking at the dinner menu listed on Restaurant.com, I was confident that we would have no trouble hitting the $37.50 minimum purchase to use it.

So a few weeks ago, Julie and I set aside a Thursday night to drive to Birdsboro and enjoy dinner.

The Cafe at Maple Springs is set inside a strip mall along Route 724, inside the borough limits but just west of downtown.

The dining room was smaller than I was expecting. Less than 20 tables—mostly wooden booths—were draped with black fabric tablecloths.

The bigger surprise was when we were handed the dinner menu, which included only sandwiches, burgers and salad and none of the dinner entrees and pasta dishes I had seen on the menu online. Instead, they offered a handful of “homestyle” options like stuffed peppers and pot pie.

It was only then that I looked on their Facebook page (the restaurant does not have a website) and saw the fine print on the dinner menu: “Served Friday, Saturday and Sunday, 4 p.m. until close.”

So we ordered a couple sandwiches and resigned ourselves to the fact that we would have to return.

This time, I made sure that our return visit was on a Friday. We were anxious to try items like brown butter crab and chicken picotta.

But when we arrived, we were once again disappointed to find that there was still no dinner menu. A few homestyle options were all that were available.

I decided to order off the homestyle menu, and in my frustration I said “meatloaf” when I actually meant “shepherd’s pie.”

In a feeble attempt to reach our $37.50, we decided to order six Chesapeake wings to start.

Before they arrived, we got our side salads, which came with our homestyle meals. The salad was hearty, a bountiful pile of lettuce, cherry tomatoes, green peppers, carrots and cucumber. After polishing it off, the wings seemed completely unnecessary.

I saved the last of my ranch from the salad to use for dipping my wings. As the name implies, the wings were doused in Old Bay with some additional herbs tossed in. The Old Bay made them just a little salty, but overall they were very tasty.

When my main course arrived, two slabs of meatloaf were piled atop each other with a mound of mashed potatoes, all drowning in gravy.

The meatloaf was a little spicy and a little salty, a product of just a little too much garlic salt in the mixture. Otherwise, it was very good and very filling. The mashed potatoes were also good, but I could have done without the corn because it didn’t add much except some color.

Julie ordered chicken pot pie and was happy to see that it was “real” Pennsylvania Dutch pot pie, not the kind that’s served in a shell.

It was actually very good, one of the better versions I have tasted at a restaurant. And they certainly gave plenty of it as half of it went home with us that night.

Our waitress brought a box for Julie’s leftovers, along with our check. For all of our food (and a soda), it was still only $25. It would have taken at least one more person to hit our minimum, and for the first time ever, I was actually upset about a restaurant having low prices.

I didn’t bother asking whether they actually have a dinner menu at all anymore because it no longer mattered to me; I already sold my coupon back to Restaurant.com for credit so we can try somewhere else.

Everything we had in our two trips to the Maple Springs Cafe was very good.

But I just can’t shake the fact that I was left wanting something more.

Dragon 21 is now closed. The restaurant closed days after our visit after losing an eminent domain battle against the county and the borough of Fleetwood. Read below for the story of a lost local business.

It’s never a good thing to see a restaurant close.

Restaurants are more than just a business venture, they’re employers, economic drivers and most importantly, a part of the community. When one closes, a piece of a community is lost.

Dragon 21 has been a part of the community in Fleetwood and beyond for 15 years, but it’s time is almost up.

The borough of Fleetwood and the Berks County Redevelopment Authority have taken the property via eminent domain. The building that houses the restaurant will be razed in order to redesign the intersection of Main and Franklin Streets, leaving Dragon 21 without a home.

And according to the owners, the government’s compensation is not enough to enable them to reopen in a new location.

While I had never been there before last week, several of my closest friends grew up in the area and were practically raised on Dragon 21. The news of the imminent closing hit my friend Mike especially hard as he took to social media to voice his displeasure.

Anybody that knows me understands that it’s nearly impossible for me to get super angry. However, I just found out that Dragon 21, run by an insanely hard-working Chinese family in Fleetwood, is getting thrown out of their building and shut down by the Berks County Redevelopment Authority (to decrease “truck traffic”)…It’s disgusting how the government can take something away so easily, while offering unfair compensation (way, way less than professional appraisal) for the business to get a new start in another location…At the end of the day, my heart breaks for this caring, diligent, respectful family following the American Dream.

A faded mural graces the west side of the building, a leftover from the Fire and Ice Cafe that operated there in the late 90s. Paint is peeling, and in other places, is gone completely.

There’s no denying that the building has become an eyesore, but according to the owners, that falls on the borough. Fleetwood officials told them to stop all repairs nearly a decade ago.

Built in 1860, the three story building is old, but the former general store lacks historical or architectural significance that could save it from the wrecking ball.

The entrance to Dragon 21 faces away from the street. It’s tucked away in the back corner of the building, hidden from view to anyone not travelling west along Main Street.

Inside, it’s your typical Americanized Chinese restaurant: a handful of tables that no one is using surrounded by stereotypical dragon motif. It’s a place that was built for takeout and little else.

One thing that is clear immediately is a sense of community. The takeout counter is littered with cards and flyers for other Fleetwood businesses and organizations. For as many supporters as Dragon 21 has, the restaurant gives back equally to its community.

I invited Mike to join us for what would be our first—and likely, only—visit to Dragon 21, and he talked us into sharing an order of fried wontons to start. Crispy outer shells held a piping-hot mixture of meat and vegetables. There was nothing extraordinary about them, but once I started, I couldn’t stop popping them in my mouth.

While we were chomping down on the wontons, Mike was doubling up with a bowl of wonton soup. He packed away an extra five or six dumplings before his dinner actually arrived.

Knowing that this was likely my only visit to Dragon 21, I decided to be boring with my main course and order the old stand-by, General Tso’s chicken.

It’s amazing how much variation there is between different restaurants in their interpretation of the sweet and spicy classic. Dragon 21’s version had a teriyaki base with enough heat to keep me going back to my bottle of water throughout. The fried rice—the darkest I have ever seen—probably wouldn’t stand on its own, but it went really well with everything.

Mike went with another staple of Chinese fast food: sweet and sour chicken. The fried nuggets were served with a side of blood red sweet and sour sauce that had no nutritional value but was delicious nonetheless.

It was so good that I also used it to top my egg roll which I really did not need to eat, but still polished off anyway.

Julie at least ordered something a little different, opting for shrimp lo mein. It was a little odd that it was also served with fried rice, but the flavors were different enough to not compete with each other. The soy based lo mein was good, especially with the choice of shrimp over chicken.

Of the three of us, I was the only one who didn’t leave any for the next day’s lunch so between the three of us, we got five meals for less than $30.

To most, Dragon 21 is not unlike any other Chinese restaurant in Berks County. The menu, the ambiance, the to-go containers: all basically the same as anywhere else.

But that’s not the point. Dragon 21 was never meant as a place for someone like me living in Wyomissing.

As Mike said, “Yes, this is just a little Chinese restaurant. But it is MY little Chinese restaurant.”

Dragon 21 is Fleetwood’s little Chinese restaurant. And when it closes, a little piece of Fleetwood will be lost.

Basil Restaurant and Pizzeria is now closed. The restaurant shut its doors in spring 2017. The location is now home to Juliana’s Italian Restaurant.

A great chef is critical to the success of a restaurant.

The chef is more than just a cook, he is the leader in the kitchen, and is the one responsible for sending the customers home happy.

Berks County has many great chefs (just check out either of the two Iron Chef competitions at Wilson or Hamburg), many of them classically trained in the Old World style.

One such chef is Chef Gianluca Longo, who created Basil Restaurant and Pizzeria in Fritztown.

Basil is hidden in a non-descript building that looks more like a warehouse than a restaurant. Even with the roadside sign, many people probably drive by without a second glance.

Inside, the restaurant is full of character. It is split into two rooms: the pizzeria and the dining room. The pizzeria is bright, open and filled with families.

The dining room has softer light, most of it coming from the lamps hanging on the burgundy walls. A never-ending waterfall cascades along the length of the rear wall.

In the back of the menu is a welcome letter from chef Longo where he tells the story of his climb through the culinary ranks, from his start as a dishwasher at age 11 in Catanzaro, Italy, through jobs in Milan and Miami, to the opening of Basil, his first restaurant.

The dining room menu is filled with Italian favorites, starting with pizza—choose from 14 specialty pies or create your own with more than 25 toppings—and continuing through a variety of chicken, seafood, beef and veal entrees.

Basil’s menu also includes a lengthy list of homemade pasta dishes, which is where my eyes started and ended.

I wanted to try angolotti, a ravioli dish filled with beef and prosciutto with bescaimella sauce, but was disappointed to learn that it was removed from the menu a month ago. So in its place, I settled on spinach ravioli.

I was expecting traditional ravioli filled with spinach, but was pleasantly surprised to find that it was baked into the oversized pasta squares, evident by the green hue that stuck out beneath the sea of red.

Of course with a name like basil, the herb is going to make an appearance in every dish. It was very much a part of the sauce, giving it a distinct sweetness. I wouldn’t have minded a cup of it on the side to drink.

Each bite made me want more, and somehow I managed to pack away the whole dish.

Basil (the herb) even starred in the garden salad, where it was mixed with the sliced tomatoes for a delicious appetizer.

The stuffed shells, which Julie also ordered off the homemade pasta menu, were covered in marinara sauce and melted provolone cheese. A mix of beef and ricotta filled each one.

The sauce on her dish differed from my own, with a deeper flavor, one that tasted more like sun-dried tomatoes than those that are fresh-picked. It was a perfect match for the dish.

On this night, we also had Julie’s parents with us. Both of them were also very happy with their meals, even my father-in-law, who was still raving about his veal Parmesan the next day.

For the four of us, our total came in at just under $70, which seemed very reasonable knowing that I was the only one to clean the plate so we were taking three more meals home with us.

In Chef Longo’s letter, he ends with this: “Your satisfaction is not only my goal, but also my measure of success.”

In my mind, there is no doubt that Chef Longo is a success.

The Virginville Hotel closed in August 2017. There are no current plans for a new restaurant to take its place.

“Let’s go for a drive in the country.”

That was what Julie said to me on my first day back after a four-day business trip to Arizona. That’s how we found ourselves winding our way through northern Berks County on our way to Virginville.

There are few restaurants in Berks County that are as much in the country as the Virginville Hotel. About 300 people live in the tiny village between Kutztown and Lenhartsville. Thousands more pass through each year as they travel to the nearby Crystal Cave. That traffic has only helped drive customers through the door of the hotel since it opened in 1885 as the Mansion House.

Like the village itself, the Virginville Hotel is not very big, at least in the dining area. The taproom, which has its own entrance out front, feels like it takes up half of the building.

There is nothing small about the menu, however. The hotel’s offerings more closely resemble a diner with four pages of simple, homestyle entrees, pasta, burgers and sandwiches, plus daily an entire page of daily specials.

One of the appetizer specials during our visit was pork pot stickers. The deep-fried treats were served with a cup of sweet and sour sauce for dipping. Unlike their pan-fried counterparts you find at most Chinese restaurants, these pot stickers ate more like finger food, the crunchy outer shell making the delicious morsels even easier to dunk.

There were a number of menu items that caught my eye, including Pennsylvania Dutch baked ham, honey dipped fried chicken, and country sausage. But I decided instead for stroganoff pasta.

Beef stroganoff is a favorite of mine, but one that I rarely find on restaurant menus. The heavy cream sauce was loaded atop the pile of egg noodles, steak tips and sliced mushrooms. It was a big, meaty, filling dish with a flavorful sauce that brought it all together. And more than one-quarter of it came home with me for later.

Each pasta dish comes with a side salad (entrees came with a salad and a side, or three sides). The salad was basic, but I really appreciated the two different flavors of croutons in it.

Another special for the day was chicken lasagna, Julie’s entree of choice on our visit. It was certainly anything but traditional.

Instead of a slice from a large sheet, the lasagna was served in a bowl. To better compliment the chicken, the dish was topped with alfredo sauce instead of the standard tomato. The ricotta cheese helped the dish maintain its identity. The flavors were still very reminiscent of lasagna, just a little cheesier and heavier (thanks to the alfredo sauce).

Our two meals left no room for dessert so we finished up our meals with a total check around $30.

The trip to the Virginville Hotel took us on some of Berks County’s scenic back roads, a nice drive that led to a fine little restaurant in a quaint little village.

All in all, I would say it was a good trip.