An old-school slice of summer: A&W drive-in doles out dinner right to your car window

MIDDLEBURY ― My wife and I pulled into the parking lot at the A&W restaurant south of Middlebury on a warm late-spring evening, and just sat there.

That’s the idea. This is not a restaurant you walk into. It’s not a fast-food joint where you drive up to a squawk box and talk into it to place your order. This is a drive-in restaurant where the waitstaff comes to you as you sit in your car and asks what you want. A few minutes later, the same person comes back with a box of steaming French fries or a cup of refreshing root beer. Then you sit and eat in your car while admiring lovely Green Mountain views.

Quaint, ain’t it? It’s like “Happy Days” fast-forwarded 70 years and transported from Milwaukee to Middlebury.

While waiting for our food I stepped out of our car to take a photo of the classic ice-cream-stand façade. A young girl in a pretty summer dress bolted out of her family’s car to run barefoot through the patch of grass I was standing on. I know our state is bucolic and all, but geez, that’s pouring the sweetness on a little thick, isn’t it, Vermont?

Drive-in restaurant, cash-only

Famous for its root beer, A&W has more than 900 locations in 42 states and Asia, according to the company’s website. Approximately 300 of those locations are co-branded with other restaurants while nearly 100 are in gas stations/convenience stores, many of which have drive-thru windows.

A company spokesperson didn’t respond to my email asking how many U.S. locations are drive-ins like Middlebury, where servers come to your car. The Middlebury location is the only A&W restaurant in Vermont, according to the website.

My wife and I had only been here once before, so we were due for a return visit. We arrived a little after 6 p.m. on a Monday, joining another dozen or so cars that preceded us. The first thing I noticed as I looked above the takeout window in front was a sign reading “Curb service – we come to you!”

We waited about five minutes before a convivial server arrived, apologizing that the sudden rush of customers delayed her. She brought paper menus and moments later took our orders on one of the few concessions to modernity at the restaurant, an electronic tablet. We paid her in decidedly un-modern fashion, with greenbacks. (The place only accepts cash.)

My wife and I each ordered original bacon cheeseburgers and root-beer floats, plus French fries and onions rings to split. We sat with our windows rolled down as we awaited our food; the cross-ventilated breeze felt lovely. The restaurant’s sound system had Eddie Money and Ronnie Spector singing “Take Me Home Tonight.” We had no need to take our takeout food home tonight. We were happy right here.

A sample of car culture

Yes, the sight of a drive-in restaurant in beautiful Vermont is all sorts of nostalgic. But it feels weirdly lazy, too, to sit inert in a car while people bring food to us. My wife and I are fortunate enough to be able-bodied, but for people with mobility issues or large families for whom getting out of a car is akin to a major military operation, an eatery like this is a godsend.

Our food came in a box, not on a tray that clips to the side of your car that we saw a few other cars getting; maybe you need to ask specifically for that old-school touch. We found it awkward to eat our sloppy burgers, creamy Cole slaw and crispy fried sides from a box and use a straw and spoon for the root-beer floats all from our laps, but our food was tasty and fun. (Our dog rested in the backseat, gladly accepting an occasional French fry.) I’m a root-beer fan, and there’s nothing more satisfying on a warm day than a root-beer float − cold soda chased by chilling vanilla ice cream.

I did find myself wanting to escape the metal box that is the car and eat among other people. (The Middlebury A&W does offer outdoor picnic tables that some diners were using.) I’ve never been a “car culture” guy, and this arrangement echoes the 1950s when autos and the freedom they represented were everything. Cars that encase us isolate us, and fresh off the COVID-19 pandemic that’s not a feeling I’m craving.

As a chronic overthinker, however, I finally thought I should let that feeling go. In the end, my wife and I appreciated the quirky, authentically old-fashioned experience this A&W and so few other places provide these days. Besides, I’d sit in the middle of a weedy median on Interstate 89 if someone walked up and handed me a root-beer float.

Hours and location

A&W drive-in restaurant, 1557 U.S. 7, Middlebury. 11 a.m.-8 p.m. daily. (802) 388-2876, www.awrestaurants.com

Contact Brent Hallenbeck atbhallenbeck@freepressmedia.com.