LANCASTER COUNTY, Pa. — It's been a year and a half since a fire destroyed a popular restaurant in Lancaster County.
With a lot of work and support from the community, the restaurant has a fresh start and a new name.
The Hershey Farm Resort has officially reopened its doors to the public on Friday.
"This is what we’ve waited for...just to see the smiling faces, them enjoying the food, it’s what we wanted,” said Deryl Stoltzfus, owner and partner of Hershey Farm Resort, formerly known as Hershey Farm Restaurant & Inn.
Longtime customers were lined up at the door before the restaurant even opened.
“We were waiting for it to come back…we saw it when it was burning, I came down and watched. I had a broken heart because where else was I going to get such good meals,” said Scott Bleecher, a regular customer of the restaurant.
When Mary Zarra and her family drove by, they said, "we're like ‘wow’ when we pulled into the parking lot."
The new Hershey Farm Resort is also bringing back some staples - like a lot of the food-favorites from their smorgasbord buffet.
“I really like the buffet…it’s like better than your average hotel food,” said Arthur Zarra, a customer of the restaurant.
They're introducing some new things too, including a large streetscape lobby now connects the restaurant with the rest of the hotel.
“We know often times there’s a lot of people coming in [to the lobby] at one time and we wanted to disperse that so it didn’t feel like everyone was on top of each other," Stoltzfus explained.
The other side is where the hotel rooms are, along with a new banquet room and a new café.
“If you look at our logo, it has the phoenix on top," said Stoltzfus, explaining the name of the café. "That came from the fire being in 2023, and from that fire, out of the ashes, came Café 23 because we didn't have a café before."
The restaurant and café are both open to the public.
The buffet restaurant will be open 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, and on Sundays for brunch. The café will be open seven days a week.
Operating hours can be found on the Hershey Farm Resort website.