Riverbend Inn & Vineyard

At Oaklands, the Niagara wine country that surrounds the inn arrives on the plate before the wine list does. Red pepper icewine jelly sets off the charcuterie, icewine hollandaise runs over the eggs Benedict, and a Riesling anglaise pools beneath the sour cherry tart. Oaklands is the dining room of the Riverbend Inn & Vineyard, a French bistro set inside a historic mansion on the Niagara River Parkway, its own vines and gardens running up to the windows. The billing is Niagara French Bistro, and that reads as the honest description: classical French method, built on what Niagara grows, presses, and bottles.

Dinner reads like a bistro that respects the canon and brings it forward. Steak au poivre is the clearest anchor — boneless beef short rib under a peppercorn sauce, with smoked tomato chutney, rapini, and black truffle fries, and a tenderloin substitution for the table that wants it. Coq au vin comes with bacon lardons, pearl onions, Parisian mushrooms, and a Dijon pomme purée; moules frites arrive as sparkling PEI mussels in a black garlic fennel crème. Diver scallops sit on a cauliflower purée with shaved pecorino and a strawberry vierge, and the rainbow trout is finished with a yellow tomato beurre blanc. To start, there is steak tartare with a quail egg and black truffle chips, a foie gras parfait against strawberry and icewine jelly, and an onion soup under Gruyère and a garlic croustade.