Hotel Leger Takes Dining to a New Level

By Antoinette May Herndon

Dinner in the dungeon. It has a ring to it, don’t you think?

Naturally, I was intrigued when Ron Pitner announced that he and Jane were going to open the Hotel Leger’s fabled cellar for private dinner parties.

The Leger is haunted, remember. People have reported seeing spooks in the bedrooms, the ballroom, the bar and even on the balcony, but the *cellar*. . . it has a cache all its own. After all, it is reputed to have been a dungeon. Don’t forget, Mok Hill was a rootin’ tootin’ place in its heyday. Just to think of all the desperados who must have spent their last nights down there after being tried and convicted in the courthouse above.

Just the mere idea evokes images of gunslingers, claim jumpers and bank robbers. They swagger easily before my mind’s eye. I’d also heard tales of opium dens built to afford Chinese diggers with a taste of home and secret tunnels leading to the basements of houses of ill repute. I love those kind of stories, don’t you? But until now, the Leger’s subterranean chamber has been off limits, its mysteries waiting to be plumbed.

During the eight years that the Pitners have owned the Leger, the basement has functioned as its wine cellar, a logical use for such a space but not a popular destination for Jane and the wait staff. No one really wanted to venture there alone.

Well, except me, that is. I’m a ghost chaser from way back and have longed to explore. So, you can imagine how thrilled I was to hear that the Pitners had decided to expand their dinner capacity to this unique venue.

“We’re about ready to announce it,” Ron told me, adding: “Would you and Charles like to be our guinea couple?”

Would we! Wow! I even had an occasion to commemorate: Charles’s birthday. Ginger and Barry Griffin had planned to celebrate with us. Were they too willing to brave the basement? Of course.

What an evening! First off, let me remind you that the Leger Hotel is built on a hill. There really aren’t that many stairs to descend when entering

the basement from the back entrance. Though possibly not wheelchair accessible, the approach is easy to navigate.

Once inside, the dungeon is a time trip. Think: original 1854 floor, stone walls and ceiling. This part of the hotel was impervious to the series of fires that ravaged early Mok Hill. It’s the real thing, a piece of Gold Rush history that remains unchanged.

I found the vibes warm and inviting. It’s clean and dry down there. Not too hot, not too cold. Perfect. No damp, musty smell either. Though we dined by candlelight, electricity is available. Whatever might have scared people in the past must have been exorcized. Spirits ran high that night but they were definitely of this world.

Ron and Jane Pitman prepared a dinner that can only be described as fabulous. It was served by two of the prettiest servers anywhere around, BJ Williams and her daughter, Rayna. This may well be Charles’s all time favourite birthday celebration.

The four, treated like kings and queens of the manor, dined in solitary splendour at an antique table on elegant overstuffed chairs.

Our feast began with seafood stuffed mushrooms—delicious— followed by a crisp spring mix salad with raspberry vinaigrette dressing. Next came the gazpacho soup, well chilled, spicy and packed with goodies. I ‘m hard to please. I do a mean gazpacho myself, but dad to rate the Leger’s as a perfect ten.

Our entrée was rib-eyed steak in a shallot mushroom sauce. Four steaks for four fussy people. We each got exactly what we wanted. Our portions were perfect. With them came a steamed potato medley and asparagus with hollandaise sauce.

What to do for an encore? We waited in suspenseful anticipation and were rewarded by crème brulee with raspberries and blueberries. Does that sound great? It was.

In case you’re wondering, our five course dinner was $30 a piece.

It was a delightful evening sparked by speculation regarding the basement’s history. Were there adjacent tunnels and where might they lead?

Hoping for answers, I called Julia Costello the following morning.

As many of you know, Julia is Mokelumne Hill’s resident historian and archaeologist. In the latter capacity, she oversaw the undergrounding of the town’s electric power lines in the 1980’s. “We excavated Main Street right in front of the hotel,” Julia recalls. “Most of the town was out in force. People lined the streets, eager to see those old whorehouse tunnels and opium dens we’d heard so much about. I wanted to see them too. The problem was, there weren’t any.”

Those historians, they’re such spoil sports!

Nevertheless, legends die hard. The dungeon remains a haunted place. Those old stones—what stories they could tell.

VITALS: The Hotel Leger is located at 8304 Main St., Mokelumne Hill. Phone: 286-1320. Open for dinner Thursday through Monday from 5 to 9. Reservations required for dungeon dining. Jane and Ron will also offer three alternative dungeon menus. For $21 per person, guests may enjoy shrimp cocktail, garden salad, roasted vegetable soup, calamari steak with creamy caper sauce, potato and veggies, with sherbet for dessert. The $25 offering is artichoke brochetta, Caesar salad, French onion soup, Cornish game hen roasted with mushroom sherry sauce and rice pilaf in a vegetable medley with a fresh berry tart for dessert. The Leger’s $28 dungeon dinner features stuffed portabella mushrooms, spinach salad with bacon vinaigrette dressing, tomato basil soup, roasted duck breast with Yukon gold potatoes and veggies. The dessert is crème brulee with berries.

Pictures: Ed Cline took the three pictures of Ron and Jane. Charles took the others.

The historic Hotel Leger at Lafayette and Main streets.

The Hotel Leger’s bar has seen lots of action.

Dinner in the dungeon was an evening to remember for Ginger and Barry Griffin and Charles and Antoinette Herndon.

(I don’t know which if any of us you’ll choose so can’t give you a left to right. Barry is wearing a white shirt, Charles’s is blue. Ginger has blond hair. Mine’s red.)