John Gottberg Anderson / For The BulletinA whole chicken at the Cowboy Dinner Tree.

SILVER LAKE —

There is nowhere else in Oregon like the Cowboy Dinner Tree.

A 90-minute drive southeast of Bend outside of the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it outback community of Silver Lake, this remote restaurant, ramshackle but revered, has been a fixture in the rural Oregon dining scene for well over two decades.

The word “rustic” doesn’t begin to describe the place. It might easily have collapsed a century ago, when already it was not a new structure. But still it perseveres, its rough-hewn walls and uneven floors harboring stories that the great-grandparents of modern-day diners might be happy to leave as secrets.

Built as a homestead sometime in the late 1800s, later used for storage, it was converted to a restaurant in 1992. Current owners Jamie and Angel Roscoe took over from Angel’s mother two years ago; now the mother of three, Angel began working in the establishment at age 14.

But the saga of this High Desert icon began long before that. Its owners say that ranchers driving their cattle from grassy Silver Lake to the lush Sycan Marsh in the late 19th century found a large juniper tree near the halfway point of the trail. Here, a chuckwagon waited to serve them heaping helpings of beans and biscuits before they continued.

The ancient tree remains, but the chuckwagon has been replaced by a restaurant that serves the largest meals this side of — well, perhaps anywhere.

Come hungry

There’s no booze here, and the only unit of exchange accepted is U.S. dollars. Leave the credit cards home: You won’t need them.

But you’d better come hungry. And it would be wise to bring an empty cooler in which to put your leftovers for the drive home.

It’s essential that you call for a reservation, preferably a couple of weeks ahead. When you do, you’ll be asked a simple question: “Steak or chicken?” Those are the only two menu choices. The poultry is rotisserie-grilled, and you get the whole bird. The steak is top sirloin, and each charbroiled cut is the size of a roast, 26 to 30 ounces.

That’s just the main course. Meals start with family-style servings of soup, salad and dinner rolls, and include baked potatoes and homemade berry shortcake.

And in this era of rising food costs, the price of a meal, and probably your next two as well, is a whopping $28 per person, or about that of three burgers at a Bend restaurant.

It’s a bargain best enjoyed with a group of friends.

Western charm

My companion and I were able to convince one other person to join us for the 83-mile drive south down U.S. Highway 97 through La Pine, then southeast on state Highway 31. As we approached the hamlet of Silver Lake, a small sign pointed us in the direction of the Dinner Tree. Before we had reached the foot of Hager Mountain — at 7,185 feet the highest peak for miles around — we found the sagebrush-enshrouded restaurant on our right.

Expect to kick up some dust in the parking area before moseying down a sawdust path toward the restaurant. The owners’ young children may be manning a lemonade stand (50 cents a glass, please) or teaching city slickers how to drop a rope upon the neck of a sawhorse calf. A gallery promotes the Fort Rock-to-Paisley economy by selling locally crafted Western memorabilia, artwork and other gift items.

Classic country and rock music resounds within the reconstructed walls of the old restaurant as you walk through the creaky door. Décor worthy of an antique shop — old bridles, stirrups, horse collars, even cowboy hats and Clint Eastwood-style serapes — adorn the walls. Dollar bills, enough to paper a modest-sized room, peek through cracks in the ceiling. On one wall are coat hangers created from old horseshoes.

The restaurant seats about 60 at an eclectic variety of varnished tables (no splinters here) and chairs. The seats were so eclectic, in fact, that one of them disintegrated before our very eyes. Okay, not our eyes. Our rumps.

But that was somehow part of the charm, as was the homespun service. The entire staff of waiters and cooks, Jamie Roscoe told me, are all residents of Silver Lake or the relatively nearby village of Christmas Valley. Every one of them wore a smile on their faces as they delivered our orders with remarkable good humor. Life in the outback is good.

Focus on food

We began our meal with a salad of fresh, finely chopped greens served in a single large bowl. Two or three lettuces were tossed with Chinese parsley (cilantro), red cabbage and carrots, and served with a pair of house-made dressings on the side. One of them, a tangy honey-mustard, was boldly sweet and unabashedly spicy. The other, a ranch dressing, was perhaps a bit too salty.

We were offered not one soup, but two. The clear favorite at our table was creamy and delicious corn chowder, with potatoes, celery, red onions and carrots. It was even better with pepper added. The other potage, recalling the cowboys’ buckaroo beans of yesteryear, was a chili-style kidney-bean soup with added celery, onion and kielbasa sausage.

Accompanying the soups was a plate of dinner rolls, light and fluffy, sweet and yeasty. I wish I knew the secret.

Both entrées came with medium-sized baked potatoes and a cup of sour cream. But they paled compared to the main attractions.

My rotisserie chicken locked in more moisture than a rainy day on the Oregon coast. Angel Roscoe said no tenderizer is injected into the Texas-bred birds; I watched my meal spin on the spit in the Dinner Tree’s outdoor barbecue area, which only piqued my appetite.

The top sirloin, hand-trimmed and shipped from the Childers Meat Co. in Eugene, could easily feed two if split dinners were permitted. (They’re not.) Nearly two full pounds in size, uniformly cooked medium rare, they assure ample leftovers.

And yes, plastic bags are provided. Both of my dining companions left with plenty of meat for the next day.

Pink lemonade

Dessert was strawberry-marionberry shortcake — a very modest square, compared to the rest of the meal. “Most people don’t get that far,” a server said. I had enough of a bite to know that I could have saved room for more.

It’s a wise thing that the Cowboy Dinner Tree doesn’t serve alcohol. A choice of coffee, iced tea and pink lemonade are sufficient. The restaurant is so far removed from mainstream communities that beer and wine could lead to major havoc on highways.

But those who insist upon indulging can make arrangements to stay at one of the two cabins that the Roscoe family has made available for guests. They are described as “cozy,” sleeping “two comfortably or four very close friends,” but the price is right: $126 per night for two, and that includes $56 for dinner.

Alcohol isn’t permitted in the restaurant, but nightcaps are allowed within private quarters. There’s also RV parking available, and well-behaved pets may stay with their people in the cabins.

— Reporter: janderson@bendbulletin.com