White Castle Valentine's Day experience books up on Long Island
White Castle’s reservations-only table service for lovers on Valentine’s Day has returned. Credit: White Castle
There’s no other way to say it: We screwed up. As Long Island’s number one source for all things food, we failed to alert you to the romantic sit-down dinners-for-two that White Castle is offering at Long Island restaurants on Valentine’s Day; dinners in which a host escorts you through a dining room decorated with hearts to a red-tableclothed booth or table, and servers take orders from actual menus in preparation for you and your beloved enjoying sliders and custom Coca-Cola Freestyle beverages (Sprite Love Castle Potion) by flickering, battery-operated candlelight, and later a nightcap of strawberry cheesecake on a stick. Such an enchanted evening could have been yours if only you’d known to head to OpenTable before all the reservations were gone.
Not everyone will suffer, of course. In Commack, Centereach, Lynbrook, Deer Park, Massapequa and West Hempstead, quick-on-the-trigger Cupids will indeed be delighting in this “opportunity to gather with those we love and savor the flavor of all the Castle has to offer,” as the company said in a release announcing the return of the decadeslong annual promotion, which the pandemic deprived us of.
Meanwhile, White Castle’s main Valentine’s deal, the Love Cube meal-for-two, will also be available to-go at area locations . No box of eight sliders, drinks and pair of shareable sides could never capture the festivity and fireworks that is dining chez Love Castle. But at least it’s something, right? There might even be upsides to making your home a Castle. Just imagine: You send your lover one of the company’s “Can I Slider Into Your DMs?” valentines, inviting them to an evening of fun which, unbeknownst to them, will involve matching magenta silk-style robes with slider prints ($60 each on White Castle's website), accessorized with candy apple red, heart-shaped sunglasses ($9.99).
Not the same, we know.
Love Cube meals to-go are available at Long Island White Castle locations on Feb. 14, whitecastle.com.
Newsday writer and restaurant critic Scott Vogel aims for a refreshing, gimlet-eyed take on the Long Island food scene, often while drinking a refreshing gimlet.
