It's 6 a.m. on a February morning in the flyspeck town of Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, and the wind swoops down State Street like a bird of prey, carrying the snow along with it. Outside Talula's Table, Daniel Kirkpatrick waits, hoping to beat the 7 a.m. opening of the restaurant's phone reservation line.

"My parents paid me $30 to stand out here and reserve a table," says Kirkpatrick, a Colorado teenager on vacation with his family. "Sounds crazy, but they told me to come back every morning until there was an opening."

By day, Talula's, 35 miles from Philadelphia, is a prepared-food shop that sells everything from artisan cheeses and duck rillettes to grilled quail and lobster pot pies. At night, it turns into a B.Y.O.B. restaurant serving eight-course feasts assembled as meticulously as a cabinetmaker constructs a fine piece of furniture.

Regulars joke that it's easier to score dinner at Per Se in Manhattan or the French Laundry in Napa Valley than it is to snag "the table"—Talula's seats eight to 12 people at its longleaf pine table each night. And they're right: Per Se and the French Laundry accept reservations two months out. As of September 1, 2007, Talula's was booked through July 31, 2008, and had stopped taking inquiries. At 7 a.m. on January 2, the restaurant began accepting reservations for the rest of the year. By 9 a.m., every night was full. Talula's now has a rolling system, taking reservations a year ahead to the numerical date. Which is why hopefuls from as far off as the Rockies stand vigil at dawn.

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Talula's is an unpretentious storefront in the rolling hills of Pennsylvania's horse country, sausaged between Picone Beauty & Wellness and the Half-Moon Saloon, where a Yuengling draught is $3.25 during happy hour.

Yet diners have included chefs, writers, tycoons, musicians, mushroom farmers, plastic surgeons, and actors. John Turturro traveled down from Brooklyn with his wife, Kathie Borowitz, on Valentine's Day; a friend had praised Talula's food so lavishly that Turturro had to see for himself.

"I was a little dubious at first, but the dinner surpassed my highest expectations," Turturro said after a banquet of egg custard with Jonah crab, exotic mushroom risotto, snails in rigatoni farci, roast pompano, osso buco and house-smoked bacon, lamb and wildflower honey, and an array of winter blue cheeses.

"Each dish was a separate love affair," Turturro said. "It was the kind of a meal you'd request before your execution."