gistfile1.txt

In my Chef cookbook:
  ["/home/vagrant/test", "/home/vagrant/test/subtest"].each do |dir|
    Chef::Log.info(dir)
    directory dir do
      owner "vagrant"
      group "vagrant"
      mode 0644
      recursive true
      action :create
    end
  end

In my log I see the following (running `rvmsudo vagrant up`, after destroying the previous VM):
  ...
  [2013-01-03T17:49:25+00:00] INFO: /home/vagrant/test
  [2013-01-03T17:49:25+00:00] INFO: /home/vagrant/test/subtest
  ...
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: Processing directory[/home/vagrant/test] action create (vine_shared::default line 22)
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: directory[/home/vagrant/test] created directory /home/vagrant/test
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: directory[/home/vagrant/test] owner changed to 900
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: directory[/home/vagrant/test] group changed to 900
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: directory[/home/vagrant/test] mode changed to 644
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: Processing directory[/home/vagrant/test/subtest] action create (vine_shared::default line   22)
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: directory[/home/vagrant/test/subtest] created directory /home/vagrant/test/subtest
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: directory[/home/vagrant/test/subtest] owner changed to 900
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: directory[/home/vagrant/test/subtest] group changed to 900
  [2013-01-03T17:49:42+00:00] INFO: directory[/home/vagrant/test/subtest] mode changed to 644
  ...

When SSH'd into the Vagrant VM and run ls, I see question marks for the directory:
  vagrant@vagrant:~$ ls -la test/
  ls: cannot access test/.: Permission denied
  ls: cannot access test/..: Permission denied
  ls: cannot access test/subtest: Permission denied
  total 0
  d????????? ? ? ? ?            ? .
  d????????? ? ? ? ?            ? ..
  d????????? ? ? ? ?            ? subtest
  vagrant@vagrant:~$ sudo ls -la test/
  total 12
  drw-r--r-- 3 vagrant vagrant 4096 Jan  3 17:49 .
  drwxr-xr-x 5 vagrant vagrant 4096 Jan  3 17:49 ..
  drw-r--r-- 2 vagrant vagrant 4096 Jan  3 17:49 subtest

For future Googlers (including myself), I needed to be using 00755 instead of 0644 for the directory permissions. See http://tickets.opscode.com/browse/CHEF-174 for more info about the extra 0, and http://content.hccfl.edu/pollock/aunix1/filepermissions.htm for more info about file permissions.