Daniel and I took a quick weekend trip to Asheville, NC to celebrate his recent birthday. I love planning trips, we both actually enjoy road trips, we both love good food, music and beautiful views, so Asheville seemed like a perfect, not too far away place for a quick weekend trip. What a great decision! Asheville is the most charming town! There’s incredible food everywhere, live music on nearly every corner, beautiful mountains only a few minutes drive away, and super friendly people. We only had a little over twenty four hours to enjoy this lovely city, so we did some pretty careful planning. I wanted to share our eating experiences with you because everywhere we ate was fantastic. We had lots of recommendations and were not disappointed in a single one!
We pulled into town and headed straight for a restaurant that a friend told us about called Buxton Hall Barbecue. Bon Apetit magazine recently did a feature on this place declaring it the number 9 new restaurant in America, so how could we not give it a try? Buxton Hall did not disappoint! The atmosphere is great! The building has been used as a roller rink and a boat show room in the past. We asked our server (shout out to Mario, who was great!) what we should try and he suggested that we go with the pulled pork sandwich and the fried chicken sandwich. Buxton Hall is known for “All Wood, Whole Hog Barbecue”. Whatever it is they do, they do it right. The pork was tender and flavorful and all that you would hope for pulled pork to be. We put Carolina sauce on it – we were in Carolina – what else would we do? The fried chicken sandwich was also amazing. It was perfectly cooked and topped with homemade pimento cheese! The sides we had were turnip greens and a mix of lima/butter beans. They were both very tasty too! I am SO glad we saved room for dessert. All their desserts are homemade and I will definitely be trying to recreate the one we had. It was called “Cocoa-Nut Chess Pie”. It was a coconut custard in a flaky cocoa crust with chocolate coconut cream and chocolate rum sauce on top. If you like barbecue and you visit Asheville, I highly recommend Buxton Hall. You won’t be sorry!
Pretty much everybody we asked said “If you’re going to Asheville, you have to go to the Grove Park Inn.” They were correct. This place was absolutely stunning. Built in 1913, it has housed many famous guests. It was so cool to walk around and look at all the pictures of United States Presidents, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, F. Scott Fitzgerald and so many more who have stayed there. There are multiple restaurants at the Inn, but we chose the Sunset Terrace. Here’s our view for dinner!
This place truly was stunning. On to the food – we started with a Caesar salad that we shared because it was HUGE. We both got steaks – a NY strip and a center cut. The steaks were tender and cooked to perfection. I got a chili lime ginger sauce for dipping that was truly incredible. I’m trying to figure out how to recreate that sauce. We had sauteed mushrooms and broccolini as our sides. Both were delicious. The food, the view, and the service were all impeccable. They even brought Daniel a complimentary birthday dessert! You simply HAVE to experience the Grove Park Inn if you are visiting Asheville.
On day 2, we had breakfast at a charming little place that lots of locals recommended called the Early Girl Eatery. If you go here, you will probably have a bit of a wait. However, I love that they put you on the waiting list and then say “Help yourself to fresh coffee while you wait.” They had a little coffee bar set up just for the people who were waiting to be seated. Score. Early Girl Eatery is a farm to table southern food restaurant. I had a sausage, egg and cheese biscuit with home fries. It was delicious and clearly all fresh. Daniel had a “scramble” made with local eggs, sausage, sweet potatoes, green onions, and shitake mushrooms. This dish was so flavorful! We had a great experience at Early Girl and would definitely go back!
After filling up on that amazing breakfast, we drove up the Blue Ridge Parkway and hiked up to Mt. Mitchell – the highest point east of the Mississippi! The drive was beautiful, the views from the top were breathtaking, and we loved reading about some of the history of the parkway and the state parks. If you enjoy the outdoors, you should definitely do this! There are lots of different levels of hiking trails and beautiful picnic spots all along the parkway.
After a lovely morning of driving and hiking, we went to another highly recommended place called Curaté for tapas. Oh my goodness. First of all, our amazing server Nico was so incredibly helpful and knowledgable. He expertly guided us through the menu and explained our options. We ordered a sample type plate of different cuts of cured Spanish hams, which was perfect. Next we ordered Spanish bread with olive oil and grated tomatoes and paired it with Manchego cheese. So simple and so incredibly wonderful. We didn’t stop there. We ordered two more dishes – a fried potato dish that had a spicy tomato sauce and a creamy garlic sauce drizzled on top. The potatoes were so perfectly cooked. They had the crispiness of fried on the outside, but then tasted like mashed potatoes on the inside. I don’t know how they did it, but I’m going to figure it out. Lastly, we had a sausage and bean dish. The beans (white) were sauteed in garlic and olive oil. I know that sounds so simple (and I guess it is), but I’m telling you, the flavor that this dish had was ridiculous. In a good way, of course. So, if you are in Asheville, you have to visit Curaté for lunch, dinner, or just tapas. You will not be disappointed.
Last but not least, if you are a chocolate lover, do not leave Asheville without visiting the French Broad Chocolate Lounge, aka Heaven. This place directly imports cacao from small farmers. The owners left graduate school and bought an abandoned cacao farm in Costa Rica and are getting it slowly back to productivity. In Asheville, they began making chocolates in their kitchen. All that to say, this is the real deal. I had a liquid truffle. Yes, a liquid truffle. It was quite possibly the most decadent thing I’ve ever had in my life. We bought some truffles there that we haven’t tried yet because we plan to ration them. I will let you know about those when we try them. You just have to check them out!
If you go to Asheville and try places that I haven’t mentioned, please let me know! We are always on the lookout for new places to try.
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