Thursday, March 26, 2009
Travel Advisory Culinary Dispatch from Asheville: Tupelo Honey Cafe
Posted by Carrington Fox on Thu, Mar 26, 2009 at 5:18 AM
Thanks to everyone who contributed to the Fox family itinerary a couple of weeks ago when I solicited dining recommendations for Asheville, N.C. Here's the first in a series of mini-reviews from the trip.
Tupelo Honey Cafe
The first time I stopped at Tupelo Honey, it was weekend brunch, and the line wrapped around the downtown block. This trip, it was Thursday, and we slipped right into a table in the sunny room, which chirped with late-morning activity. Bathed in amber light and accented with dark woods, colorful oil paintings and tables topped white cloths and paper for crayon drawings, the shotgun room has a well-worn grace, like a large eat-in kitchen that serves a diverse family as it comes and goes in everything from business suits to nose-rings to toddler togs.
Chef Brian Sonoskus mans the open kitchen, where he creates a Southern-infused repertoire of breakfast, lunch and dinner, all of which takes advantage of locally grown produce and meats whenever possible. In Asheville, a city that pulses with an earthy-artsy beat, a restaurant that farms its own produce in nearby fields and serves it on the sidewalks of downtown is about as natural a marriage as pancakes and syrup.
We tucked into bacon, organic eggs, home fries and blueberry-granola pancakes, which arrived with homegrown edible flowers on the plate. Grandma's maple granola was a sweet and crisp medley of almonds, grains and toasted coconut, served with cool vanilla yogurt and fresh fruit. I am still haunted by visions of a candied ginger cornbread with whipped peach butter that I did not see on the menu until we were leaving.
Two adults and three kids ate breakfast for under $50, a price tag that made us consider returning for dinner, when prices top out at $23.95 for shrimp and grits with andouille and a 4-ounce lobster tail. With the bulk of the menu well below $20, including skillet catfish ($12.95), flank steak ($17.95) and baked sea scallops with chorizo ($18.95), Tupelo Honey is just the type of thoughtful, affordable restaurant that Nashvillians persistently cry out for.
Tupelo Honey Cafe is located at 12 College St. in Asheville, N.C.
Comments (11)
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The Fluffernutter family had this same amazing Tupelo Honey experience over spring break 06. An appetizer or two, pork chop, fish, pasta, an extra side dish, two glasses of win -- everything was really good, and the bill was about $75.
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$23.95 for shrimp and grits...affordable
I hope you realize the typical Nashville household has about $400 a month to spend on food. That's $42 per person per week.
gnomey - paleeze... enough already. why don't you share with us what you spend your disposable income on, ok? that way we can remind you what the average person can't afford that to you, matters.
if not restaurants and travel, what is it?
Christmas eve dinner 2008 - Two wonderful vegitarian meals with dirnks and dessert for under $100. Wish we had one here.
