Sunday, March 7th, 2010
In 2009, Asheville was barely edged out by Portland, OR as Beer City USA’s favorite place for beer. Didn’t know Asheville was even in the running? Well, Asheville has nine local breweries and brewpubs, and is adding more each year! The city even offers a Brews Cruise that takes guests around to a few of the breweries to learn about each location’s special brews and allows guests to taste test their most popular brands. In addition, I just learned that downtown Asheville offers a beer-only shop! It’s called Bruisin’ Ales and a trip is definitely in order. This store boasts over 800 brews from around the world (and around the corner). You’ll find rare brews, exceptional seasonals, and other hard-to-find limited releases. The unique bottle shop set-up allows customers to “Mix-a-Six.”
The names of Asheville’s breweries are as creative as their beer. With names like Highland Brewing Company, French Broad Brewing Company, Asheville Pizza & Brewing Company, Pisgah Brewing Company, Wedge Brewing, OysterHouse Brewing, Craggie Brewing Company, Lexington Avenue Brewery and Green Man Ale & Brewing Company, you know you’re in for a real treat. In March 2010, a new brewery will be introduced to Asheville. Mother Earth Brewery will be adding to the increasing list of craft beers.
As some of my readers may know, I have teamed up with a Kook (cook), a charity, a band and a couple of Asheville’s local breweries for a one-of-a-kind weekend Culinary Event: Feasting With Brew to raise money for The Hope & Light Foundation. I have donated the Inn for the weekend to Angela McKeller from Kick Back & Kook who will be offering beer and dessert tastings as well as cooking classes the weekend of June 4-5, 2010. Davin McCoy & The Coming Attractions from Atlanta have donated their time and musical talents to come up to Asheville to play their brand of music (likened to Cat Stevens, Dave Matthews & Shawn Mullins). The schedule for the weekend consists of:
- Friday, June 4: 2:30 – 4:30 pm – Beer & Truffles ($29) – Think beer and chocolate don’t go together? Pisgah Brewing will come by and explain the ins and outs of brewing, the difference between one brew and another and give a presentation on how to pair beer with chocolate!
- Friday, June 4: 6-9 pm – Souffles Made Simple ($45) – French for “puff up”, Angela will demonstrate just how easy these seemingly difficult, but impressive dishes are for dinner and dessert! On the menu: Shrimp Soufflé with Creamy Dill Sauce; Spinach and Ricotta Soufflé and Dark Chocolate Soufflé.
- Saturday, June 5: 1-3 pm – Simple Summer Desserts Sampling and Brew Tasting ($29) – On the menu: Chef Mike Carrino’s Cherry and Apple Tart to Angela’s own Flambéd Brandied Peaches to Chef Jerry Solomon’s Zabayon, a simple but delicious Italian custard served with mixed berries, you’ll experience it all!
- Saturday, June 5: 6:30-9:30 pm – Iron Chef Competition ($65) – Paired off into two groups, munching on some of Angela’s most popular dips while you “kook”, two teams will go head to head, competing to see who can create the best meal of the evening! Who judges? You do! Everyone is given a score card to fill out without anyone else seeing. On a scale of 1-5, you try each others dishes and rate them, putting the score cards in a bowl for Angela to tally the scores while you finish dessert. The winning team gets a prize as “kooky” as Angela is!
This culinary fundraiser promises to be a real treat for everyone who attends. The beer/dessert pairings are open to 200 people each while the cooking classes are limited to 25 participants each. In addition to Pisgah Brewing, we are working with another local brewery for Saturday’s tasting and will announce who that will be once the details have been worked out.
Asheville already has five beer festivals throughout the year, including Winter Warmer, Oktoberfest, Baseball & Beers at McCormick Field, Beer City Brewfest and Brewgrass. Maybe the Feasting With Beer event will become the next annual festival.
Saturday, February 6th, 2010
Asheville is slowly becoming a foodie’s paradise. From restaurants that embrace the Farm to Table concept, to vegetarian restaurants, to eco-conscious cafes, this city is on the verge of something great. Already known as an artist’s city and home to the grand Biltmore Estate and Grove Park Inn Resort & Spa, Asheville can now add food city to its resume.
Within the past several months, one of my innkeeping comrades, Chris Ortwein, has started offering food tours in downtown Asheville & Biltmore Village. There are three different tours, each with between six – nine restaurants or shops where tour goers get to taste test foods, wine, local beer, spices, chocolate, and just about anything food-related. In December, my mother and I went on the Biltmore Village Tour and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, as well as stuffed ourselves with everything from calamari to beet soup to chicken skewers.
Today, we braved the chilly and sometimes rainy weather, to go on one of the two downtown tours. I enjoyed myself even more, if you can believe it. Everyone met at the Grove Arcade at 1:45 and off we went at 2:00. Our first stop was the Flying Frog. I had eaten lunch there several times, but had never been downstairs where they serve dinner. The Chef at the Flying Frog, I learned, is German and Indian, so his menu combines dishes from both cultures. We sampled some duck breast over sweet potatoes and arugula with an apple butter sauce. I had never tried duck before and was pleasantly surprised.
Next, it was on to The Chocolate Fetish, my favorite place. I already buy chocolate truffles from there for our Romance Packages, but I got to try something new today. They were serving dark and milk chocolate truffles topped with two different types of sea salt. Salt, you ask? Yes, a very fine and expensive type of sea salt. The combination of chocolate and salt was surprisingly delicious. I will definitely try those again.
Stop 3 was the Spice & Tea Exchange where we got to sample some run-of-the-mill pork rinds sprinkled with a spicy salt mix. Again, surprisingly good. Mom vowed to come back after the tour to pick up a pitcher they had that had a small canister-type thing inside where you can put lemon, lime, orange slices, or whatever you want. Fill the pitcher with water and the juice from the fruits will seep into the water to taste it without the seeds getting into the water. There was also a spice she wanted to get. But since we had to keep moving with the tour, we had to come back afterwards.
Stop 4 was the Green Sage Coffeehouse and Cafe. The owners of the Green Sage are the same people who started Earthfare. After it became successful, they sold them and started the Green Sage. It calls itself the greenest restaurant in Asheville, and for good reason. Just about everything they use, buy, sell, whatever, is produced locally, recycled, or composted. The restaurant produces so little trash that it only needs one small trash bin. There was a line to the door of customers waiting for coffee, tea, smoothies, or other quick-make foods. Our group got to taste some delicious tomato soup, a quiche, turkey sandwich, and a veggie burger of some sort. The drink was a red berry sparkling cider that I had never seen before. Everything was delicious!
Next, we were off to Fiore’s, an Italian restaurant with a Tuscan flare. Here we got to sample some beer from local brewery, Asheville Brewery, called Old School Pale Ale. Delish! Along with that was a small caesar salad and a New York-style pizza with tomatoes, garlic, and spinach. i don’t typically like thin-crust pizza, but there was something about the crust. While it was thin, it tasted fluffy. Very good pizza.
Then, we walked several blocks to the Soda Fountain inside the Woolworth Walk. The Woolworth Walk is “store” with artist booths throughout and a small soda fountain off to the side. Here we had a root beer float which really hit the spot. Afterwards, we crossed the street to Mayfels and got to sample a binette (sp?). It was a puffed, warm, doughy pastry shaped like a small square and sprinkled with powdered sugar. Served fresh out of the oven, they were wonderful after being out in the cold.
I had always heard good things about Cucina 24, but had never been until today. Located on Wall Street, the backside overlooks the intersection of College Street and Patton Avenue. It’s owned by two brother chefs and they serve upscale Italian food. Chef Brian demonstrated for us a crepe filled with a cheese mixture (with a bunch of other savory seasonings which I can’t remember). Rather than roll it up like a traditional crepe, he rolled it into a ball, then baked it in the oven for about 5 minutes. It came served with a slightly spicy chunky tomato sauce, just the way I like it. I definitely will be going back there!
Our last stop on the tour was Carmel’s, a restaurant I have been to many times. It’s located omn one of the corners of the Grove Arcade, where we first met for the tour. This place is great, especially during the summer when you can sit outside and people watch to your heart’s content. Today, Chef Sugar (as she’s called) demonstrated a tuna, avocado, cucumber dish that was topped with a sauce mixture that I can’t remember. I am not a fan of raw tuna, but was pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed it when it was paired with all the other items.
I had not been to most of the places on the tour so I am extra glad to have been able to go today. Thanks again to Chris for opening the tours up to innkeepers (at no charge) as he gets them going. I was able to pick up menus from most places for the menu binder I keep at the Inn for guests and now I can recommend some of these places. Plus, there are a couple I definitely want to return to. One of the benefits of attending the tours is that you receive a passport afterwards that can be used for up to 5 days after the tour at all of the places on the tour. And you receive a discount, typically 10%, when you present the passport for a future meal.
I hope to be able to go on the other Downtown Tour before the end of February since it also has several restaurants I haven’t been to. Right now, I am offering 2 FREE tour tickets to guests when they stay 2 or more mid-week nights (Mondays – Thursdays) in February. This is a $50 value and well worth the ticket price. Biltmore Village tours are on Tuesdays, Downtown Tour 1 is on Wednesdays & Fridays, and Downtown Tour 2 (the one we went on today) runs on Thursdays and Saturdays. All tours start at 2:00 and last about 2 1/2 hours. Walking and eating, a great combination!
Sunday, January 31st, 2010
Apple-Walnut Crisp (Serves 4)
Ingredients:
- 2 medium apples, cored & chopped into bite size pieces
- 1 cup Raisin Bran (or any bran flake cereal) – I use Raisin Bran because it has raisins in it.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Instructions:
- Spray ramekins (4, 6, or 8 oz.) with cooking spray.
- Core apples and chop into bite size pieces. Put apples in a medium bowl. Sprinkle 1/2 tbsp. of cinnamon over apples and mix.
- Put apple/cinnamon mixture into 4 ramekins.
- In a bowl, mix remaining 1/2 tbsp. of cinnamon, 2 tbsp. of brown sugar, and 1 tbsp. of flour. Mix well.
- Add 2 tbsp. of butter to mixture and mash butter into mixture until it becomes crumbles.
- Add Raisin Bran and walnuts to mixture and mix well.
- Spoon mixture over the tops of the apples.
- Put ramekins on a baking sheet and bake in the oven at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.
- Let cool for 5 minutes and serve.
Variations: In the fall and winter, I like to add fresh cranberries to the recipe for a little added tartness. You can also add pears, nectarines, or pineapple to the recipe.
