Spring 2024 Issue

Member of Edible Communities

Irecently went to a cocktail tasting at Claywood, a new wine and whiskey bar in Hendersonville that has become a mecca for sophisticated sips and artisan charcuterie boards. The bar manager, Bret, had developed a handful of new drinks and had invited Claywood’s team of servers (and me) to sample them before formally rolling things out to customers.

Moving swiftly behind the bar, Bret plucked bottles from the wall behind him, displaying the elegance of the free pour and, with a ick of the wrist, swept up small bottles of bitters for a dash of depth. Finished with a peel of citrus, the drinks were poured into coupe glasses and passed down the bar, where the servers and I would straw-taste each new creation, tuning in to the delicate balances between sweet, bitter and dry in uences.

Between jolts of the shaker tin, Bret, a seasoned bartender with years of experience, told us about the whiskeys, the distilleries from which they came and the drinks they made famous. Did you know that the recipe ratio for a Manhattan is 2-1-2 (whiskey, vermouth and bitters), the same numbers as the Big Apple’s area code? Or that water from a drained can of chickpeas (known as aquafaba) is used as a vegan substitute for egg whites in popular drinks like whiskey sours? I marveled at the knowledge he held about bourbons, ryes and scotches, and left feeling smarter about these spirits.

In this issue, we celebrate knowledge—the beautiful compendium of facts, gures and know-how that form the foundation of just about anything that’s made or produced with quality. It takes a lot of time and dedication to become an expert at something—whether that’s mixing drinks, growing vegetables, roasting chickens, creating sauces or baking pies—and I’d argue that you have to understand the depth of that dedication to be able to truly appreciate its yields.

This issue includes a fascinating Q&A with acclaimed local author David Joy—who won recognition in 2015 with his rst novel Where All Light Tends to Go, the inspiration behind the 2023 movie Devil’s Peak starring Billy Bob ornton and Robin Wright—and he beautifully and rightly laments the loss of knowledge about regional food traditions. Meanwhile, recipe editors Terri Terrell and Michele Gentille present a trio of dishes using crops cultivated by the local Utopian Seed Project, a nonpro t dedicated to learning more about agricultural diversity.

As the weather warms and we devote ourselves to new tasks and projects, I hope you get the chance to appreciate the knowledge you’ve gained over the years—in whatever area of expertise you have—and similarly embrace the knowledge shared by others.

Tennille Tracy Legler Publisher

A yacon berry cobbler (above); novelist David Joy at his home in Jackson County (right); a burger and beer at Wicked Weed Brewing (bottom right); chef Ashleigh Shanti at her newly opened Good Hot Fish eatery (below).

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Contributors

Erin Adams - Photographer

Erin Adams is an Asheville-based food and lifestyle photographer. In addition to Edible Asheville, her work appears in a variety of publications, including Our State, WNC Magazine, Southern Living, and Garden & Gun She shoots commercially for Biltmore Wines, e Biltmore Estate restaurants and many small businesses in the area.

Brook Bolen - Features Editor

Born and bred in WNC, Brook Bolen is a writer, editor, home cook and ravenous eater. Her work has appeared in Salon, VICE, WNC magazine, and more.

Michele Gentille - Recipe Editor

Michele Gentille grew up in food-diverse Toronto, received a culinary degree from La Varenne in France and moved to the WNC countryside in 2012. She works as a food stylist and private chef, has written about food for publications including e Wall Street Journal and T Magazine from the New York Times and has been a culinary assistant on Food Network shows.

Chris Smith - Contributor

Chris Smith is executive director of the Utopian Seed Project, a crop-trialing nonpro t working to celebrate food and farming, and co-host of “ e Okra Pod Cast.” Smith’s book, e Whole Okra, won a James Beard Foundation Award in 2020. In 2023, he received the Organic Educator Award from the Organic Growers School and was named a Champion of Conservation by Garden & Gun.

Gina Smith - Features Editor

A passionate gardener, cook, and fermenter, Gina Smith lives in Asheville with her family, including two dogs and a small ock of chickens. She has been writing about food and agriculture for local, regional and national publications for more than a decade.

Terri Terrell - Recipe Editor

Born in Mississippi, Terri Terrell is a Delta chef in the Appalachian tradition. She has been an active voice and participant in the culinary scene for over two decades. She was one of the rst Asheville chefs to highlight local and consciously grown ingredients, leading to her current role as Development and Events Director at the Utopian Seed Project.

Kristina Valdiviezo - Photographer

Based in Asheville, Kristina Valdiviezo specializes in food, restaurant, lifestyle and product photography. Working as Fraiche Photography, she is known for crafting captivating stories with a minimalist touch.

Kay West - Contributor

Kay West covered food and restaurants for over 30 years in Nashville and, since 2019, in Asheville— where she now lives. She is the author of ve books, including Around the Opry Table: A Feast of Recipes and Stories from the Grand Ole Opry.

Knowledge for the Next Generation

Cathy Horton | Director, The Brumit Center for Culinary Arts and Hospitality

Department Chair, Culinary Arts & Hospitality Management

When Cathy Horton decided to start a new career in the food industry, she was quick to say yes to just about any opportunity that came her way. Write restaurant reviews? Sure. Cook for a wine dinner? Absolutely. How about work as a part-time chef at Sam’s Club and hand out free nibbles to shoppers? Yep, why not?

But it was when she got the chance to teach a private cooking class that she felt a spark of inspiration. “When I taught cooking classes, I saw the people in the class get excited about what they were doing,” Horton says.

ese days, Horton oversees a lot of cooking classes. As chair of the Culinary Arts & Hospitality Management department at A-B Tech Community College, she helms an award-winning program that routinely punches above its weight class and turns out highly successful graduates. Her department includes A-B Tech’s popular culinary and baking courses, as well as its hospitality management program.

“I tell students all the time, ‘ ey can never take your education away from you,’” she says. And a primary mission among A-B Tech’s instructors is to impart practical knowledge, to teach students how to thrive in the day-to-day demands of restaurants, catering companies, bakeries, breweries, hotels and country clubs.

“A successful chef or baker knows more than just knife skills or how to develop a good palate,” she says. “We want them to have a sense of responsibility, time management, organization and leadership. We try to teach them how to be people that others want to work with and for.”

Horton decided in the mid aughts to pursue a job in restaurants, marking a mid-career shift after several years in the insurance business. She herself graduated from A-B Tech’s culinary program, earning her associate’s degree in 2008. “I went to A-B Tech thinking I’d just take a look at the courses they had—and when I left, I was enrolled in two classes.”

In many ways, the path made perfect sense because Horton had always loved to cook. As a child in Minnesota, she’d earned a spot of privilege in her grandmother’s kitchen, where she alone among the family was invited to help bake cakes. As a young adult, she eagerly awaited the arrival of new food magazines, trying to re-create the magic from the glossy pages when she hosted Sunday brunches for her family and friends.

“When it was time for me to create a second act, I knew I still really enjoyed cooking,” she says.

After graduating from A-B Tech, Horton accepted a job at a Hendersonville restaurant and was then hired by Season’s at Highland Lake, a top-rated restaurant in Flat Rock, eventually working her way to the role of senior restaurant manager. She then started teaching a few courses at A-B Tech and was recruited as chair in 2016.

e art of being a successful chef is so much more than knowing how to cook, she says. It’s also about navigating a highly competitive industry and doing well in a role that can be equal parts demanding and rewarding.

“ ere are lots of people who like to cook, but professional chefs have to be able to do so much more,” she says. “Like saving a disaster. If something goes wrong and you still have to cook for 200 people on a Saturday night, you have to gure it out: save a broken hollandaise or x a demi glace, repair a dish that’s been oversalted.”

Every day within the classrooms of A-B Tech knowledge is imparted from instructors to students. And the apex of Horton’s experience as department chair occurs when that cumulative knowledge allows a student to jump-start a career of their dreams.

One student who made an impression on Horton enrolled in the school’s culinary program in his mid-40s after a few years in prison. “He told me his goal was to live at the beach. And today, he’s running a restaurant in Myrtle Beach and living his best life,” Horton says. “I still get phone calls from him and he stops by when he’s in town.”

Another student left a career in the military and information technology to launch a new chapter as a baker. Today, he’s fully employed in that eld. Still another student hit a series of glass ceilings among the ranks of hotel managers, but earned a hospitality management degree and now works in top management.

“ ese are the moments I love,” she says. “Every day, I’m watching the next generation.”

Sochan

Western North Carolina’s Native, Perennial and Edible Green

WRITTEN BY CHRIS SMITH

In 2013 I took part in a permaculture design certificate course at Earthaven Ecovillage, and at the end of the program we organized a gift exchange. I brought seeds because they are the perfect gift of abundance, especially for garden folk and seed savers. In return, I received two small sochan plants from Alexander Meander, owner of Feralwood Nursery in Kings Mountain, NC. I didn’t have a relationship with sochan at the time, but the plant turned out to also be a gift of abundance and quickly became a personal favorite in my garden.

Botanically, sochan is Rudbeckia lacinata, which puts it in close relation with other East Coast natives, the most common being black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia hirata) and a little more distantly, purple cone ower, aka echinacea (Echinacea purpurea). Sochan is also known as green-headed cone ower and cutleaf cone ower, and in late summer produces large quantities of small, yellow-petaled blooms a little like miniature sun owers. When I stand and watch my sochan

patch at peak owering, I am always overwhelmed by the sheer number of insects visiting the owers. Pollinator potential? Check!

I planted those two small gifted plants beside a young pawpaw tree back in spring 2014. My soil is the typical red clay of the region, but native plants know this soil well. I’m not great at attentive gardening, so once they were planted, those baby sochans were on their own!

Traditionally, sochan is treated like any leafy edible and can be cooked together with other foraged greens like nettles and lambsquarters.

Ten years later, and I have a sochan forest. e abundant flowering leads to abundant seed production, which has meant a slow spread across my garden wherever there is space and sun for seeds to send out radicles (the first seed root) and then roots. I personally welcome this sochan spread, but take heed: Sochan is a self-seeding perennial with a borderline aggressive personality, and it can grow as tall as 10 feet before being killed back by frost each year.

For all its pollinator props, the main reason I’m enamored by sochan is its edible leaves. Sochan is a much-loved foraged green of the Cherokee and has a long culinary history as a

Native food. It’s one of the earliest greens to pop up in spring and still has harvestable leaves deep into fall. e leaves start the season mild and tender and gradually become tougher and more intense in avor, but they remain edible all the way through.

Traditionally, sochan is treated like any leafy edible and can be cooked together with other foraged greens like nettles and lambsquarters. I throw bunches of sochan leaves into soups and stews; I’ve stir-fried them with summer squash and cherry tomatoes; and I love wilting the tender greens like spinach to fold into an omelet or quiche. As a cooked green, they are very versatile. Sochan leaves can also be eaten raw in salads or smoothies, but it’s not my favorite way to enjoy them.

Sochan can be started from seeds (Asheville-based Sow True Seed carries them), and as a native perennial they’ll bene t from cold strati cation (a period of storing seeds at cold temperature to break dormancy) to help with germination. If you have a friend growing it, then they’ll likely have as many volunteer plants as I do, and it’s easy enough to dig up and transplant a baby or two. I also see sochan sold in local nurseries and garden centers, and it’ll be easy to nd at the annual Asheville Herb Festival at the WNC Agricultural Center the last weekend of April.

If you don’t have a garden in which to grow your sochan, you can easily nd it along forest and stream edges. I’ve seen it growing wild in the Bent Creek area and alongside the Big Laurel Creek in Madison County. While you’re learning to recognize sochan, be sure to identify it correctly, preferably from a friend who already knows it well! Once you have a relationship with the plant, then it’s hard to mistake, and you’ll have an abundant perennial green to add to your diet.

Novelist David Joy stands in his Jackson County home with his 1928 nickel steel Winchester Model 12.

AQA Q&A with Novelist David Joy

Writer, hunter, forager and home chef David Joy is just as handy with a pan as he is with a pen

WRITTEN BY BROOK BOLEN | PHOTOS BY ASHLEY EVANS

When he’s not writing brutally beautiful works centered on characters living in Western North Carolina—including his 2015 hit Where All Light Tends to Go, which was made into a movie starring Billy Bob ornton and Robin Wright—the Jackson County resident brightens his social media feed with a mouthwatering glimpse into the cooking, hunting and foraging he likes to do.

To be sure, the dishes created by Joy read like menu items from any trendy eatery but with a mountain man twist: Black bear rib roast braised in Pinot Grigio with shallots and nished with a cinnamon and pear balsamic glaze. Risotto with freshly foraged chanterelle mushrooms.

Joy’s latest novel, ose We ought We Knew, was released in 2023.

Edible Asheville: You have credited your grandmother with sparking your love of storytelling. Where did your love of cooking come from? Did your grandmother also teach you how to put up foods?

David Joy: Granny was a wonderful cook in the Southern sense—cornbread, biscuits, fried chicken, green beans, ham, pintos, mashed potatoes, gravy. It was always simple, grounded foods dialed to perfection from years of having made them.

I always loved how she’d stretch a can of Double Q salmon. She made her salmon patties small, like the size of a silver dollar, so they fried crisper, and she always ran saltines for breadcrumbs. Any time I make them how she did, people tell me they’re the

best they’ve ever eaten. So, yes, some of it certainly ties back to that. If I’m thinking about the biggest in uence on my cooking, though, it’s just growing up during the advent of cooking television and the Food Network.

EA: You live in Jackson County and your novels are set in rural Western North Carolina. Are there any foods you associate with the region? What are your favorites? And is there anything you pride yourself on being able to make especially well?

ere’s a lot of game that I associate with the mountains, some of it not really eaten anymore. I think about something like groundhog, and for a long time that was really common, but no one really eats that anymore. I know a lot of stories of cooking them down with apples.

Bear. Most times that’s going to be in a stew, a lot of times canned. at’s something that’s been done here for a long time that you don’t see a lot elsewhere. Bear is something that’s particularly good canned. Obviously trout—and not the stockers, but the specks, 8 inches long, fried whole. We’ve got a long tradition of raising hogs and putting them up in sugar shacks and smokehouses, another thing you seldom see anymore.

ere’s also a lot of vegetables I associate with up here, things like greasy backs or pintos or heirlooms like Rachel beans out of Fines Creek in Haywood County. Potatoes. A biggie for a long time that you don’t really think about anymore is cabbage. Fried

cabbage was always a staple, and there was a long tradition of making kraut on the porch in summer in a crock with cloth over it and a river rock weighing it down. en there’s all the wilds like ramps and branch lettuce.

Do you see cooking as an extension of hunting and shing? Other than creating delicious sustenance, does cooking hold any value for you?

I think the end game is important when an animal’s life has been taken, and that’s not something I attach strictly to wild game. at disconnect for the majority of Americans is one of the greatest cultural losses we’ve experienced as a people, just that complete disregard, that packaged and sealed detachment from where our foods come from. One of the most valuable aspects of hunting and shing and procuring your own meat sources is that intimacy.

So much of our identities are tied to the foods we eat. How do the foods you prepare and eat in uence your sense of self or identity?

I come from a family that hunted squirrels and rabbits, that grew big gardens and held sh fries, that made children turn the churn when it came time to make ice cream. We live in a time of displacement and uprootedness where no one seems to be able to hold on to anything. We’re losing culture. We’re losing food like we’re losing a language.

I don’t want to live in a world where southern Louisiana doesn’t taste like southern Louisiana. I don’t want to live in a

Top left: Joy calls to a nearby turkey with a spalted maple pot call crafted by WNC callmaker and Jackson County native, Jack Mincey. Above: A selection of calls from his collections: a crow call made by Bryan Stanley, and a yelper made by Tony Ezolt from the shin bone of a whitetail deer Joy killed.

Opposite page: Fried bluegill caught with his grandmother's rod and served in her cast iron pan. The fish is paired with a mixed tomato salad and Italian beans canned from Joy's garden.

“Most people eat meals having no idea where any of the things on their plate come from. I think that’s a horrible shame.”

— David Joy

world where people from Maine don’t sound like they’re from Maine. I want those di erences. I want the richness. I want the avors. I want the things that de ne a person to hold like scrimshaw on their bones.

Are there any professional chefs and food writers that inspire you as a home cook and/or a writer?

Nowadays there are a lot of trained chefs doing interesting things with wild game. Chief among them, I think, is (chef and author) Hank Shaw. Whenever I’ve got something I just don’t know what to do with, I’ll look through some of his recipes. So for instance, I took one of his recipes for rillettes and adapted it for squirrels. Jesse Gri ths (author and restaurant owner) is another one. Eduardo Garcia (chef and outdoor enthusiast). As far as writing, the most helpful cookbook I’ve stumbled on in a long time is Cathy Barrow’s Mrs. Wheelbarrow’s Practical Pantry. e best writing I’ve come across in a cookbook in a long, long time is Crystal Wilkinson’s Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts. I’d about bet that book will win a James Beard Award next year.

ere’s a level of knowledge and attachment that comes from hunting and preparing the food you hunt. How does this knowledge of food sources a ect the way you engage with the food you take and prepare?

When you spend a great deal of your life hunting and shing, you come to look at the landscape di erently. e way you come to view the world is just di erent from most people, and I always nd myself going back to that word intimacy, because that’s the only way I can explain it. at intimacy carries directly over into the food.

Most people eat meals having no idea where any of the things on their plate come from. I think that’s a horrible shame. I try to live knowing where the majority of the things I eat come from. I eat a deer and I remember the way that animal ltered through the trees. I pull a handful of dried black trumpets out of a jar and I remember late summer foraging. What I’m getting at is that when there’s that type of relationship with the food, it’s no longer just a meal. Because of that you just have a much deeper sense of value for what you’re consuming. at’s the heart of it.

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2024 Brunch Directory

These popular brunch spots o er a mix of sweet and savory dishes for that perfect midday meal

BARGELLO

7 Patton Ave, Downtown Asheville

Brunch o ered Saturday and Sunday | 10am–2pm

Located within Hotel Arras in Downtown Asheville, Bargello is a casual fine-dining destination with a focus on Italian and Mediterranean flavors, welcoming visitors for brunch on the weekends with a solid menu and lots of patio seating. You can start with nibbles like avocado toast—seasoned with aleppo pepper and feta from Three Graces Dairy—or doughnut holes made with pumpkin zeppole, cream cheese mousse, a caramel sauce and candied pecans. Heartier options include omelets and French toast, along with a handful of creative sandwiches, including a hot honey chicken made with fried chicken, a cilantro and lime aioli, arugula and cucumber.

THE BLACKBIRD

47 Biltmore Ave, Downtown Asheville

Brunch o ered daily | 10am–2:30pm

As one of the few restaurants in town that o er a daily brunch, The Blackbird o ers a menu that mixes its New Southern cuisine with classic brunch faves. Plenty of hearty egg plates—including steak and eggs, eggs Benedict and assorted omelets—along with shrimp and grits, corned beef hash, and fried chicken with biscuits and gravy. Snag a seat by the big windows that get opened during warm-weather months and check out the options from the bar, including a “Boozy Brew” with housemade cold brew, vanilla Stoli vodka and a nutty liqueur.

CHESTNUT

48 Biltmore Ave, Downtown Asheville Brunch o ered Saturday and Sunday | 10am–2:30pm

Brunch at the always-popular Chestnut features some of the best local ingredients, utilized in creative ways in spot-on dishes. A five-star breakfast sandwich is o ered on a buttered croissant with sausage from Hickory Nut Gap Farm and eggs from Far Side Farms, topped with melted gouda and arugula. Meanwhile, the Southern Shrimp N’ Grits, is a standout meal featuring a regional who’s who of food producers, with North Carolina tailon shrimp, South Carolina’s Adluh grits and Tennessee’s beloved Benton’s bacon. Don’t miss the chance to try the bacon-infused vodka Bloody Mary, mimosas by the glass or carafe, or one of the custom brunch cocktails.

CLAYWOOD

317 7th Ave E, Hendersonville

Brunch o ered Sunday year-round, 11am–2pm | plus Saturday in spring and summer

This comfortably chic place in downtown Hendersonville attracts a crowd for weekend brunch. Known for its artisan charcuterie boards, which are next level, Claywood o ers a “Brunch Board” with Belgian wa es, apple-smoked bacon, chorizo Cajun grits and wild boar sausage. It’s a showpiece that starts a conversation. Pair it with one of Claywood’s cool beverage boards, which include a “Mimosa Board”—a flight of three drinks, assorted pastries and fresh fruit—or a “Bloody Mary Board”—which serves two and comes with stu ed peppers and olives, pickled veggies, candied bacon, Monterey Jack and port salut.

TALL JOHN’S

152 Montford Ave, Asheville

Brunch o ered Sunday | 9am–2pm

This neighborhood gem in Montford, housed in a beautiful historic building that was formerly a church, offers a great brunch menu of mostly American classics. Clear the way for the Florentine—which is served on a brioche from Mother bakery, with locally sourced spinach, a poached egg and a delightfully creamy bearnaise—or consider a clever twist with their breakfast wedge salad, which has romaine, bacon, a sieved egg and bleu cheese. All wine bottles are 25% o on Sundays, so settle in for the afternoon, and check out the patio if it’s open for good weather. Reservations available and walk-ins welcome.

Sustenance for

Soul Searching

The region’s bustling business for wellness retreats gives local chefs another arena to shine

WRITTEN BY TENNILLE T. LEGLER | PHOTOS BY KRISTINA VALDIVIEZO

Chef Katie Fiore has prepared a healthy and wholesome breakfast for a small group of retreat guests—a beautiful presentation of organic berries and yogurt, sprouted oatmeal drizzled with honey, and slices of toasted Ezekiel bread. With a busy day ahead, and no time for post-food lethargy, it’s the sort of slow-release energy infusion that sets folks up for a day of get-up-and-go.

e group of guests gathers around the food. Having just nished an early morning yoga session, they ll their plates and discuss the day’s itinerary. It’s the rst full day of the “In nity Wellness Adventure”—hosted by Asheville-based In nity Greens, a popular maker of superfood supplements—and the group will be heading out for a

hike, followed by qigong, meditation, one-on-one health coaching and relaxing stints by the retreat center’s koi pond.

Between the activities will be a lineup of avorful snacks and hearty meals, showcasing several local ingredients and prepared onsite by Fiore and her team.

is weekend’s retreat—taking place at Bend of Ivy Lodge, a stunning property nestled in the rolling mountains of Madison County—is the type of event in which Fiore specializes. Her ve-yearold catering company, Fioreously Delicious, which o ers a weekly meal service in Asheville, has

Top left: Breakfast prepared by chef Katie Fiore for a wellness retreat in Madison County.

Top right: The Bend of Ivy Lodge encourages relaxation, reflection and healing.

There’s a whole side of Asheville’s popular food scene that’s often overlooked. Far from the bustle of the city’s award-winning restaurants, the food being served at mountain retreats is just as impressive, with customized menus prepared by talented local chefs using the freshest seasonal ingredients.

also become a popular provider of customized menus for multi-day retreats, with a particular focus on what she calls “healthy comfort food” for wellness gatherings.

“It’s really rewarding because when people come to retreats, they’re not usually thinking about the food. ey’re here for healing and relaxation,” Fiore says. “But when they get here, and the food is delicious, it becomes something that makes the retreat special.”

To be sure, there’s a whole side of Asheville’s popular food scene that’s often overlooked. Far from the bustle of the city’s award-winning restaurants are the mountain retreat centers that welcome visitors from corporate groups and yoga practices, and everything in between. And the food there is just as impressive, with customized menus prepared by talented local chefs using the freshest seasonal ingredients.

Just as important are the retreat venues. e mountains of Western North Carolina are home to several retreat centers that welcome guests and o er a quiet space for work and re ection, along with comfortable lodging and engaging on-site activities.

e Bend of Ivy Lodge, the location of this weekend’s event, sits on 40 acres in a peaceful valley about 20 minutes from downtown Asheville. As you turn onto a one-lane road, a mountain landscape worthy of a watercolor greets you. A wooden bench is perched on a viewtop peak and a small sign encourages visitors to slow down for turtle crossings; farther down the road, a trail for viewing birds, butter ies and bees winds into the woods.

With lodging for 26 people, and two spacious indoor meeting spaces—including a bright, welcoming space inside the e Lodge, a central gathering point—the Bend of Ivy Lodge also invites guests to relax by a koi pond, view the gardens of a four-acre organic farm or amble along any one of a dozen trails. e Salamander Valley Trail is a relaxing 45-minute journey, with a walk along Ivy River leading to a lookout point at Hound Dog Hill, where visitors will nd a beautifully restored hemlock forest.

Left to Right: The Lodge at Bend of Ivey Lodge, a boxed lunch prepared for a hike, chef Katie Fiore of Fioreously Delicious

“People can de nitely leave the center and go out and explore, but they usually just stay here for the time of their retreat,” says owner Susan Walters Minker, a former landscape designer who now works as a life and leadership coach. “ is is our purpose, to have a place for healing work and deeper conversation.”

Having nished breakfast, guests attending the Infinity Wellness Adventure pull on their hiking boots for an afternoon amble around the property. Inside the kitchen, Fiore is preparing boxed lunches for each guest: a dish of black rice, edamame, pickled vegetables and a tamari-tahini sauce. When they return, they’ll decamp for various other activities while Fiore turns her attention to dinner: a avor-rich ai green curry, served with fresh vegetables, rice and either chicken or tempeh.

“I work with just about any kind of diet,” Fiore says. “Gluten-free, dairy-free, vegetarian, vegan, plant-based diets … it can all be avorful and taste really good.”

Traveling through Southeast Asia in her 20s, Fiore discovered a passion for cooking and was particularly impressed with the region’s vegetarian dishes and rich avors. After returning to the States, she enrolled in the New England Culinary Institute in Vermont, where she met her husband, Kirk (who’s now the executive chef at e Cli s at Walnut Cove in Asheville), and together they opened a farm-to-table catering business in Burlington called Sugarsnap Catering.

When the couple moved their family to Asheville, Fiore continued to perfect a style of cuisine that both impressed the palate and strengthened the body, cooking at the Asheville Racquet Club and later Red Radish in Black Mountain. In 2019, she formed Fioreously Delicious, o ering personal chef services, weekly meal deliveries and catering—for dinner parties and weddings, in addition to retreats—all of which have grown quickly. Now, having recently hired two additional chefs to her team, she’s looking forward to a busy future.

“It’s been good to see all of this happen,” she says. “I’m just trying to keep up.”

A Craft Experience All Around

The What and Why of Wicked Weed Brewing

Presented in Partnership with Wicked Weed

| Photos by Kristina Valdiviezo

Amural of Henry VIII covers the north wall of Wicked Weed’s 15-barrel Brewpub in downtown Asheville—a nod to the 16th century English monarch whose disdain for hops and, more importantly, the impact they were having on his ability to make money o the country’s beer production, led him to utter a phrase that became the namesake of this popular brewery, as well as its top-selling product

“Hops,” said the king, “are a wicked and pernicious weed.”

Now in its second decade of operation, Wicked Weed is a cornerstone of Asheville’s beer scene. With four production facilities and an award-winning restaurant, it was recently described by Beer Connoisseur as the “the jewel of Asheville’s brewing scene.“

While not the rst brewery in town (that distinction goes to Highland Brewing), nor the biggest (the area is home to the sprawling secondary facilities of Sierra Nevada, New Belgium Brewing and Oskar Blues), Wicked Weed has a solid reputation for edgy and nely crafted beers made from high-quality ingredients. (Wicked Weed co-founder Ryan Guthy once told the Raleigh-based apparel maker Peter Millar that they tracked down organic watermelons for a sour ale called Sandiaca: “We’re cutting them up and we’re mashing them in ourselves.”)

To be sure, Wicked Weed is a powerful magnet for beer lovers, who ock to its downtown Brewpub, its agship location, where a rotating selection of more than two dozen beers are o ered on tap. “We make beers that sometimes people don’t expect to taste good—and we make them really well,” says Brewpub General Manager Russ Brown.

e Brewpub’s free tours—available ve times a day, seven days a week—are among the most popular tours in Asheville. Meanwhile, the brewery’s top-selling Pernicious India Pale Ale, an explosion of hops with a fruity avor, is currently sold in 11 states, the District of Columbia and Manhattan (and will be available in an additional 10 states along the east coast in spring 2024) and has been awarded medals by both the Great American

Beer Festival and U.S. Open Beer Championship, alongside a dozen other Wicked Weed brews that have medaled in these competitions.

Having made a name for itself with West Coast–style IPAs and barrel-aged sours, Wicked Weed catapulted out of the gate and now, more than 10 years later, remains a centerpiece of downtown Asheville’s craft brew o erings. Here, we track a few of the milestone events that helped to shape the company and its beer.

2012 — e Beginning

Wicked Weed opened its Brewpub in December 2012, becoming the 13th brewery to set up shop in Asheville. e founders were a group of ve—a coming together of two families, the Guthys and the Dickinsons. e Dickinson siblings had worked in other successful breweries and took the lead on recipe creation. e Guthys, meanwhile, whose family boasts a sharp set of business chops, took the lead on sales, marketing and nancing.

e Wicked Weed Brewpub, located in a former hardware store on Biltmore Avenue, showcased work from local artisans, along with a bartop made from a 200-year-old piece of Black Gum that carried embedded musket balls from the Civil War.

At its opening, the Brewpub encompassed the same collection of o erings it does today—a restaurant, tasting room, courtyard beer garden and outdoor patio—making it easily one of the biggest outposts for craft beer in Asheville. It o ered an astonishing 17 beers on tap, while many taprooms o ered just ve or six, churning out new batches and recipes at an electric pace.

Although Asheville’s food scene was still in its early years, Wicked Weed had the foresight to want the restaurant to be just as impressive as the beer. Recruiting a team of talented chefs—including John Rice, who was hired as a line cook in 2012 and now serves as the Brewpub’s executive chef—Wicked Weed introduced a menu of “enlightened pub food,” which is a guiding principle that still wins fans today.

“We want the food menu to keep up with the integrity of the beer,” Brown says. “We want this to be a craft experience all around.”

A burger and beer at the Wicked Weed Brew Pub in downtown Asheville (photo courtesy of Wicked Weed).

2014 — Wicked Weed Grows Like A …

Wicked Weed enjoyed quick success and expanded rapidly, prompting many to joke that Wicked Weed was, well, growing like one.

By 2014, less than two years after it opened, the company launched the Funkatorium, a 13,000-square-foot facility dedicated to its barrel-aged sour beers on downtown’s Cox Avenue. At the same time, Wicked Weed announced plans for an even bigger 50-barrel brewhouse in Candler, which now operates as Wicked Weed West, with a taproom, food truck and bottle shop.

Today, the Wicked Weed umbrella also includes the top-rated Cultura restaurant, led by Chef Eric Morris, which was nominated for a James Beard Award in 2020.

Having enjoyed a meteoric rise, and a stellar reputation as a golden child of Asheville’s craft beer industry, Wicked Weed was acquired by Anheuser-Busch in 2017, joining about 10 other craft breweries in A-B’s “High End” portfolio and paving the way for continued growth while allowing the founders to stay focused on creating good beer.

“We believed and still believe to this day that it was the right move for our company’s stability, our employees and the future growth of our brand,” Walt Dickinson told Forbes magazine in 2020. “We’re still the same company with the same ethos: an emphasis on giving back to the community and making great beer.”

“We want the food menu to keep up with the integrity of the beer. We want this to be a craft experience all around.”

—Brewpub General Manager Russ Brown

Top Left: Executive Chef John Rice at the Wicked Weed Brew Pub. Right: The candied brussels sprouts are a favorite on the menu (photos courtesy of Wicked Weed).

Today, Wicked Weed’s founders are still guiding operations, with Ryan Guthy serving as president of the company and Walt Dickinson leading innovation and creative direction for the company.

2019 — Awards & World Records

In 2019, Wicked Weed earned a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records, executing a “Tap Takeover” at the Raleigh Beer Garden, where 177 of the beer garden’s 350 taps each poured a unique Wicked Weed beer, including brewpub favorites, rare verticals and new o erings. e event highlighted the scale and scope of Wicked Weed’s brewing abilities.

at same year, Wicked Weed brought home three medals from the U.S. Open Beer Championship, including a gold for Coastal Love Hazy IPA and a silver for the always-popular Pernicious.

To date, Wicked Weed has won nearly 20 of these awards— which also includes a gold for Red Angel, a balanced raspberry sour that Walt Dickinson called his second-favorite beer after Pernicious.

2023 — Deepening Asheville Roots

Wicked Weed emerged from the pandemic with a refocused effort on engaging with the community in Asheville and Western North Carolina. It started to attract a wider crowd of local fans with a Tuesday “Family Night” special where kids 12 and younger receive a free meal—often on the dog-friendly patio—and “New Beer ursday” where pints of weekly new releases are priced at just $4.

Its menu is an impressive collection of seasonal dishes and beer-friendly bites made with locally grown meats and produce. e Pub Burger is a top favorite, made with beef from nearby Hickory Nut Gap Farm, and the Kimchi Fried Chicken Sandwich has a beautiful bite that pairs well with a pint of Pernicious. For those looking for a snack, check out the candied brussels sprouts, which are pan seared with sugar, salt and butter and dashed with whole grain mustard, cider vinegar and a balsamic reduction. And while the beers almost always take center stage, Wicked Weed also o ers cocktails and non-alcohol beverages.

Wicked Weed’s Beers that Build program, meanwhile, is a monthly series of beer releases at the Brewpub where $1 for every pour of the beer is donated to di erent local organizations.

Proceeds from its “Milk & Cookies” imperial stout, for example, made with golden raisins, cinnamon and vanilla, went to local groups addressing the issue of food insecurity. A session IPA called “Appalachia” was used to help the Asheville-based Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy, which protects local lands and waterways.

“With all of this, we’re inviting people to connect with us,” Brown says. “A lot of people have heard about Wicked Weed, but we want people to know what we’re about.”

PRESENTED BY THE INGLES TABLE

Mexican Skillet Tilapia

WRITTEN BY JOE LASHER

Ilove the vibrant flavors in this dish! e combination of ingredients creates a zesty and aromatic base for the sauce, while the addition of Mexican beer adds depth and a bit of orange juice lends a hint of sweetness and balances out the heat. And when the panseared tilapia filets absorb all these delicious avors, each bite becomes a burst of Mexican-inspired goodness.

Joe Lasher is co-owner of M7 Event Solutions & Catering, operating The Crest Center and Pavilion in Asheville, Claxton Farm in Weaverville, and the new "Twin Willows" Estate in Mars Hill, featuring vacation rentals, event spaces, and more. To try Joe's cooking, visit Twin Willows and look for the Smokin' Joe Lasher mobile kitchen. Find out more on social media @smokinjoelasher or at SmokinJoeLasher.com.

Mexican Skillet Tilapia

Serves 4

4 fresh tilapia filets (substitute any hearty white fish)

2 teaspoons ground cumin

1 teaspoon chili powder

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon sea salt

1 tablespoon olive oil

½ cup cherry or grape tomatoes

½ red onion, thinly sliced

1 tablespoon minced garlic

1 cup Mexican beer (substitute vegetable broth)

1 jalapeño pepper, minced

¼ cup fresh squeezed orange juice

Sea salt, to taste

Ground black pepper, to taste

Fresh cilantro, chopped for garnish

Combine cumin, chili powder, garlic powder, and sea salt. Generously coat tilapia filets with this seasoning blend.

Heat olive oil in a heavy skillet over medium-high heat and add fish filets. Cook 2-3 minutes and then carefully turn using a flat spatula. Cook 2-3 more minutes until the fish is white and flaky. Remove and set aside.

Add tomatoes to the same skillet and sauté until blistered. Add onion and garlic and sauté until onions soften.

De-glaze the skillet by adding beer (or broth) to it, still over mediumhigh heat and bring to a boil. Let simmer until liquid is reduced by half, approximately 5 minutes.

Finish the sauce by adding jalapeño, citrus juice, and salt and pepper to taste. Simmer over low-medium heat for 5 minutes.

Add the fish back into the skillet. Spoon sauce over the fish and garnish with fresh cilantro and lemon or lime wedges.

Painting

Outside the Lines

Artistic expression is a gateway to wellness, no matter your skill level

WRITTEN BY GINA SMITH | PHOTOS BY ERIN ADAMS

Whether quietly studying the lines and colors of a painting, watching a modern dance performance or being swept away by a beautiful piece of music, exposure to works of art helps connect us to new ideas, puts us in touch with a range of emotions, provokes thought and inspires joy. Similarly, rolling up our sleeves to actually create the art can have strong and lasting positive impacts on mental and physical health and overall well-being—even for people who don’t think of themselves as artistic.

Humans have no doubt been spontaneously self-medicating with creativity since the days of the rst cave paintings. (Singing in the shower, doodling on your grocery store receipt or making a tiny sculpture out of your chewing gum wrapper during a boring meeting all qualify.) But art therapy emerged as an o cial eld of study and practice in the United States in the early 1940s when psychologist, educator and artist Margaret Naumburg began publishing clinical cases on what she called “dynamically oriented art therapy.”

Since then, a large and ever-growing body of scienti c evidence has shown that engaging in arts activities and practices is directly connected with positive health outcomes.

e American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine says

“Art o ers you an opportunity to access your imagination, and the imagination is an important part of our mental health. When someone can think beyond what’s placed in front of them, they have a freedom to their interior and exterior worlds.”

— Cleaster Cotton

Asheville-based artist and educator

Cleaster Cotton in front of her public art installation, “Going to Market,” at 55 South Market Street in Asheville.

artistic expression can reduce stress and anxiety, improve focus, provide a healthy catharsis for intense emotions, enhance decision-making skills and improve overall brain plasticity and function.

Also, according to a 2019 study of young people in the United Kingdom by the New York Academy of Sciences, engaging in creative activities provides a serious boost to self-esteem, which the report describes as “key to one's social and cognitive development and emotional well-being.”

riving rough Art

For Cleaster Cotton, an Asheville artist, educator, inventor and recipient of a 2024 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Association MLK Community Service Award, the connection between artistic expression and vibrant health and self-esteem has been a constant throughout her life and in her work as an arts educator.

Seated in her studio space at Art Garden AVL in Asheville’s River Arts District, Cotton points to several of her richly textured, vividly colored, contemporary primitive-style paintings adorning the walls. One features a blocky image that looks like a mountain range from one angle and a human pro le from another; a second is a vividly patterned closeup of what she reveals is a Masai warrior’s breastplate.

“ e art that I create is genetically inspired through my ancestors,” she says.

As a teaching artist in New York in 1999, Cotton invented the ALNUGE (ALphabet, NUmbers, GEometrics) Codes, a geometric visual language and STEAM curriculum based on simple shapes—“circles, squares, triangles, rectangles with a line, a dot, or not,” she explains—

that’s used in fun, brain-strengthening, con dence-building games and activities for students in kindergarten through high school.

As a teaching artist, Cotton introduced the ALNUGE Codes Evidence Based Practice to Asheville schools through a program known as Teaching Artists Presenting in Asheville Schools. More broadly, ALNUGE has been used in educational curricula in Buncombe County, across the United States, and in several countries around the world.

Cotton also facilitates hands-on workshops through Asheville-area arts and educational organizations and companies. She founded Youth Artists Empowered and co-founded WNC EarthMates to inspire condence and self-esteem and teach life skills through art and nature to everyone from preschoolers to military veterans.

“Art o ers you an opportunity to access your imagination, and the imagination is, I feel, an important part of our mental health,” Cotton says. “When someone can think beyond what’s placed in front of them, they have a freedom to their interior and exterior worlds.”

In her decades of fostering wellness through art, Cotton says she has observed that many people are resistant to or afraid of being creative out of a fear that their work will be less than perfect.

"What is perfect?” she asks. “ at's a heavy concept to put on yourself or anybody else. What is perfect is whatever comes out of you. My most freeing, grandest elevation of myself as an artist is when I started painting outside the lines."

An Act of Vulnerability

Sometimes, people who don’t consider themselves to be artistically inclined or are shy about expressing themselves through art have expe-

rienced negative judgment about their e orts in the past, Cotton says. “Creating art is an act of vulnerability, and we need to be vulnerable in order to connect deeply and grow. When facilitating a creative process, I create a safe container [space] in order for people to feel comfortable enough to be vulnerable,” she explains.

To establish that safe space, Cotton begins by leading people to calm their minds and ground themselves in their bodies through breathing and visualization exercises. She then provides access to a large variety of art materials and invites students to engage in nonthreatening creative activities, such as collage or painting simple shapes, with no expectations for the results.

Once people have learned to relax and center themselves in a nonjudgemental environment—whether they’re wiggly youngsters or adults—they can feel safe expressing themselves artistically. And producing those creations is a proven catalyst for positive health outcomes, including greater self-con dence and self-esteem.

The 2019 research from the New York Academy of Sciences says that making art— regardless of whether or not the person is actually good at it—improves self-worth, self-empowerment and self-esteem by validating an individual’s uniqueness and providing a sense of accomplishment. Art done in a group environment also enhances a person’s sense of social identity.

“You have an immediate result,” says Cotton. “Knowing that there wasn’t a middleman or something in between you and what you’ve created, that’s empowering. It’s tangible: I did that!”

Cotton has witnessed profound changes occur in students through art, including some children who have grown up to pursue art as a career. And she believes those successes collectively lead to a better overall community.

“It has to start with us. Self-care puts you in a position to come to the table from a healthier perspective,” she says. “Art helps you to thrive as a singular individual and then also takes root and grows into your family and your community and your country.”

The perfect place to relax with a morning pastry, enjoy an afternoon latte with a friend, and your downtown destination for after dinner desserts.

77-81 Pa on Ave • Asheville

Tip of the Iceberg

A nod to the local greens that show up in springtime salads

WORDS BY KAY WEST

Chef Ashleigh Shanti thinks iceberg lettuce gets a bum rap and she’s determined to change that.

“It’s a great salad green,” she says. “It’s crispy, refreshing, forgiving and hardy.”

Shanti fondly remembers a salad she enjoyed as a kid at little barbecue spots she visited while traveling with her family through the South. “I think it originated in the Delta region—it was this super-overdressed iceberg salad with tomatoes, loaded up with a vinaigrette that was apple cider vinegar and some neutral oil, and was called a ‘wet salad.’”

“Killed lettuce”—a springtime recipe deeply rooted in Appalachian culinary culture—is an iceberg salad that can take the heat, literally. “It’s hot bacon grease, a little splash of vinegar, and I add a little sorghum for some sweetness to o set the acidity,” Shanti explains. “Pour it over the lettuce, give it a toss so it wilts, and it makes a great side dish.”

e Ranchovy iceberg salad is her current shout-out to the green and the third item on the succinct menu of her new Asheville restaurant, Good Hot Fish. e small counter-service spot, which opened in January in Asheville’s South Slope, is an homage to the women in her family who sold their fresh-fried, hot sh sandwiches from their homes and churches, and a nod to the traditional sh camps the chef grew up around in Virginia Beach and the coastal mid-South. Good Hot Fish supplements its signature sandwich with sh-of-the-day plates, a shrimp burger, a trout bologna sandwich and sides like stewed greens, baked macaroni ’n’ cheese, red peas with ham hock, and hushpuppies.

Green Acres

e Ranchovy salad ts right in with the down-home fare. “Iceberg is an approachable salad green and ts the sh camp model better than radicchio or arugula,” Shanti says. “It stands up to what we put on it: lime-pickled red onion, crispy shallots, loads of chives, crunchy things like benne seed and fried sh skin, and that creamy Caesar-ranch dressing.”

But before all the things is the main thing: the lettuce. Shanti was determined to source locally and, as it turned out, she had a guy. Shanti got to know farmer and former chef Jamie Swo ord while serving on the board of directors of Utopian Seed Project in 2020, not long after she left her position as chef de cuisine at the Asheville restaurant Benne on Eagle. Both Shanti and Swo ord worked on the Heirloom Collards Project, she as a chef and he as a grower. Swo ord and his wife, writer-baker Keia Mastrianni, have a family of businesses at Old North Farm in Shelby, a 2½ -acre property on which he farms about a hundred 100-foot beds on 1 acre.

“I told Jamie I was putting an iceberg salad on the menu and wanted a local source for the lettuce,” Shanti recalls. “He is one of those farmers willing to meet speci c chef needs, so we started that conversation about what kind of iceberg he could grow.”

Says Swo ord, “What people see in the grocery store is usually a commodity grown en masse and shipped across the country. It’s, like, a Saran-wrapped ball of tasteless, water- lled, white lettuce. Iceberg grown locally is a whole di erent vegetable.”

Swo ord grows year-round using low hoop houses and caterpillar tunnels among other tricks, but says iceberg is not the easiest winter lettuce. He reached out to seed companies, tried a few varieties and landed on one called Crispino.

“Crispino has avor and sweetness, it has life and color, it’s green, not white,” he says. “It’s beautiful, delicious, crunchy and a great product.”

He began growing the Crispino in anticipation of Good Hot Fish’s planned October 2023 opening. As the projected launch date was delayed and stretched through the holidays, other Asheville and Charlotte restaurants were happy to take the lettuce he was growing for Shanti until she opened in January. She also sources her mustard greens and collards from him, using heirloom varieties like Tabitha Dykes and Lottie Collards.

The salad o erings at The Market Place in Asheville feature a rotating mix of seasonal and locally grown greens. Photo courtesey of The Market Place.

Clockwise from left: The Ranchovy Iceburg Bowl at Good Hot Fish; farmer Jamie Swo ord of Old North Farm (photo courtesy of Old North Farm); and chef Ashleigh Shanti of Good Hot Fish (photo by Erin Adams)

“Crispino has flavor and sweetness, it has life and color, it’s green, not white. It’s beautiful, delicious, crunchy.”

— Jamie Swo ord

Farm to Market Place

Old North Farm is also well known for Little Gem lettuce, which Swo ord grows 52 weeks a year. “ e beauty of Little Gems is you can split a head in half, and each is a portion.

ey’re great for a wedge salad,” he says.

Ah, the classic wedge, that staple of steakhouses and beloved by chefs in its classic form or as a canvas for reinterpretation. William Dissen, chef/owner of e Market Place in Asheville and also a customer of Old North Farm, is an unabashed fan of the wedge, using iceberg as the foundation. “A chilled crisp quarter of iceberg, a little salt and pepper, some bacon crumbles or lardons, sliced scallions, bleu cheese crumbles, maybe some cherry tomatoes and bleu cheese dressing drizzled over the whole thing,” is how he describes his perfect wedge.

Though diners at his Wall Street eatery—a 2024 James Beard semi nalist for Outstanding Restaurant—won’t always see a wedge on the local and seasonally driven menu, there will always be at least two salads.

“ rough our lens as a farm-to-table restaurant, we are always focused on vegetables at e Market Place,” says Dissen. “ e farmers we source from have done all the hard work, we just need to put that on a plate. Salads really showcase the spectacular vegetables we get from our farmers.”

“Each place has a di erent vibe, but we set really high standards at all of them and want our guests to relax and have a unique experience.”

— Mike Reppert | Chef and Owner

Modern Southern eatery with award-winning wine selection

47 Biltmore Ave, Asheville

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Dissen says the seasonal salad will transition through the year in a somewhat whimsical fashion depending on what is available. Last summer showcased heirloom tomatoes with house-made burrata; fall brought Candy Roaster squash with radicchio and other bitter greens; winter featured wood-roasted beet salad with stracciatella.

e spring menu will likely debut a strawberry and arugula salad with shaved spring radishes, chevre, toasted almonds, red onion marmalade and Pedro Ximénez vinegar. (In April, Dissen’s cookbook, oughtful Cooking: Recipes Rooted in the New South, will be published and includes the recipe for the strawberry-arugula salad.)

No matter the season, the Market Place Salad is a menu staple built upon a foundation of greens with changing accouterments and dressings—another place Dissen likes to play. “For bitter greens, I make a con t shallot vinaigrette with a little bit of heat and lemon zest,” he o ers as an example.

Dissen describes the milder iceberg, butter and Little Gem lettuces as vessels for bolder avors. He likes Little Gem so much that the restaurant he is opening soon in partnership with the North Carolina Zoo in Asheboro is

“The farmers we source from have done all the hard work, we just need to put that on a plate. Salads really showcase the spectacular vegetables we get from our farmers.”

— William Dissen

Chef William Dissen of The Market Place in Asheville (photo courtesy of The Market Place).

called Little Gem and will use that green as the base for salad bowls.

Swo ord, Shanti and Dissen all point to iceberg as the gateway salad lettuce of their childhoods. However, Jake Whitman, chef/ owner of e Pure & Proper in Black Mountain, says that didn’t land on his family dinner table. “My mom was a bit of a health nut, so when we were kids we ate a lot of kale, spinach and arugula,” he says.

That early exposure translates to Whitman’s menu at The Pure & Proper, where diners nd arugula in both expected and surprising places—like the arugula Caesar, which has white anchovies, roasted corn kernels, pecorino and breadcrumbs. In the winter, he uses romaine for his wedge salad, smokes his bleu cheese and tosses on Benton’s bacon. In spring, that will segue to Bibb or butter lettuce. With his base in Black Mountain, among his sources are two farms in nearby Old Fort: Mystic Roots Farm and Recovery Roots, the latter of which specializes in hydroponics and is operated by people in recovery.

When Whitman considers creating a new salad, he typically thinks rst of the fruits coming into season he’d like to highlight, how hardy or delicate they are, what kind of dressing works with that fruit and what greens he will use. In the cold-weather months, he takes advantage of Western North Carolina’s bounty of apples, as well as dried fruits like currants. For spring he loves the pairing of strawberries and rhubarb. “It’s a great combination for desserts and for salads, a beautiful fresh start for spring.”

Classic sustainable seafood flown fresh from the ocean, to the mountains of Asheville.

Cooking with The Utopian Seed Project

RECIPES AND STYLING BY TERRI TERRELL AND MICHELE GENTILLE

In this issue, we bring you recipes that focus specifically on crops from The Utopian Seed Project. TUSP is an Asheville-based nonprofit that conducts trials for a wide range of crops and vegetable varieties to support diversity in food and farming. Its events and educational programs bring together growers, gardeners, farmers, foodies, cooks and chefs who are open to playing with new ingredients and believe in a resilient, delicious and equitable food and farming system. We concur!

We were happy to nd winter storage crops like taro, yacon and squash—all of which e Utopian Seed Project has worked with— since the lush spring growing season has barely begun. We found several great ways to utilize these crops in really tasty dishes, and we love seeing local farmers starting to grow and o er them. Many Asian markets stock them year-round!

To learn more about what e Utopian Seed Project is doing with each crop, check out utopianseed.org.

There are cooks and chefs who are open to playing with new ingredients and believe in a resilient, delicious and equitable food and farming system.

Crispy Taro Fritters with Green Sauce

Taro root is a staple in many countries, but is relatively new to the American diet. It loves to be fried, so a fritter seemed like a simple introduction to the vegetable and easy to replicate. Note that taro root should not be consumed raw, as it contains a bitter-tasting compound called calcium oxalate that can cause an itchy mouth and throat. Luckily, that goes away completely when taro is cooked.

With a crunchy exterior and pillowy, starchy, nutty, goodness inside, these irresistible fritters get a drizzle of a garlicky olive oil green sauce that gives it that extra punch.

Yields: 12 fritters; 6 servings as a side

1½ pounds taro root

1 large shallot, minced

2 garlic cloves, minced

1½ teaspoons Dijon mustard

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

¾ teaspoon fine sea salt

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2–3 tablespoons cornstarch

1 cup frying oil, such as peanut or

Green Sauce

Yields: 1 cup

2 large cloves garlic

2 cups packed aromatic green leaves such as arugula, parsley, cilantro or basil

1 teaspoon fine sea salt

1 good grind of fresh pepper

1 tablespoon sherry or red wine vinegar

Drop the garlic into a food processor with the blade running and let it chop. Open the lid and add the leaves with salt and pepper. Pulse to chop the leaves fairly well, then add vinegar. Pulse again to incorporate, then turn the blade on and add the olive oil in a stream. Process until smooth and incorporated. Taste to adjust seasoning if necessary. If not using it right away, it will keep a couple of weeks

Charred Squash in Vinaigrette

Although most of us are familiar with winter squashes such as acorn or butternut, there are actually hundreds of varieties—most of which do not reach the market. Each has a di erent nuance and sugar content, and cutting open one from The Utopian Seed Project can be like opening a mystery gift. The one we used for our recipe is akin to a butternut squash, but more highly flavored than most from the grocers. The sugars inherent to the vegetable make it easy to char, giving this room temperature salad a further depth of flavor. Yields: 6 servings as a side

3-pound winter squash such as butternut

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

Salt and freshly ground pepper

2 tablespoons red wine or sherry vinegar

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

2 garlic cloves, finely minced

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil

3 tablespoons toasted chopped walnuts

2 tablespoons chopped fresh herbs such as parsley, mint, tarragon or chives

½ cup crumbled feta cheese

Heat oven to 400°F.

Peel and seed the squash and cut into ¾-inch cubes. Toss with 1 tablespoon of olive oil, salt and pepper, and place in one layer on a baking sheet. Roast for approximately 10 minutes, until it begins softening but is still quite firm to the bite.

Turn on the broiler and place squash directly under it, watching until small parts of it char, while most remains golden brown, 2–5 minutes. Turn the squash over and broil the other side. Timing will vary for each kind of squash as sugar contents range widely. Remove from the heat and cool to room temperature.

Whisk together the vinegars, mustard, garlic and oils. Add salt and pepper to taste. Drizzle the vinaigrette over the room-temperature squash.

Place dressed squash in a bowl or platter and sprinkle the walnuts, herbs and feta on top. This dish is best served right away, but will keep in the refrigerator for a couple of days. Bring to room temperature before serving.

Yacon Berry

Cobbler

Yacon is a most inspiring and delightful crop and such a pleasure to experiment with. This Andean root looks like a sweet potato but has a much di erent texture. It is sometimes referred to as a ground apple and comes from the same family as sunchokes, dahlias and sunflowers. The flavor has been described as a cross between a Granny Smith apple and celery, and we are finding that yacon works well in many recipes where an apple works.

This cobbler includes berry juice for fun and color. Bake in individual portions and serve warm, topped with vanilla or buttermilk ice cream.

Yields: 6 portions

2 cups mixed berry juice

2½ pounds yacon, peeled, cut into ¼-inch cubes and soaked in lemon water to prevent browning

½ teaspoon almond extract

1 cup coconut sugar, divided, plus more for sprinkling

2 cups all-purpose flour

¼ cup almond flour

Fine sea salt

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 stick cold unsalted butter

1 cup cold heavy cream, plus more for brushing

Fresh berries

Fresh basil leaves

Vanilla or buttermilk ice cream

Preheat oven to 375°F.

In a small saucepan, bring the berry juice to a boil and reduce to about ½ cup. Drain the yacon and discard the liquid. Put drained yacon into a bowl along with the reduced juice, almond extract and ¾ cup of the sugar, ¼ cup of the flour and ½ teaspoon of salt. Set aside.

In the bowl of a food processor combine the remaining flour, almond flour, ¼ cup of sugar, baking powder and ½ teaspoon salt. Cut the butter into rough pieces and add, then process the butter into the flour mixture until it has the consistency of coarse crumbs. Add the cream and pulse to just combine.

Thoroughly butter either an 8- by 8-inch baking pan or 6 cup-size ovenproof ramekins, and distribute the yacon mixture evenly. Crumble

the topping as evenly as possible over the top and brush with cream; sprinkle generously with sugar. Place the pan(s) on top of a sheet pan. Bake about an hour, or 45 minutes for individual pans, until the filling is bubbling and the topping is golden. Tent with foil if the crust browns too quickly. Let cool. Serve with berries on top, ice cream and a chi onade of fresh basil.

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The Spice & Tea Exchange

46 Haywood St #101

Downtown Asheville

Well Seasoned Table

Wellseasonedtable.com

WNC Farmers Market

570 Brevard Rd

Asheville

HOME & DESIGN

Beverly Hanks - Eddie Delaney

Cell: 828-551-8637

O ce: 828-251-1800

Grovewood Gallery

111 Grovewood Rd #2

Grovewood Village, Asheville

Je rey, The Jewel of Asheville

20 Artful Way, Ste 101

River Arts District, Asheville

Mountain Vista Properties 118 Broadway Ave

Black Mountain

River Arts District

Riverartsdistrict.com

RESTAURANTS

The Blackbird

47 Biltmore Ave

Downtown Asheville

Cultura

147 Coxe Ave

South Slope, Asheville

Dilbar

5 Biltmore Avenue, Suite A

Downtown Asheville

Fork Lore

43 Town Square Blvd

Biltmore Park Town Square

Gemelli

70 Westgate Pkwy

Westgate Parkway, Asheville

Jargon 715 Haywood Rd

West Asheville

The Lobster Trap 35 Patton Ave

Downtown Asheville

Mehfil

5 Biltmore Ave, Ste B

Downtown Asheville

Mikasa Criolla

56 Patton Ave

Downtown Asheville

Rocky’s Hot Chicken Shack

Multiple Locations

Arden | West Asheville

Strada Italiano

27 Broadway St

Downtown Asheville

Sunny Point Cafe 626 Haywood Rd

West Asheville

Tastee Diner 575 Haywood Rd

West Asheville

Yum Poke Spot

Multiple Locations

Downtown Asheville | South Asheville

Zella’s Deli

48 College St

Downtown Asheville

Enj漀礀 t栀攀 Art 漀昀 Liv渀퀀

GRAZING TABLES

THE SOCIAL ROOM

TASTING EVENTS

317 7th

Experience a curated selection of quality wines and whiskeys paired with our culinary team’s handcra ed artisan charcuterie boards. Live music lls our space, as you reunite with old friends and connect with new neighbors as Claywood reminds us to … Enjoy the Art of Living

Our founder, Robert Ingle, saw a need to invest in smaller towns and rural communities throughout the Carolinas that were being unsupported by large grocery chains. So, he opened the 昀椀rst Ingles supermarket in Asheville, North Carolina in 1963 working primarily with local farmers to get their product into the hands of consumers.

Today, we continue building on our founder’s ambitious dreams of supporting underserved and local communities, farmers, and producers. Together with our customers we proudly provide assistance to more local children and families, schools and universities, athletic and arts programs, and those hungry and in-need than any other grocery store in the southeast. WHERE

ingles-markets.com