While I nibbled on an oozy croissant stuffed with a Mallorcan Chorizo, spread the spicy taste of paprika washed control over my senses. After this smoky start in my life, I walked towards a pop-up offering Filipino barbecue. I was attracted by the sour smell of caramelized pork skewers in a soy-based glaze. After that, I had an enticing bowl of ceviche and the frozen pisco bad, taking in the sweet citrus. These kinds of extraordinary food experiences are becoming more commonplace in Asheville, the town of immigrants that has a vibrant, diverse community. While on a recent trip to Asheville in the North Carolina mountains, I encountered four individuals who are shaping the City’s culinary scene.
Family-style Filipino Food
The first thing that Silver Iocovozzi was taught to make was rice. His mom always had a pot of rice ready upon his return. “Rice has texture and warmth and steam and gumminess,” Iocovozzi declares. “It gives you the comfort of cooking.”
Iocovozzi was known as “Neng Junior” after his mother, whom he calls “Neneng” to her friends. He grew up as a child in North Carolina, but his mother’s Filipino culture played an important influence in his childhood. As a family, they enjoyed American staples such as Campbell’s soup and grilled cheeses; Iocovozzi also cherished the moments when his mom cooked eggs fried along with onions and tomatoes, the slender pile of rice that was served with banana ketchup essential ingredient in the Filipino pantry.
These memories of food prompted Iocovozzi to launch Neng Jr., which is a restaurant with 17 seats situated in West Asheville, in the summer of 2022. (This year, it’s a finalist in the James Beard Award for Best New Restaurant.) The standout dish is the duck adobo, which is rich with crispy and juicy skin with a rich and coconut-forward sauce. Another option is ice cream, which is made from strong cheddar and mimolette. Mimolette is a tough French cheese that is similar to the keto or sorbets that are sold on the streets of the Philippines.
The decor of the restaurant is a colorful celebration of LGBTQ culture. The central piece of art is of Drake Carr, showing Iocovozzi’s mother in a stunning yellow dress and a chef right to her left and other queer individuals with vibrant colors around the scene. From the dress hangs an orange ribbon, which Iocovozzi believes symbolizes the recollection of traditional values and recipes over the years.
Neng Jr.’s is already gaining traction in the City as one of its most sought-after tickets (reservations are usually booked one month in advance). Iocovozzi adds, “I just try to emulate that friendly or familial quality of a gathering at a house where everyone’s in the kitchen and hanging out, watching while you cook.”.
Street-style Indian Food
A lot of eateries within the U.S. have a similar menu to northern India, such as tandoori chicken paneer saag and chicken tikka masala. It’s not the food Meherwan Irani was eating in Maharashtra, which is located in the western region of India. “Naan was something I ate maybe once a year,” Meherwan Irani declares. However, spiced snacks that are served with sauces, known as Chaat, as well as other street food, are food items “that every Indian can relate to — it’s affordable and approachable.”
The reason is that Irani’s first eatery, Chai Pani, which opened in 2009, features the best dishes of his youth: uttapam, a pancake made of a rice-and-lentil batter, as well as the chicken pakora that is succulent and crisply fried with a curry-chickpea topping as well as his most-loved dish, bhel puri which is a refreshingly sweet and crunchy mix of puffy rice dried chickpeas, chopped chickpeas, and cilantro, as well as onions. All mixed with tangy tamarind, green herbs, and spicy garlic Chutneys.
It has proven to be a massive triumph: Irani is now a five-time James Beard Foundation Award semifinalist for the title of Best Chef in the Southeast and, in the past, won the Outstanding Restaurant category of the foundation. Additionally, in Asheville, Irani operates Spicewalla and Spicewalla, a spice shop, as well as Buxton Hall, which is a barbecue restaurant. He also founded Buxton Chicken Palace inside the new S&W Market, a food hall that he created.
For Irani, his feeling of becoming Indian in the sense of calling South home is a crucial part of the narrative about his meals. “Sometimes that requires being completely true to the way the dish would’ve been made in India, and sometimes that means changing it to a version that’s appropriate for where you are,” Irani states. “And I am in the American South.”.
Heritage and Hops
Asheville is a city of beer, and up until the time Morgan Owle Crisp launched 7 Clans Brewing in the year 2017, the area was not home to any Indigenous-owned brewery, despite the region being the location of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians that Owle-Crisp is a part of. In the year 2018, the brewery launched an ale with a blonde hue that has corn in the form of a hint in a nod to Selu as the mother figure of the Cherokee stories of creation, which was the name given to one of the first plants to grow corn. In 2018the brand launched two chestnut brown ales and an IPA, and stores across the state soon sold the beer.
The brewery now offers seven different beers as well as seasonal variations that rotate. “The variety of ingredients that you can use to capture time and place was important to me,” Owle-Crisp mentions, referring back to native plants such as chestnuts, corn, and strawberries, which she incorporates into her brews.
The business has caused some controversy within her local community. In the past, there’s been a stigma surrounding Native groups and drinking 1832. When in 1832, the U.S. government even banned the sale of alcohol in the United States to Indigenous people. Before the tribal council approved an ordinance in 2021, alcohol was not permitted in the Qualla Boundary (which is the area belonging to the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians), with the exception of Casinos. Therefore, when Owle-Crisp was searching for a place to open, “even when I had access to my tribal lands, I had to go outside of the community.” She launched the taproom at Biltmore Village, south of downtown.
“Even people who live in North Carolina sometimes forget there are Native people,” she declares. “For me the brewery was a way to say that we are still here.”.
If you inquire around town, everyone will inform you that Curate Tapas Restaurant, which is a popular tapas spot, is a must-visit. Curate’s chef is the South Carolina native Katie Button, who pivoted into the world of cooking after leaving the Ph.D. program in neuroscience. Her first job was working at Cafe Atlantico in Washington, D.C. -where she also got married to her husband, Felix Meana. The couple later moved to the town of Meana’s birthplace, Roses, Spain, to work at Ferran Adria’s renowned El Bulli.
They married in 2011 and made the move to Asheville with hopes of building a home and an eatery. (Meana is a co-owner of Curate.) They pondered different cities, but the decision was made to go to Asheville. Button remembers, “driving into Asheville — I swear this happens to a lot of people, it’s not just me — there was this moment where we said, ‘Oh my gosh, this is it.’ “
A focus on Spanish food is a natural choice. Curate’s menu is easy and allows the great products and food items to be highlighted. Naturally, they serve perfectly thinly cut jamon Iberico of bellota, made from acorn-fed porcine. Also, there’s pulp a La Gallega, a Galician-style octopus dish that is spiced with olive oil, sea salt, and a hint of the spice paprika. The most popular item to order is berenjenas con mel, which is crisp, warm slices of cooked eggplant drenched in honey (even better when served with homemade rosemary Ice Cream). In the past year, Button and Meana opened La Bodega by Curate, which is a cafe and wine bar that sells Spanish products. It’s just right across the street from the main restaurant.
