Best Restaurants in Asheville nc (Breweries too!)

We love visiting Asheville, North Carolina! The city has so much to offer — delicious food, awesome micro breweries, great hikes, and beautiful vistas. With so many great choices it can seem intimidating to know the best breweries to visit or what the best restaurants in Asheville NC are. To help you navigate this outdoor centric, foodie town we’ve created our personal food and brew tour to show you a bit of what the town has to offer. We definitely do not get to all of the best breweries or best restaurants in Asheville NC on this tour alone, so scroll down to see our suggestions beyond what we show in the video!

Best breweries in asheville nc

Burial Beer co.

If you could only go to one brewery, we would recommend Burial Beer Co. Their beers are fantastic! We tried almost everything they had on tap and were consistently blown away. Their beers were flavorful and well balanced. If you are doing a self guided brew tour, we suggest going to Burial first. This is not a brewery you want to be tipsy for. This is a spot you will want to remember and be able to appreciate the beer. P.S. Their menu was AWESOME! We ordered the mezze platter and were blown away. It was one of the best dishes we had all weekend.

funkatorium

The Funkatorium is Wicked Weed’s taproom dedicated to funky, farmhouse, and sour style beers. Even if you’re not into sour beers, it’s worth a visit. They have curated flights to choose from or you can get creative and build your own. If you’re feeling hungry you can order from their menu (which looked great). *Wicked Weed was acquired by Anheuser-Busch in 2017. Normally we avoid big name breweries, especially when there are dozen smaller, local, microbreweries we can’t get or try elsewhere, but we still feel this is worth a visit.

New belgium brewery

You’re probably familiar with Fat Tire from New Belgium Brewing. This Colorado based brewery which now has a brewery in Asheville, is the 4th largest micro-brewer in the US. Located near Hole Doughnuts in West Asheville, New Belgium has an incredible set up with a big green lawn out front to enjoy Asheville’s sunny weather, music, and food trucks. They have a ton of beers on tap that you cannot get elsewhere and we loved that any tips they receive are donated to a local charity, rather than being split between the servers. We ordered food from the Grilled Cheese lady, sat out on the lawn, and soaked up the sun with a great beer. It was pretty darn perfect.

grilled cheese food truck asheville outside of new belgium

Other notable breweries

There are over 30 breweries in Asheville. Leaving you with a lot of options, while the breweries above are our recommendation they are not necessarily the best. We suggest them for their uniqueness, the overall experience and vibe, or for their quality. Below are other breweries worth trying as well.

Zillicoah Beer Co is located about 12 miles from downtown Asheville in Woodfin, NC. It’s a bit of a hike compared to other breweries but came highly recommended by one of the bartenders at Burial. If someone from the best brewery in Asheville says this brewery is doing it right, it’s probably doing it right.
Green man brewery has a smaller selection of beers on tap and there beers were good, just not great. We liked the vibe of the bar, and both found a full beer to enjoy. It’s worth a stop but doesn’t make the top of our list.
Wedge Brewing located in Asheville’s River Art’s District is known for good food and great beer. We went a very long time ago, and remembered enjoying the ambiance and our drinks. They have a great patio area, and is a perfect spot on a nice summer or fall day to enjoy a cool beer.

Best breakfast in asheville

We love breakfast, but don’t typically eat out for breakfast or brunch. Living on the RV, we can easily and quickly make a delicious breakfast. However, if you are a breakfast person, Asheville has some tasty breakfast spots. We’ve personally eaten at all of the recommended restaurants in previous visits and can attest to their deliciousness.

Sunny Point Cafe located in West Asheville offers traditional breakfast options with a unique twist. Almost always a wait, but worth it!
Biscuit Head has become one of the most popular breakfast joints in Asheville known for an array of southern biscuit and gravy combinations with enormous biscuits. While it is delicious, it’s become rather touristy and very busy. To avoid the crowd, go to the West Asheville location.
Over easy cafe is a must. They are making creative, flavorful, and beautiful dishes with local seasonal ingredients. Their menu changes often, so it’s always a new experience.
Hole Doughnuts (see below)

hole doughnuts

We love a good doughnut! After getting a serious fix of delicious doughnuts in Portland, OR we had to see what Asheville’s doughnut scene was all about. After careful deliberation, we decided to go to Hole Doughnuts in West Asheville — and we are glad we did! There are only four doughnut flavors to choose from

Vanilla Glazed
Toasted Almond Sesame Cinnamon
Cinnamon Sugar
Seasonal flavor that changes weekly

Every doughnut is made to order right in front of you. Hand formed from their yeasted dough recipe, fried to perfection in rice oil, then hand glazed and dressed for your eating pleasure! This place gets busy, so don’t be surprised if you have to wait in line — it’s worth it! If Hole Doughnuts doesn’t seem like your style, you can get more traditional doughnuts from Vortex who also uses great quality ingredients, made in house daily with no trans-fat oils.

Best Lunch in asheville

Chai Pani now with several locations throughout the southeast (including Ponce City Market in Atlanta) serves creative Indian style street food. A great spot for those who enjoy Indian or are feeling adventurous!
White Duck Taco has several locations allowing you to get your taco on across the city. They have traditional taco and creative ones you won’t see elsewhere. It’s casual, fast, and delicious!
Sierra Nevada Brewery is a massive brewery that has a tasting room, tour of the brewery, and great menu. While it may seem silly to go a brewery for lunch, their food is worth it and you’re almost guaranteed to have a good time.
Burial Beer Co not only has amazing beers, but truly has incredible food! The chef at the restaurant was a James Beard nominated chef for Asheville’s Cucina 24 (a great dinner spot). We would go back just for their food!
Buxton Hall BBQ is one of the few restaurant on this list we haven’t personally eaten at, but it has been recommended to us time and time again. If you like BBQ, we’ve been told this is one of the best BBQ spots in all of Asheville.

Best dinner in asheville

Rhubarb

The last time we went to Asheville, we were able to snag a spot at Rhubarb. We had no idea what was in store for us. Their menu is seasonal, local, and so creative. Their portions are smaller, more like a tapa size plate than an entree, but we loved everything we ordered! Their cocktails were also very creative and delightful.

Limones or en La Calle

We didn’t visit Limones this trip but instead opted for their neighboring, sister restaurant, En la Calle. Known for their unique Mexican and Central American influenced cuisine, your taste buds will thank you for dining at either of these restaurants. Both are seriously amazing and the top of our list for best restaurants in Asheville NC.

White labs

White labs is a brewery and restaurant melding the art of experimental fermentation. They use experimental yeast in their doughs and beers which creates a very unique and delicious menu for both food and drinks. We ordered the kimchi fries and a pizza and loved both, although the kimchi fries stole the show. Seriously, we will forever dream of these kimchi fries.

Other notable dinner restaurants

It’s hard to find a bad spot to eat in Asheville. You really can’t go wrong. The restaurants above are our favorite, but other notable restaurants you may want to give a try are below.

Curate is known as Asheville’s best restaurant, and is from a James Beard award winning chef Katie Button serving authentic Spanish tapas and dishes. This restaurant is extremely tough to get a reservation at. We ended up snagging a canceled reservation (you can sign up for this here) and finally got to see what this restaurant was made of. While the food was good, it wasn’t the best we’ve ever had. It’s definitely worth a visit, and if you haven’t been to Spain, Curate’s tapas are authentic, but we feel Asheville has other incredible restaurants to try.
Plant is an upscale, vegan, plant based restaurant that is getting a ton of recognition for their innovative menu. We haven’t eaten here yet, but it’s next on our list! We’ve only heard incredible reviews and honestly their menu is drool worthy!

We hope you enjoyed this guide to the best restaurants and breweries in Asheville, NC. We would love to hear what your favorite breweries and restaurants are in Asheville in the comments below.

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Liz & Dennis

ESRV Team

We’re two travel-loving, real estate investing, foodies exploring North America as full-time RV’ers. This blog is where we share our lessons learned, tips and tricks, and favorite places to eat, see, and RV across North America! We hope it helps you find your wanderlust, plan and prepare for RV life, and get out on the road!

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