A Locally Sourced, Farm to Table Girls Weekend

October, 2018

My sister in law Jenni and I chose Asheville, NC for our 2018 Girls Weekend.  When considering locations, we factor in driving distance, amount of activities to do, availability of lodging, and cost of various attractions.  Asheville is a great answer for all those categories!  I had been once before and Jenni had never been.  A quick Google search showed lots of places to eat, tons of houses for rent, and a short 5 hour drive. Sounds great!

We rented a house about 15 minutes outside of Asheville, which was cheaper than a hotel and gave us a lot of room to relax in.  Our plan was to eat good food, see the Biltmore, and do whatever WE wanted for a change.  It turns out, Asheville is a great little city for a weekend getaway.  

Here's our weekend in pictures!

Our first stop was for lunch on the outskirts of Nashville. I did a Google search and came up with Sweet P's BBQ. It got really good reviews, but you never really know what you are getting into. This was an excellent choice.

Brisket, Mac and cheese, potato salad, and a bacon chocolate chip cookie. Everything was good except the cookie, which was just ok. You couldn't taste any bacon, I think they just added it to get people to buy it, without really considering if the bacon was adding anything to the cookie.

Once we arrived in Asheville, we visited the Lexington Glassworks. It was super cool to see these guys blowing glass. All their creations were beautiful, and if I win the lottery they can do the lighting fixtures in my mansion.

I love these colors.

Cute sign waiting for us at check-in.

View from the back windows.

After exploring the house and relaxing a bit, we went off for our first dinner in Asheville.  That is when we became aware of just how hipster Asheville really is.  There are so many delicious sounding restaurants, but they all use the same adjectives to describe their food.  Locally sourced.  Farm to Table.  Asheville is all abuzz with these buzz words.  

I snagged us a reservation at Table.  The menu was interesting, the wine list was extensive.  They had an opening, it was perfect!  

There was bread service and a dish of olives. That's new. Loved the use of mismatched china!

Salt and pepper shakers are so 2017. Now we use dishes that are open so they can collect every germ possible. Bon Appetit!

The food was really good, although a bit... pretentious? Jenni got acorn pasta, which we thought would be from acorn squash. Nope, it was made with acorn flour, which I didn't even know was a thing. I had the sustainably caught monkfish with autumnal bean salad. It was really good.

I honestly don't remember what I got for dessert. It was cherry and the cookie was a gingersnap. It was way too sweet.

The next day we were up and on our way to the Biltmore House early.  Since October is their high season, we reserved a time to visit the house online before we left.  I highly recommend doing this.  We parked and had a bit of a walk in, but it was a lovely walk.

I did not realize when I took this picture that JMAN had been here before me...

If you have never been, you really should put the Biltmore Estate on your travel list.

I was a bit disappointed that we were visiting before Halloween and they were already decorating for Christmas.

Triple fireplace in the grand hall.

This photo does not do the scenery justice.

I loved this guy shushing people in the library.

All these books!

This ladder was as tall as I am.

Here's how you call for Mr. Carson.

So pretty. And grand.

Dumb waiter.

I cannot imagine using this laundry room.

After we toured the house, we shopped in all the shops, then went to the village on the estate for lunch.  Following lunch we went to the Biltmore Winery for a wine tasting and more shopping.

She crab soup is my favorite. I was so glad to find it on this cold day.

And in keeping with the seafood theme, I had a shrimp po boy.

We were exhausted after all that Biltmore fun, so we went back to our rental house and chilled.  It was so nice, I may have taken a nap but I don't exactly remember.  For dinner we decided to try a French restaurant, Bouchon.  It sounded good, all the ingredients were locally sourced, of course.  To be honest, it was the dessert menu that sold us!

Champagne!

Lobster ravioli. Uh, I ate seafood for lunch.

This was Nutella Cheesecake. It was as good as it sounds.

​The next morning we ate at a farm to table, locally sourced brunch place.  I must have been anxious to get home because I didn't take a single picture!  I also just realized I didn't take a single picture of Jenni, my travel companion.  Oh man, blogger fail!  After brunch we drove home, stopping at Cracker Barrel for lunch, where nothing is locally sourced. 

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