Sugar Beet Cafe

By Jonathan Welch Flavor: American Food 101 Ambiance: Bustling diner, degreased and organic Price: $6-$9 Where: 1185 Charlotte Hwy. #B, Fairview Contact: 628-0094 Hours: Wed-Fri, 7:30 a.m.-3 p.m.; Sat-Sun, 8 a.m.-3 p.m. Food writing isn’t exactly a science, but there are a few rules that seem to make the whole rigmarole work: Don’t make a […]

Easy target, low blow

I read Bill Branyon’s commentary [“Jack Cecil’s Serf City,” March 18]. The title is provocative, and the content is just what many of your subscribers may want to read. The article is also a classic one-sided jab at developers in general and Mr. Cecil in particular. Being a native of Asheville, and having seen large […]

A panoply of hikes for the taking

I felt so sorry for these folks from Abingdon, Va., who went to hike at Warren Wilson College and found that they had parked in the wrong place and were about to be towed [“Not Just a Walk in the Park,” Letters, March 18]. With thousands of miles of trails in our area, why hike […]

Bumpy rides

I greatly enjoyed Kristin McLeod’s March 11 column “On Bumper Stickers and Biking.” Her “rudest” bumper sticker reminded me of one I saw several years back: “I just got a gun for my wife. Best trade I ever made.” — Nancy James Seagrove Beach, FL

Celebrate tax day?

For years, individual Americans representing various “truth, honesty and protest” income-tax groups, including We the People (www.GiveMeLiberty.org), FairTax (www.FairTax.org), and Truth Attack (www.TruthAttack.org), have been striking from work annually on April 15 to spend the day at their local post office—or other visible public locations—distributing various pieces of literature on the subject to fellow Americans […]

Study the past before choosing future

The opera Dr. Atomic, recently shown on public TV and at local theaters as performed by the Metropolitan Opera, reminded me of the founding of the Atomic Age. It started at Los Alamos, N.M., as a top-secret government project, under the leadership of J. Robert Oppenheimer. The people of the United States were not aware […]

A question of priorities

“They ought to make the feller sell his horses if he ain’t feeding them,” I said to Jill. Jill is the nurse that administers my chemo every six weeks. She does nursing for a living and farms as a sideline, or maybe it’s the other way around. Once the usual medical questions are out of […]

Local farms could be in jeopardy

I just learned about H.R. 875, a disturbing bill that has been introduced in Congress, and I want to make sure everyone knows about it. This bill is called the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009. I encourage everyone to go investigate this bill. As far as I can tell, it has very little to […]

SoundTrack

Drawing inspiration from the ancient wisdom of the 13 Moon Mayan Dreamspell Calendar (a modern application of the Mayan calendar of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica), self-described “cosmic reggae” band Crystal Kind has established a musical niche of its own. At a recent Hookah Joe’s show, the band wove Mayan mysticism with Rastafarian philosophy and principles of Cosmic […]

Small Bites

Red Stag Grill: Adam Hayes, recently of Greensboro’s lauded (and LEED platinum) Print Works Bistro, will serve as executive chef of the Grand Bohemian Hotel’s restaurant in Biltmore Village, slated to open this week. The Red Stag Grill’s dinner menu, posted online at www.bohemianasheville.com, spotlights a wide selection of steaks and a variety of old-world […]

Bar Beat: Curras Dom

Tequila has, among the uninitiated, acquired a bit of a bad reputation. This is supposedly the stuff college students glug in their rotgut days or that’s simply shoved into legions of frozen margaritas on Cinco de Mayo. Unexpected delight: One of Curras Dom’s masterly concoctions, the surprisingly smooth and pleasing avocado margarita. Photo by Jonathan […]

PUSH Asheville Fashion (runway show)

Models at last Friday’s PUSH Asheville Fashion show walk the runway in clothing from these Asheville-based boutiques and designers: Hip Replacements, Terra Diva, Virtue, Frock, Union, Hunk, HoneyPot, Vintage Moon (46 Commerce St., Asheville, 225-2768), Custom (415 Haywood Rd. # A, West Asheville, 257-4007), Wink, Va Va Voom and Boga (32 Biltmore Ave., Asheville, 253-2642). […]