Cúrate

Félix Meana and Katie Button, veterans of elBulli in Spain, converted Asheville’s former downtown bus depot into a stylish tapas bar. Cúrate means to cure oneself, which diners can do with traditional Spanish dishes such as Catalan sausage bocadillos, codfish salad, and honey-drizzled fried eggplant. This appeared in the July/August 2012 issue. Read Emma John’s feature on the North Carolina bluegrass scene.

Rock a few plates of tapas and don’t forget to pull back an Eclipse de Luna - a moonshine-based cocktail - and a few slices of jamon iberico. They are unlikely pairs, but so worth one of the top dining adventures in Asheville, NC.

Our Asheville food find is the amazing Spanish tapas style restaurant Cúrate. We stumbled upon Cúrate while doing some research on where to eat in Asheville. We looked no further when we read that the chef interned at El Bulli and that another founder of the restaurant was the Chef de Rang (front of the house service manager) of El Bulli. El Bulli was a restaurant near Catalonia run by famed chef Ferran Adrià. Ferran Adrià is highly regarded as the best chef in the world, and his Michelin 3-star establishment was considered the best restaurant in the world. Unfortunately, El Bulli is now closed and we will never get the opportunity to dine there. However, after eating at Cúrate in Asheville, I’m convinced I found an authentic taste of Spain right here in America. Who knew there was a tiny slice of Spain in North Carolina? Years ago, Paul and I fell in love with the flavors of Spain on a delicious trip to Madrid. We’ve been having Spanish hunger pangs ever since. Luckily, Cúrate came to our rescue and fulfilled all of our desires. Our dinner at Cúrate consisted of a pitcher of the best sangria we’ve ever had, accompanied by a series of tapas style dishes including gazpacho, jamon Iberico, meatballs, potatoes, and tomato spread on fresh-baked bread. The restaurant was bustling, but we still landed two of the best seats in the house by sitting at the bar and getting a front row seat of the intense preparation put into each dish.

Whether taking up permanent residence in the Blue Ridge Mountains, or passing through - Cúrate can not be missed. Three time James Beard nominated and one of Food & Wine’s Best New Chef’s, Katie Button brings all the rich authenticity of Spain to our mountain town. For menu and cocktail recommendations, visit Ramble + Wolf.