The Market Place

The Market Place has been quietly doing the work for a long time now, the kind of downtown Asheville restaurant that doesn't need a gimmick to keep pulling people in. It plays it straight: seasonal American cooking, no theatrics, no trend-chasing menu that rewrites itself every few months. That steadiness is the whole case for it.

What confirms it is that the recognition hasn't been a one-off. A semifinalist nod for the restaurant itself, then one for the chef the following year — that's not a fluke of timing, that's a kitchen holding its line year over year while plenty of flashier rooms come and go around it.

Asheville has no shortage of restaurants chasing attention. The Market Place isn't chasing anything. It's just still here, still good, still worth the trip downtown.