We ate dinner at Lulu’s on Main in Sylva tonight.  It’s a nice little restaurant and was pretty busy for a Friday night.  They have a lot of vegan and vegetarian dishes.  We started off with The Frenchy, which is goat cheese, olives and French bread.

I’m a big fan of goat cheese, so I really liked this appetizer.  Loren ate the olives and I scarfed most of the bread and cheese.  The French bread was really good.  Our entrees came with salads.  Loren got the szechaun dressing and I tried the lemon dill.

I didn’t get a lot of lemon flavor in the dressing, just the dill.  Loren liked his more than I did, which also went for our entrees.  He ordered the portabello mushrooms.

They were served with a garlic mashed and broccoli.  There was a lot of mushrooms on the plate, he couldn’t even finish them all.  He liked the flavor of the sauce and was surprised to discover that he enjoyed almonds on his mashed potatoes too.  I ordered one of the specials which was a sweet potato and black bean enchilada.

It was a little too spicy for me and I just didn’t enjoy the overall texture of the dish.  It was all too soft and there wasn’t any contrast in flavors.  We also ordered the white chocolate cheesecake for dessert.

This was a big disappointment to me.  This was not the texture that I believe cheesecake should have.  This had a gelatin rubbery texture that completely ruined it for me.  Cheesecake should melt in your mouth; this did not.  The cookie crust was good though.  Total bill was $39.

Lulu’s On Main
612 W Main St
Sylva, NC
(828) 586-8989

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We stopped in Bryson City for dinner tonight at Pasqualinos Italian Restaurant.  Unfortunately, out of all the places we ate on vacation, this one ended up being at the bottom of the list.  From start to finish, service and flavor were lacking.

The restaurant was understaffed and the waiter we had was clueless.  He was completely overwhelmed with the number of tables he had and other people working in the restaurant did more for our table and other tables of his, than he did.

Once we finally got our order placed, they brought some bread to the table.

The bread sticks were ok, but the dipping sauce had way too much balsamic vinegar in it for my taste.  Our dinners came with soup or salad, so we got one of each.

The pasta fagioli was like mush with no flavor whatsoever.  I never put salt on my food and this needed it desparately.  It was so bland and a foreshadow of everything else to come.

Loren ordered the ribeye for his entree.  They actually had another steak special tonight but we didn’t know about it until we heard our waiter tell another table.

The steak was cooked well, but again lacked any seasoning whatsoever.  Same with the marinara sauce.  It tasted like tart tomatoes with no spices at all.  A sauce has to cook for a lot longer in order to mellow that tartness.   I ordered the fettucine alfredo.

The sauce was creamy, but again lacked in flavor.  The alfredo sauce at Olive Garden is much better.   Despite my better judgment, I ordered a piece of French Silk pie to go.

It would have been much better without the Hershey’s syrup drenching it.  I couldn’t even taste the pie.  Total bill with a drink was $41.  This is not a place we’d recommend.

Pasqualinos Italian
25 Everett Street
Bryson City, NC
(828) 488-9555

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On our fourth day of vacation we headed over to Brevard to see some waterfalls and stopped for lunch at The Falls Landing.  The downtown area of Brevard had lots of little shops and cafes and I’m glad we ended up where we did.  The food, service and atmosphere were wonderful here.  This is another one of those restaurants that “gets it”.

We started off with a bowl of clam chowder.

It had a wonderful creamy texture and flavor.  One of those dishes where after the first bite, Loren kept trying to slide it closer and closer to his side of the table.  For his entree, he ordered the salmon BLT with a side salad.

He immediately declared that bacon and salmon are a wonderful combination.  The salmon was cooked perfectly and he was one happy guy.  I ordered the French Dip with fries.

This was also very tasty and the au jus was perfect.  So many places make it way too salty, but this was just right.  The fries were addictive.   Once I heard the list of desserts, there just wasn’t any way that I was passing up the molten chocolate lava cake.

Warm, moist chocolate cake oozing with chocolate sauce, plus some vanilla ice cream and whipped cream and I was one happy gal.  I definitely needed to do more hiking to walk off this lunch.  If you’re in Brevard, definitely give this place a try.  Total bill with a drink was $35.

The Falls Landing
18 East Main St
Brevard, NC
828-884-2835

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After a day of hiking, we stopped in Franklin, NC for dinner at the Cajun Connection Cafe.  This was the tastiest meal we had on our entire vacation.   We started off with some calamari and Loren got a side salad.

The calamari was a little chewy, but had a nice crunch to it.  It had a little bit of spice and the dipping sauce was tasty.  Loren decided to get a mini sampler which included jambalaya, gumbo, and creole.

Though he enjoyed the other two, the jambalaya was definitely his favorite.  It had all the right flavor components with just the right amount of spice.  If we’re ever back this way again, he’d be getting a big ol’ bowl of the jambalaya.  I ordered the crawfish etouffee.

Though it could have used a few more crawfish, the dish was delicious.  Not too spicy, but with an amazing flavor and texture.  After a long day hiking, it really hit the spot.  We couldn’t pass up the bread pudding and I wanted some chocolate cake for later.

The bread pudding was yummy.  We needed more sauce because it was very tasty too.  The chocolate cake was moist and made a great late night snack.  Overall, this was the most flavorful meal we had in North Carolina.  Definitely a place to check out if you’re in the area.  Total bill with a drink was $41.

Cajun Connection Cafe
549 Highlands Rd
Franklin, NC
828-369-6288

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We ate lunch in Cashiers, NC at the Cornucopia Restaurant.  It’s got a big open dining area, but since the weather was so gorgeous, we decided to eat on the patio.  The soup of the day was corn chowder and I had to have some.

It was yummy.  Fresh sweet corn made the difference in this dish.  It was creamy and delicious.  I opted for the California BLT.

It was a pretty thick sandwich.  The bacon was a little too crispy for my taste, but the avocado was fresh and delicious.  This was a really tasty sandwich.  Loren got the knockwurst and if I thought mine was too big to fit in my mouth, his was even bigger.

Knockwurst and bacon on the same sandwich along with a jamaican salsa that Loren really liked.  We also got a side of cheese fries.

 I’m not sure if they oversalted the fries or if it was the cheese that made them salty.  The cheese had a wonderful flavor to them though.  Total bill was $30 with a drink and definitely one of the better meals we’ve had on vacation.  The food was fresh and tasty and the entire experience was a good one.

Cornucopia
16 Cashiers School Road
Cashiers, NC
828-743-3750

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We stopped for lunch at Highlands Smokehouse.  We were on our way to Glen Falls and decided to eat lunch before hiking the trails.   For an appetizer, we decided to split a bowl of Brunswick stew.

Best thing we ate here.  It had just a hint of spice along with some meat and lots of veggies, including okra.  It was really tasty.  Normally I don’t like hushpuppies, but this one  just tasted like cornbread to me.  As for the rest of the meal, we weren’t as impressed.

Loren got a half rack of ribs with collard greens and baked beans.

He said the ribs were ok, but didn’t really have a lot of smokey goodness.  He did like the beans, but the collard greens had a really odd flavoring to them.  I thought they tasted like sweet dill pickles.  He didn’t like them at all.  I got a pork sandwich with corn pudding and mashed sweet potatoes.

I did not like the taste of the pork.  It wasn’t smokey and it had an odd aftertaste.  It’s hard to describe.  It was really moist and almost had a beer like flavor to it.  That’s probably not the right flavor, but whatever it was, it just didn’t do it for me.  The corn pudding sort of tasted like scrambled eggs with lots of pepper.  The mashed sweet potatoes were ok, but would have been so much better if they were served with a cinnamon butter.  Overall, not the best BBQ we’ve had.  Total bill was $35.

Highlands Smokehouse
595 Franklin Road
Highlands, NC
(828) 526-5000

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