March 4, 2019

A photo preview of Peppervine, now open in SouthPark

The restaurant opened its doors on Friday

I often click around OpenTable, getting an idea of which restaurants are struggling to fill reservations and which are hard to get into. Recently, I was exploring the site when I noticed that Peppervine had opened up for reservations on March 1. I booked a table for two immediately.

March 1 was opening night for Peppervine, an ingredient-driven restaurant from Bill and Anita Greene, the couple behind popular Banner Elk restaurant Artisanal. And for opening night, it was incredibly smooth. Though service leaned towards slow, it wasn’t annoyingly slow, and the servers clearly studied and knew the menu. The restaurant is stunning, with the design centering around a wood installation from artist Alex Pate. Local art gallery Shain Gallery is overseeing a rotating selection of art that will decorate the restaurant. Still, you sense the newness of the Peppervine space; the shine and elegance is very much South Park and lacks the down-to-earth feel of Artisanal.

Chef Bill Greene and his staff looked comfortable in the kitchen, which is open to the dining room through a glass wall. Nearly every dish was a stunner. See below for a highlight of some of the dishes, and thoughts on each one. —Kristen Wile

Two bread options are available for purchase, yeast rolls (pictured) and pimento cheese scones. We asked the server to surprise us with one of them. We loved the yeast rolls he brought us; they were are airy yet moist and topped with salt. Our served joked he almost brought us both, and we wish he had. We’ll do that next time. Kristen Wile/UP

The Peppervine menu features more vegetables than you’d see from most kitchens, such as the butternut squash. It’s served with pickled bok choy over lebneh and was a deliciously complex dish, though we could’ve used a little more pickling on the bok choy. Kristen Wile/UP