How an insurance adjuster’s food reviews brought some joy to Western NC after Helene
For the last eight years, Tony Prieto has been an insurance adjuster. Born and raised in Miami, he had a lot of experience inspecting hurricane damage in his home state. But when an opportunity to come up to Western North Carolina in the wake of Hurricane Helene arose, he decided a change of scenery was in order for him and his chow-shepherd mix, Dr. Hunter S. Thompson.
“I always wanted to go to Asheville. I just never wanted to go to Asheville like this,” Prieto said from his home back in Miami. “But I was happy I went.”
So are a number of Western North Carolina locals who have come to know Prieto through his posts on the Asheville Foodies Facebook group, celebrating restaurants in Asheville and beyond that have reopened in the wake of the storm.
Creating community
“My very nice server asked if I wanted sausage gravy with my biscuit. I looked at her and wanted to say, ‘Lady, I’m fat, of course I want gravy.’ Instead, I remembered I’m in the South and just said, ‘Yes, ma’am.’” — Prieto on Sunny Point Cafe in Asheville
From his first post about visiting The Cuban Guy in Waynesville on Oct. 18 to his final stop at Chai Pani on Nov. 25, he received thousands of likes, hundreds of comments and the love and appreciation of a whole new group of people.
“Thank you for seeing this place with new eyes and reminding us how lucky we are,” commented Amanda Sexton.
That’s exactly what Prieto, 49, hoped to accomplish when he started writing.
“I don’t care if you’re laughing at me or with me. I just wanted people to laugh,” he said. That, and encourage people to eat at these restaurants so that they survive. “Go spend money at these places. They’re open,” he said.
But, as he stressed repeatedly, the love he gave our local food scene was returned many times over.
“I got a few comments where it was, like, ‘Oh, you were the guy we needed at the worst time. Those really affected me, because I didn’t really realize that I was really making people happy,” Prieto said, his voice strained with emotion.
Trying to lift people’s spirits
“The spice chart goes up to ‘Extra Hot.’ I like spicy, but as I had a few more hours of work, I wasn’t sure if my stomach would cooperate. I’m the idiot who puts more and more hot sauce on food even though I’m sweating like a fat kid in a sauna. Not a good look on a date, but I was running solo.” — Prieto on Rocky’s Hot Chicken Shack in Asheville
It all started with a short post on Asheville Foodies on Oct. 11. “Hi ‘y’all!’ I’m a huge foodie and I’m gonna be working in Asheville as an adjuster for awhile. Can you point me to the best restaurants that are open?”
Recommendations flooded in: Nine Mile, Rocky’s Chicken Shack, Luella’s Bar-B-Que, The Madness and others.
Given his Cuban heritage, Prieto initially sought out local Cuban eateries, starting with The Cuban Guy in Waynesville, where he praised the restaurant for getting its bread from La Segunda Bakery in Tampa, the oldest surviving Cuban bakery in the United States.
“I’ll be back!” he wrote.
He was inspired to write, he said, because he kept hearing Helene’s survivors say that they didn’t think they could come back from their losses. “That’s not true. I know better. I’m from Florida, I’ve dealt with this a lot,” he said. “So I just started writing my stupid, self-deprecating stories.”
The members of Asheville Foodies didn’t see his writing that way. That first post about The Cuban Guy got more than 1,400 likes, 185 comments,and 75 shares.
And, of course, more suggestions.
Becoming a beloved reviewer
“I didn’t know my coffee drink was iced, nor did I know it would look like a little girl’s milkshake. As you may know by now, I have no shame. I probably had whip cream all over my overgrown beard and I was licking the glass, until I noticed a woman looking at me. That’s when I ran out like a little girl,” — Prieto on Panacea Coffeehouse, Cafe, and Roastery in Waynesville
Over the next six weeks, Prieto wrote nearly 30 posts about his food adventures in Asheville. He fell in love with the meatloaf — a dish he hated as a child and always avoided — at Beach Mountain Diner in Waynesville. He visited the WNC Farmers Market and was blown away: “A farmers market open all week? I’ve never seen so many varieties of jams, jellies, and honey.”
He even ended up getting recognized at an outdoor Halloween block party in West Asheville.
The diversity of the cuisine was a pleasant surprise to Prieto. “I thought I was just going to have some Southern food and barbecue,” he said. Though at one point, he did eat so many biscuits that he needed a break from them.
While he rarely found a dish he didn’t like, a few places stood out. He loved Cousins Cuban Cafe in Black Mountain, writing “the mojo roasted pork is as good or better than any Cuban restaurant I’ve ever had in Miami and Tampa.” He visited Beach Mountain Diner twice, he enjoyed it so much. Panacea Coffee Company warranted three visits, it was so good.
Then there was Juancho’s Fonda, a restaurant that serves gluten-free Colombian food, about which Prieto wrote, “I have been to Colombia. I have eaten at many Colombian restaurants in Miami. This might have been my best Colombian meal.” He had the Bandeja Paisa, the restaurant’s version of Colombia’s national dish that combines pork belly, steak, chorizo, egg, rice, beans, plantains and avocado.
But it wasn’t just the praise for the food that drew people in. It was the personality that came through: lighthearted, jovial and full of humor. Take his review of Leo’s House of Thirst in West Asheville, where Prieto wrote about eating a chicken liver mousse “like it was a jello pudding” and steak tartare that “was like biting into a cow.” (In a good way.)
“If you write a book I’d buy it,” one commenter responded.
On Prieto’s final day in the area, he was even recognized while dining at Chai Pani by an older man who asked for a picture and asked if he was really leaving.
“The response was insane,” Prieto said.
A different class of people
Prieto was also bowled over by the people he met doing his inspections, most of which were residential. Over and over again, he heard stories of neighbors helping neighbors – and even strangers helping strangers. One story that stayed with him came from an elderly couple, one of whom had dementia, whose mountain home flooded.
“The next morning, all his neighbors were outside. Like, 14 people were outside, digging out the mud,” Prieto recalled. “You just don’t see that in Miami.”
He was also amazed at how honest people were compared to his experiences in Florida, where people often attribute older home issues to storm damage. “For six weeks, nobody lied to me,” he said, fighting back tears.
“It’s just a different class of people.”
And from the responses to his posts, it’s clear that many people in Western North Carolina feel the same about Prieto. As one commenter wrote, “I think Asheville has officially adopted you. You come back home soon now, ya hear me?”
And Prieto plans to. He was so moved by the love he received from readers, as well as the depth of the community response, that he’s planning to move to Asheville. And he has a long list of places and dishes to try when he does.
This story was originally published December 27, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
