Hello again! Welcome to another post about the city of Raleigh, NC! Last week, I showed you guys all of the free attractions in Raleigh and the surrounding areas that you can check out without spending a dime, which means that if you follow my advice, you’ll be left with so much money to spend on FOOD!
While I was there, I realized that Raleigh is such a foodie destination. There are so many restaurants that serve quality food and are located in beautiful venues, which is why I’ve decided to compile a short list of four of the most Instagram worthy restaurants in Raleigh.
My friends Jessica and Michael and I literally chose these restaurants based on blog reviews, Instagram posts (cough cough… thank you @raleighfoodpics), as well as how good the food looked from pictures and how well it photographed.
All I can say is: all of these spots and dishes lived up to our expectations.
Vidrio
Vidrio means “glass”, which will totally make sense to you when you walk through that (really fancy) door and see the décor for yourself. The entire main wall of the restaurant is entirely covered in glass bowls and orbs. It’s mesmerizing!
Since restauranteur Lou Moshakos is Greek, Vidrio focuses on Mediterranean cuisine: they serve sharing plates both large and small, and offer a seasonal menu of only the freshest ingredients. They also have the longest wine list if you’re into that.
Since the restaurant looks rather fancy, Jessica, Michael and I all thought that the shareable plates were going to be relatively small. Therefore, after munching on the freshly baked focaccia and olive oil at the beginning of the meal, we ordered two small shareable plates, the branzino ceviche and the charcuterie board, and then three main dishes: the whole grilled market fish – which also happened to be branzino that day, – the pissaladière flatbread (Jamon serrano, tapenade, anchovies and manchego) and the Harris Ranch Strip Steak, accompanied by roasted shallots, guanciale, potatoes and truffle mustard.
We were absolutely wrong with the quantities and ended up with way too much food. If there is one thing we have learned over that whole weekend is that North Carolinians do love their hearty portions!
The food was incredible, every dish left us entirely satisfied. You could taste the quality in the ingredients used. Some of them were even pretty rare: I would’ve never thought I’d be eating bresaola (a type of air-cured meat you can usually only find in Valtellina, a valley in the Alps of Northern Italy’s Lombardy region) in downtown Raleigh, but there it was, on my charcuterie plate!
INSTA VALUE: To be fair, the lighting inside the restaurant makes it hard to take amazing pics of your food, which sucks, because these dishes looked 10x better in real life. However, the venue is one of the most instagrammable locations I’ve ever been to. The wall covered in glass decorations is spectacular.
Venable
Venable Rotisserie Bistro is a cute restaurant in Carrboro, NC – just outside of Raleigh – that serves “elevated comfort food”. On top of that, they also serve brunch on both Saturday and Sunday mornings, which is the reason why we checked them out.
Both the regular menu and their brunch menu looked amazing. The best part about the latter is probably the fact that they offer an eggs benedict special that’s different every weekend. Way to be creative in the kitchen! Jessica actually ordered the Southwestern eggs benedict special, while I ordered a brioche French toast topped with Vermont syrup, whipped cream and fresh berries.
INSTA VALUE: The food served at Venable simply looks amazing both IRL and in pictures. If you sit at a table near the window, you’ll be blessed with good lighting and you’ll definitely get a money shot for your insta.
City Market Sushi
City Market Sushi is a tiny restaurant in downtown Raleigh that serves the cutest and most colorful sushi in the area. On top of that, not only is it pretty, but absolutely delicious too. As soon as I saw the rolls they served, I thought they looked a lot like the ones at Temakinho, my favorite sushi restaurant in Milan. Therefore, I was excited to try them.
First, we ordered an appetizer called Maguro Tataki, a seared tuna sashimi served with herbs and spices. It was really good and it left us hungry for more fish!
After that, we got four special rolls for the three of us to share. I believe we ordered the Orange Red, the Ultimate Rainbow, the Dragon Tuna and the Salmon Volcano. Some of the ingredients in them were pretty unusual, such as barbecue eel, soy paper and dragon fruit (check out their menu for a full list of their special rolls), but somehow, all of those flavors worked! Everything was spectacular, and we ended up being so satisfied with our meal.
However, there was something on the dessert menu that really caught our eye: the green tea crème brulée. None of us had ever seen it or tried it elsewhere, and we were all very curious. Turns out, that was delicious too!
INSTA VALUE: This place’s sushi rolls are incredibly pretty. Snap a pic, post it and step up your insta game.
Beasley’s Chicken + Honey
Okay, so. Beasley’s Chicken + Honey is apparently a downtown Raleigh institution as far as fried chicken and seasonal southern sides are concerned. We decided to check out this place because every blogger and every roundup of the best restaurants in Raleigh suggested we should pay them a visit. Therefore, we went there for Sunday brunch. There was a line. We waited in the rain for 30 minutes. Then we finally got a table. We ordered fried chicken and waffles, as well as biscuits and gravy. We waited for ten minutes. And then, we finally got our food. Well, that was the best fried chicken and waffles I have ever had, and I know my chicken and waffles; as a matter of fact, I am obsessed with fried chicken. This one’s a special one. It’s so crispy on the outside, so juicy on the inside, and is accompanied by sweet honey and a soft waffle: delicious. If you’re ever in Raleigh, do pay Beasley’s a visit: you might get the impression of being on the verge of a stroke after you’re done eating, and you’ll literally feel your arteries clog, but it is SO worth it. Their drink list (beers, cocktails and wine) is pretty bomb too.
INSTA VALUE: The chicken photographs well, but you’ll have to hope for a table by the window in order to get good lighting for your pics: the walls are of a deep burgundy color that looks amazing but seems to suck up all the natural light.
These are the best and most insta worthy restaurants we were able to find in Raleigh! Did we forget any? Make sure to let me know!