My husband and I are at Ridgecrest for a conference and will have time on Wed. to go somewhere else for dinner. Yeah!!!!
We would like to find a place with great food, but he does not have a coat and tie with him.

La Caterina Trattoria, on Pack Square

For tasty, old-fashioned southern style food served at a sweet B&B, make a dinner reservation at the Red Rocker Inn in Black Mountain. Here's the web page: www.redrockerinn.com
It's fun to stroll around the shops in downtown Black Mountain- and a good way to walk off the dinner. Hope this is helpful.

Ginger,
Gabrielle's at the Richmond Hill Inn. They say jacket suggested, but been there twice in business casual and had no problem.
Sinbad's down in Hendersonville. Middle Eastern food in a renovated home. Very comfortable and good food.
Many restaurants down in the downtown Pack Square area.

The two best restaurants in ASheville, by far, (IMO) are Salsa - casual carribean and Zambra - only slightly less casual Spanish tappas and wine bar. Both owned by same inspired chef.

Caveat: if you are a very traditional dinner, i.e. , steak and potato , then these would not be your best bets.

We went to Zambra and were very dissapointed. It was expensive, pretentious and worst of all out of bread. Most authentic tapas dishes are made to be eaten with bread and it's just ridiculous that they were out.

We did eat at a nice Italian place, Vincenzo's on Market street. Dressy casual would be fine for this place.