North Carolina
2024 USA TODAY Restaurants of the Year: How we decided who made the list
Catch named one of USA TODAY’s best restaurants of 2024 – Video
Take a look inside Catch in Wilmington, NC, named one of USA TODAY’s best restaurants for 2024
It’s one of the most common questions when visiting a new place: “Where should I go to eat?”
Answers can be found all around, whether you consult a well-traveled friend, strangers on social media or online reviews.
Allow us to introduce another option: Our inaugural list of 2024 USA TODAY Restaurants of the Year.
Plenty of other Best Restaurant lists exist, offering their take on standouts. So what makes our list stand out? For one, we pulled together the expertise of journalists who live in the places they cover. This is not compiled by writers who swooped into cities like Wilmington for a weekend.
The restaurants on this list are the ones we’d take our family members to for a special night out. If an old friend was visiting and asked where to eat, these are the restaurants we’d recommend.
“Our food writers live here, they work here, they eat here,” said project leader Liz Johnson, senior director at The Record and northjersey.com and a former food writer. “They know their beats. These may not be the fanciest restaurants in the U.S.A., though some are. These are the restaurants we want to eat at over and over again.”
Our list is also unique because it truly covers the country. Let’s hear it for representation of restaurants in cities beyond Los Angeles or New York. The list praises places in Bloomington, Indiana, and Shreveport, Louisiana.
The USA TODAY Network is made up of 200 sites in 42 states and our writers worked together to share favorite restaurants in the communities we cover. More than 150 restaurants were nominated, and that number was whittled down to 47, including two in North Carolina.
How many have you been to? Check out USA TODAY’s 2024 Restaurants of the Year.
A team of seasoned editors and writers considered the restaurants with great service, interesting atmospheres, and food that keeps you coming back.
They also looked for a spread full of different flavors and feels. The list includes a seafood shack, a Laotian restaurant, and a farm-to-table spot in an old Kentucky barn.
Now, we invite you to dig in and enjoy the USA TODAY Restaurants of the Year 2024, including Catch in Wilmington.
ASHEVILLE, N.C. (WLOS) — The North Carolina Arboretum has announced a new season of “Spring Into the Arb!”
The “Spring Into the Arb!” is in its second year, with its series of plant shows and sales, science and nature activities, music, and art, allowing people to reemerge and reconnect with nature.
The season begins with Nature Play Day on Saturday, March 14, continuing through April, May, and June with new activities every weekend.
TROLLS DRAW LARGE WEEKEND CROWD, FORCING N.C. ARBORETUM TO TEMPORARILY CLOSE
According to a news release, throughout the season, guests can enjoy the following:
- Asheville Orchid Festival, annual Ikebana and Rose shows
- Purchase plants at the Spring Plant Sale and Market
- Get back to their native roots with Native Azalea Day, Mountain Science Expo, and Nature Play Day
The series culminates with Bonsai in the Blue Ridge in June, according to the release.
The release says guests and members are invited to drop in on the newly-opened Arbor Eatery in the Arboretum’s Education Center, which is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily. Hours extend to 5 p.m. beginning April 1.
Spring Into the Arb events and programs are included with the regular Arboretum parking fee of $25 per vehicle. Arboretum Society Members get in free.
NC ARBORETUM MARKS BIRD DAY WITH WALKS, DEMOS AHEAD OF GREAT BACKYARD BIRD COUNT
According to the release, additional admission is required for the Asheville Orchid Festival and Bonsai in the Blue Ridge.
A full list of the Spring Into the Arb 2026 events includes:
- Nature Play Day: March 14
- Asheville Orchid Festival: March 28 to 29
- Music in the Mountains Day: April 4
- Arbor Day Celebration: April 11
- Native Azalea Day: April 18
- Mountain Science Expo: April 25
- World Bonsai Day: May 9
- Change of Seasons: Spring into Ikebana: May 16 to 17
- The Asheville-Blue Ridge Rose Society Exhibition: May 22 to 24
- The Arb in Focus: 40 Views for 40 Years: Opening May 23
- Spring Plant Sale and Market: May 29 to 30
- Bonsai in the Blue Ridge: June 4 to 7
For more information, visit here.
A copy of Michael Jordan’s 1983 “Sports Illustrated” cover debut sold for $229,360 on Saturday night at Goldin, obliterating the previous record for a graded magazine.
Before Saturday, the previous record was the $126,000 paid for Jordan’s 1984 SI debut in a Bulls uniform entitled “A Star Is Born.”
“Sports Illustrated” magazines are very common and people kept them, but collectors narrowed the category by making rarer newsstand copies most collectible, and graded condition of those copies to narrow the most desirable down further.
Then, in July, came PSA to challenge CGC in the grading space.
The record UNC Jordan, with teammate Sam Perkins on the cover, was the only PSA 9.6. The question is, with PSA’s grading just beginning, are there others our there?
It’s possible, but that Jordan issue presents a challenge because it has a gatefold that makes it more challenging to press out defects.
The big price will likely create a group of opportunists who will now take raw subscription copies of this issue and get them graded for potential arbitrage.
But it won’t be that easy. A CGC 8.0 newsstand edition sold for $4,636 in October.
Whether the big price also creates more grading and selling of rare magazines remains to be seen, but PSA’s entrance into the space has definitely turned heads.
PSA has graded more than 50 of this particular issue, the second most commonly graded after the “Star is Born” issue.
Darren Rovell is the founder of cllct and one of the country’s leading reporters on the collectibles market. He previously worked for ESPN, CNBC and The Action Network.
Warmer temperatures are bringing North Carolina’s ski season to a close, with several mountain resorts announcing closing dates. Beech Mountain will close after its annual Pond Skim on March 14, while Appalachian Ski Mountain plans to stay open through March 15 for its Meltdown Games.
Web Editor : Mark Bergin
Reporter : Eric Miller
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