The 39 Best Restaurants in Charleston
"Charleston already knew they loved Daniel Heinze's cooking—he was a long-standing Chef de Cuisine at McCrady's—but when he and his wife Bethany returned from California and started a series of pop-ups to begin testing menu items and concept for their neighborhood restaurant, they started a buzz about the inevitable opening that has hung around well past the place's launch. They've settled down into consistent excellence, with hints of McCrady's past in items such as the escargot—but make no mistake, the menu is very much their style of cooking, heralding favorite Lowcountry ingredients and showcasing them. There's charred sourdough, bright salads, almost always a mushroom dish, pastas and proteins like rabbit or yellowfin tuna to a in-season satsuma confection created from fruit gleaned from a friend's backyard. The cooking techniques are advanced but the plating is beautiful simplicity, and nothing about Vern's says stuffy." - Stephanie Burt
