FOREST FAVORITE: A family-owned restaurant helps create community for five decades in Transylvania County.

• Author: Ellis, Kevin

Jeanne Hawkins stepped out of the kitchen just as the weekday lunch crowd started filtering out of her family's Pisgah Fish Camp, which will mark its 55th year in Transylvania County in September. She and co-owner Dana Turner, who is her oldest brother, consider their cooking time to be as vital as any other restaurant duties. "There's no sitting in the office and delegating," Jeanne Hawkins says. "It's hands-on."

Wearing a T-shirt and baseball cap, both sporting restaurant logos, she shared the recipe ofhow the 160-seat fish camp started by her father has thrived for many years. Its location on US 64/276, a few hundred yards from the entrance to the Pisgah National Forest, is a key factor. From the end of the school year until September, bicyclists and hikers who visit the 500,000-plus acre forest or Transylvania County's 250 waterfalls make it a favorite pit stop. Fall attracts leaf watchers. The holidays bring in family gatherings.

Hawkins points toward an older couple leaving, noting that they eat at the restaurant three or four times a week. The Pisgah Fish Camp enjoys its reputation as the place where local folks eat. Whenever she steps out of the kitchen, "I'll know four or five people sitting out here," she says.

The family patriarch, Dan Hawkins, started the restaurant in 1968, and remained active until a short time before his death in 2012. "I thought my dad was Superman," she says. "My dad was just a kind, caring man." A memorial photograph of Dan Hawkins and his wife of 59 years, Fran, who died the following year, is staged in a chair near the entrance.

Dan Hawkins was a World War II veteran who grew up in Simpsonville, South Carolina, but moved to Transylvania County after the war. He managed a bowling alley and built the area's first miniature golf course, but wanted a fish camp like he had seen in eastern North Carolina.

Secrets to his success were staying active in the community, sourcing his food from high-quality producers and charging a fair price. Fried flounder plates now cost $ 12.49, while catfish nabs $ 15.99. My dad figured out a plan for success and we just carried on," his daughter says. An early, smart decision was to move the restaurant from near the old Brevard Country Club to its current...