Concentrating on Mateo’s classic food while sitting in Mateo’s trendy dining room was like trying to read The Grapes of Wrath in a strip club: Both the food and the setting were worthy of attention, but the combination drove me to distraction. You can’t blame chef Seamus Feeley for trying…
Q: I’m a big Thai fan. I know you love Thai Bistro, but where else can I get top Thai food? A: I do have a fondness for the superb Thai fare at Thai Bistro (5924 South Kipling Street, Littleton, 720-981-7600), but I also love to Thai one on at…
Coffee, table, books: Time to wake up and smell the coffee, Starbucks. The brand-spanking-new Schlessman Family Branch Library, at 100 Poplar Street, has a surprise in store for visitors: a full- service coffee bar run by the Baroness Coffee Company. “This is the first time we’ve tried this,” says Celeste…
Denver diners have been waiting for the right twist on Mexican food, and Lime just might be it. Over the last year, a number of eateries have opened that feature either upscale Latin-derived cuisines (Cuban, Peruvian) or upscale Mexican fare, with prices to match (ten bucks for tacos). Although such…
Q: I am getting married in June. Where should I get a wedding cake? A: If I were getting married, I’d head over to Gateaux (1160 Speer Boulevard, 303-376-0070), which makes drop-dead stunning cakes that also taste great. And at a friend’s recent wedding, I tasted a cake from Das…
I’d walk several miles to eat more of Sean Kelly’s food, so it comes as good news that his Clair de Lune, at 1313 East Sixth Avenue (in the space that was Merano), will be open soon. “I’m shooting for the first week of April,” Kelly says. “I don’t have…
Recently I’ve had to face the fact that I’m never going to climb Everest. First, there’s the problem of my day job, which doesn’t exactly allow for the time commitment — or, for that matter, the tens of thousands of dollars needed to have a guide carry me up there…
Q: Do you have any suggestions for a special dinner in the Vail/Beaver Creek/Edwards area? We’ve already done Sweet Basil, the Bristol at Arrowhead, Zino’s, Larkspur and Mirabelle. So we’re willing to pay the Vail Valley price of admission. A: The restaurants you mention are definitely among the best, but…
Smokin’ to the left, smokin’ to the right: It’s getting harder and harder to find a restaurant that still welcomes smokers — even the very casual Benny’s Restaurant y Cantina (301 East Seventh Avenue) considered taking itself off the list of possibilities. Earlier this year, the popular Mexican eatery printed…
Lentils may be good for you, but they taste like the dried paste from a kindergartner’s Popsicle-stick project. They sort of taste like the Popsicle sticks, too. Since lentils are a staple of Indian food, resourceful Indian cooks long ago figured out how to spice up the legumes. Enough cloves,…
Q: I’m a big prime-rib fan. Can you give me a list of places that do it well? A: What we call prime rib is actually a boneless cut from the super-tender eye muscle of a steer’s primal rib, also known as the ribeye roast. The name may have come…
The lunch bunch: Kate’s at 35th Avenue (see review above) offers a nice, cozy lunchtime repast — but sometimes nothing will do but a fat pastrami sandwich on rye, served in a noisy, crowded deli evocative of New York City. In which case, run, don’t walk, to Deli Tech (8101…
Between its answering-machine message, its local advertising and the way staff members drop the news every chance they get, Sacre Bleu wants to make it clear that the place is under new ownership and new management. And — mon Dieu! — that seems to have made all the difference. When…
Lynn Smith’s to-do list is a little longer than most. She’s a mom; she runs a restaurant; she also goes to graduate school. “Some days I wonder, ‘What was I thinking?'” Smith says. “But most days I love it. I’m always being challenged, and so far, everything’s working out.” It…
Q: Where can I find real flour and/or corn tortillas ‹ meaning ones made with lard and not vegetable shortening? A: Nowhere that I could find in town. As Fred Paz, manager of wholesaler Tortillas Mexico (which has a retail outlet at 840 West 11th Avenue, 303-623-7875), points out, “Once…
The waiting game: Restaurant service continues to be a hot topic, especially since folks with fewer dining dollars want to spend their money somewhere, anywhere, that doesn’t treat them like dog poop on the bottom of a shoe. Although the service was just fine at Chautauqua Dining Hall (see review…
The word chautauqua is Iroquois for either “two moccasins tied together” or “jumping fish,” depending on which historical linguist you believe — and its first use by non-Native Americans was to name a lake in western New York. Later the word referred to an institute for Sunday-school teachers, one that…
Q: Service at Denver restaurants just keeps getting lousier. Is there a place we can go where we won’t feel like cattle bothering the servers with our presence? A: I’ve never had better service than at Tante Louise (4900 East Colfax Avenue, 303-355-4488), although my experiences at Mizuna (225 East…
The restaurant business is like the Mafia: Every time you try to get out, they pull you back in. For Sean Kelly, “they” comprise an unholy alliance of Denver diners eager for his food, along with his own insatiable desire to cook contemporary Mediterranean cuisine for people who appreciate the…
When I was a growing up in a very white-bread section of Pittsburgh, our choices for an ethnic dining experience consisted of a pizzeria, a Chinese restaurant that nobody went to because, well, who knew what they were doing in that kitchen, and Isley’s, which poured a red sauce that…
Q: What’s a good place with selections for both vegetarians and non-vegetarians? A: Most of our better restaurants offer at least one vegetarian option, but that one can get old. Radex (100 East Ninth Avenue, 303-861-7999) usually has a good choice of non-meat pastas, risotto and vegetable-based dishes, along with…
The reign of Spain: Kevin Taylor isn’t the only restaurateur who’s cooking with a Spanish accent. In what could be the fastest turnaround since, well, since Taylor turned Zenith into Nicois (see review above), Sevilla closed its doors at the Icehouse (1801 Wynkoop Street) just last Friday and will reopen…
