Eighteen months ago, when renowned restaurateur/chef Frank Bonanno revealed that he was opening Bonanno Brothers Pizzeria in Park Meadows Shopping Center, Cafe Society readers had high hopes the venture would inject some local flavor in an area whose main dining options are outposts of national chains: Brio Tuscan Grille, California…

Need an eye-opener this morning? You might if you’d joined the throngs at DISH, Westword’s twentieth anniversary of the Denver dining scene, which yesterday filled Sculpture Park at the Denver Performing Arts Complex with booths featuring signature dishes from forty of our favorite local eateries — with Bloody Marys from…

As Michael Roberts reports on the Latest Word this morning, yesterday’s protest outside the McDonald’s at 505 East Colfax Avenue — part of a nationwide campaign demanding higher wages and union rights — resulted in three arrests and plenty of attention for the issue. And the comments keep coming in…

At Barolo Grill, the Italian restaurant that Blair Taylor opened two decades ago at 3030 East Sixth Avenue, there’s only one thing on the menu from twenty years ago: the duck. “I’m not allowed to change it,” Taylor says. But he can, and does, think about changing everything else. “You…

This week Gretchen Kurtz reviews Bistro Barbès, a tiny spot in Park Hill that cooks up some big flavors. That’s just one of the diminutive dining establishments she’s visited recently, which inspired our list of the Ten Best Tiny Restaurants in Denver — all places that seat forty or fewer…

As chef at the now-defunct Row 14, Jensen Cummings was used to being asked to participate in charity events; out of 150 requests, he did 31 events in 2013. And even as he made plans to open his own spot, the Slotted Spoon Meatball Eatery, at 2730 South Colorado Boulevard,…

“We set out to do a small, simple restaurant, not to blaze any trails,” Alex Seidel, chef-owner of Fruition, told Westword two years after he opened that award-winning restaurant.”The positive reaction has been fantastic, but we never expected this kind of attention. I’m just a simple chef who cooks food.”…

After cooking around town, including at the late, lamented Encore, Paul Reilly and his sister, Aileen, finally got to open a place of their own last year. And what a place it is! Beast + Bottle, at 719 East 17th Avenue, is the restaurant “we conjured in our heads since…

Has Denver become a city of bagel snobs? That’s what one reader suggests, as the debate over Denver bagels versus New York bagels — as exemplified by Rosenberg’s Bagels & Delicatessen — continues. But according to that same reader, there’s another danger lurking on the horizon: designer toast. See also:…

It’s been a big summer for Rosenberg’s Bagels & Delicatessen, which opened in July in a Welton Street storefront and has been packing in the customers ever since. But owner Joshua Pollack’s claims that he makes an authentic “New York-style” New York native Eden Myles has spent years in the…

There are all kinds of happy hours in Denver, from the glitzy to the grim, the highbrow to the ‘hood. This week, Chris Utterback visited what could be the ultimate neighborhood bar, the Rosa Mia Inn, which is under new ownership but has the same old friendly vibe that dates…

You could once find red-sauce joints all over Highland, which decades ago was this town’s biggest Italian neighborhood. But over the years, those spots have been closing….and now Lechuga’s , which got its start as Carbone’s and continued to serve some of its classic dishes over the next two-plus decades,…

To close out a month of eating barbecue for Ethniche, Mark Antonation visited a new spot, 3 Sons BBQ, that occupies an address with a long barbecue history, since it was once home to M&D’s Cafe. Although 3 Sons might not live up to that legendary spot, he still found…

The Golden Triangle is full of cultural amenities, large and small, from the Denver Art Museum to Walker Fine Art to the Clyfford Still Museum. But while you can find fine art in the area, maybe not it’s not the right spot for fine dining. That’s the theory of one…

In Ethniche, Mark Antonation has been exploring barbecue all month; his final installment on ‘cue runs tomorrow. And even as he’s explored options around town, like Brooks Smokehouse, new places keep opening up, including Burt’s Smokehouse BBQ, now smokin’ in Centennial. But still, readers are hungry for more — and…

Denver is about to get another burger joint: Hopdoddy Burger Bar will open its sixth location next to Union Station this fall. The chain got its start in Austin, Texas, which inspired the usual Colorado-centric comments — as well as requests fro a different Texas product… See also: Texas Burger…

Rick and Noy Farrell opened Taste of Thailand twenty years ago this month. The restaurant has remained true to its goals — authentic dishes made with fresh ingredients — for the past two decades. But over that same period, dining habits have changed a lot (few people linger over lunch,…