Hail to the king — crab, that is. When I was growing up, my dad used to take me our for crab legs every Sunday, but then, one day, I I wearied of cracking the shells and dribbling butter down my chin. So I quit. Just like that. Recently, though,…
When I reviewed the Squeaky Bean nine months ago, I was amused and delighted by what Max MacKissock was dreaming up in his tiny kitchen, playing with classic American dishes and making them into something new and unexpected. A reimagined shepherd’s pie, light enough for a summer evening. Sweetbreads made…
“Restaurant Week brings out the worst in people,” lamented one chef this week, after a woman lambasted his menu for offering three courses rather than four. “What the fuck is this?” she shouted at her server, who was so stunned she broke into tears. The restaurant — one of Denver’s…
If you’ve ever been to the Valverde Country Club, a somewhat unsavory bar at 1319 West Alameda Avenue, then you know that the country club moniker is a little like comparing Fritos to foie gras. Still, the beers are ultra-cheap, the clientele, animated (to say the least), and now that…
Robert McCarthy Rialto Cafe 934 16th Street 303-893-2233 www.rialtocafe.com This is part two of my interview with Robert McCarthy, executive chef of Rialto Cafe. Part one of that interview ran in this space yesterday. Favorite restaurant in America: Lupa, Mario Batali’s restaurant in New York. It’s really simple, straightforward food…
Without exception, during every visit I made to Thai Flavor for this week’s review — and during the lunch I ate at US Thai Cafe for this week’s Second Helping — I overheard at least one table ask for chopsticks. I’d venture a guess that those diners thought they were…
Comments have been pouring out over the news that Dry Dock Brewing in Aurora (one of our “Top ten places to drink like a pirate”) has to change the name of its acclaimed Seven Seas Double IPA after getting a “nasty” letter from a lawyer representing 7 Seas Brewing Company…
Of the three dozen or so Thai restaurants scattered around the metro area, I can think of only one that rises to the curry occasion as triumphantly as Thai Flavor, and that’s U.S. Thai Cafe in Edgewater. Ma Vue, a Laotian, opened the eatery in 2006, with native Thai chef…
Sarah Amorese fell in love with chocolate when she lived in Amsterdam. “My boss used to bring Belgian chocolates back to the office,” she says. “And my husband — boyfriend at the time — and I did a lot of business trips through Europe. We used to visit every pastry…
Whenever I’m desperate for a breakfast burrito fix, I normally make the trek to the Taco Wagon in Lafayette, but that could soon change, because I recently discovered a taqueria closer to home that satiates my yearnings. Bonus: Excellent tamales and green chile, too. Can you guess where I’m eating?…
It’s not hard to see why Sputnik is so popular. At 8 p.m. on a Tuesday night — a time when most restaurants would see guests trickling out the door — the Baker-neighborhood joint is still packed, with every table occupied and almost every seat at the bar hosting a…
Last fall, the folks behind Organic Pizza Co., a nascent local chain, threw an introductory party in the top-floor party room of the spiffy Spire, where they demonstrated their commitment to top-notch ingredients and innovative pies. But there were delays in the build-out of the spot planned for the ground…
The Wash Park ‘hood, especially the stretch of Alameda, between Logan and Downing, is turning into a bona fide restaurant row, thanks to new restaurants like Bittersweet, Pho Pasta, and soon, a fifth outpost of Larkburger, joining stalwarts like Pete’s Central One, Lucile’s Creole Cafe, Fontana Sushi, Thai Basil and…
Robert McCarthy Rialto Cafe 934 16th Street 303-893-2233 www.rialtocafe.com This is part one of my interview with Robert McCarthy, exec chef of Rialto Cafe. Part two of our interview will run in this space tomorrow. Robert McCarthy shakes his head in aggravation and rolls his eyes. “The hoods went down…
It was sixty years ago that Jerry Feld, then a student at the University of Denver, decided to get into the bar business and bought a watering hole at 404 Broadway from a man who’d opened it on the day Prohibition ended. At the time, Jerry was too young to…
Denver Restaurant Week ended at the close of service on March 11, with a record number of restaurants participating: 303. “Talk about a Denver number,” says Rich Grant, the spokesman for Visit Denver, the convention and visitors bureau that organizes the seven-year-old event. Even more impressive was the number of…
After Laura Shunk received an e-mail from a national food pub working on a list of the best pastas around the country, she posted a piece spilling some of her own favorites, and asked readers for their own. And out poured some saucy suggestions — Luca D’Italia, Rioja, Mizuna (fair…
Over the course of my life in Denver, I’ve eaten a lot of mediocre Thai food, putting down bowls of curry and plates of pad Thai that were edible — but forgettable — up and down the Front Range. But this winter, after I returned from Southeast Asia, where I’d…
The Berkeley neighborhood certainly isn’t lacking for bars and restaurants. But when the owners of Tennyson’s Tap decided to set up shop on West 38th Avenue at the start of the year, they were betting that the neighborhood didn’t have another bar like it. “There are a lot of local…
Last night, in the midst of making final preparations to open Caffé, Bobby Stuckey and Lachlan MacKinnon-Patterson put together a momentous Monday night wine dinner at Frasca Food and Wine featuring Sasa Radikon, a wine producer from Friuli that makes unique, complex macerated wines — but rarely leaves the vineyard,…
It’s official: after months of construction, oven problems, delays and, finally, stocking, outfitting and training, the third member of the growing Frasca Food and Wine family, Caffè, opened this morning. The sliver of a spot, tucked next to Pizzeria Locale, is filled with quirky artifacts that include paintings of roosters…
Once the Stock Show leaves town, there are only a few places where a bartender wearing a cowboy hat doesn’t look ridiculous. But here — ka-ching! Can you guess where I’m drinking? Special bonus: Anyone who gives the first correct answer to the week’s Where am I drinking/eating posts is…
