Red Mountain Grill

Even with mud season well under way in Summit County, the small smoking patio in front of Red Mountain Grill (703 East Anemone Trail in Dillon) still sports a snow shovel and other all-weather tools. Through scratched sunglass lenses, I squint at this peculiarity in the early evening sun, run…

Wash Park Grille

I’m tired of sliders. Seriously, they were cool for about a minute two years ago when a few brave chefs decided to resurrect them as jewel-box examples of haute-gone-south lowbrow chic. Then they were amusing for a few months as everyone scrambled to add them. Kobe sliders. Barbecue sliders. Truffled…

Get Sauced: Maggiano’s Little Italy

We love the patio outside Maggiano’s in the Denver Pavilions, where the people-watching is almost as delicious as the happy-hour deals from 3-5:30 p.m. weekdays, including calamari fritte ($1.95), spaghetti & mini meatballs ($2.95) and chicken saltimbocca ($3.95). And both this location and Maggiano’s DTC are offering lighter, seasonal summer…

Welcome to the Windy City

The newspapers? Chicago Tribunes. The tattered phone books? Chicagoland area directories. The game on the radio is the Cubs or the Bears and the tin stars in the display case are all replicas of Chicago police badges. Chicago is really less a restaurant than a small, cramped, cluttered and plastic-wrapped…

Ital Do: Venice Ristorante & Winebar

LoDo can sure get hectic when the Rockies are in town, but Venice Ristorante & Winebar not only has a nice patio where you can chill out, it serves gourmet grub and offers valet parking for just $6 — a deal, since that buys you a front-row seat for some…

Taste of Taste of the Nation

Looking around the Westin ballroom Sunday night, I was overwhelmed by one thought: Restaurateurs in Denver are unbelievably generous. Two dozen chefs had volunteered their time, and their supplies, and their sous chefs, to cook up a storm at the 21st annual Taste of the Nation Share Our Strength benefit…

Ray Loves Terrorists, Wants To Make Them Pie

I can’t believe that this is twice in a single week that I have to stand up for people or institutions that I can’t stand simply because they are being attacked by people or institutions that I can stand even less. First it was Starbucks, the victim of an attack…

Milking It: Wild Animal Crunch

Wild Animal Crunch Kellogg’s Rating: One and a half spoons out of four Cereal description: The cereal pieces, a mash-up of oat, wheat and corn flour that suggests the manufacturing process used to make plywood, are tan in hue with light brown streaks running through them. Shape-wide, they’re meant to…

King Aldo

A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough to have the greatest meal of my (relatively) young life at Eric Ripert’s Manhattan restaurant, Le Bernardin. There was me, my buddy East Coast Dave, Dave’s fiancé Nikki from Hawaii, and it was, in a word, absofuckinglutelymindblowinglyawesome. I wrote about said dinner…

Seafood, Eat It

The owners of Prime 121 at 121 Clayton Lane, a spot formerly (and briefly) occupied by Bob’s Steak and Chop House, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization last month. When I reviewed it last fall, I was impressed by the service, not so much by the steak and trimmings. Now…

Slutbucks

I am no fan of Starbucks. Certainly not now that I have had to kick my lifelong coffee habit, but even when I was putting down several pots of coffee a day, it took an event of truly apocalyptic proportion to get me into any of the estimated 4 billion…

Viewmaster: Lola

Although Lola was built into the retrofitted Olinger’s mortuary building, it looks like it was created to support the patio, a deck that offers a stunning view of downtown. Although an in-the-works loft project could change that view, it’s unlikely to affect Lola’s popularity: Since the day it moved from…

Hoof on the Roof: The Buckhorn Exchange

The people planning the Democratic National Convention are making a video showing the ten places that visitors shouldn’t miss in Denver — and today, they were filming at the Buckhorn Exchange. It’s tough to imagine a more worthy tourist trap, since the Buckhorn is Denver’s oldest eatery (founded in 1893)…

Second Act for Mark Tarbell

Almost since the day Mark Tarbell, one of the darlings of the Arizona restaurant scene, opened The Oven in Belmar, there have been rumors that he would soon open a second restaurant in Denver. There have been “Coming Soon” ads, stories about plans and promises. There have been suggestions of…

Cheap Eats: Mustard’s Last Stand

Being vegetarian, I often find that certain decadent and fat-laden food options are generally off limits to me. Sure, you can smother fries in cheese and eat greasy pizza, but giant ½ pound beef burgers and chili dogs are not usually available in tofu/seitan/TVP versions…

Candy Girls: Dietrich’s Chocolate & Espresso

This week, the Candy Girls went out on assignment to Dietrich’s at 1734 East Evans Avenue in the University area. Having heard of the shop’s rich, decadent treats, we had to do a sampling of all of the fresh, homemade chocolates that owner Erich Dietrich makes at his store. Dietrich…

Bono’s Pit Bar-B-Q

I can be bought with an easy smile and a pint of sweet tea. When someone has a grill going in my neighborhood, I will sometimes sit out on my porch just to smell the air. My wife has often told me that I’ve never met a barbecue restaurant I…

On Broadway

Broadway is enjoying a restaurant renaissance, what with the recent openings of Delite and Beatrice & Woodsley at 32 South Broadway and 36 South Broadway, respectively. And next week, Bistro One could be open at 1294 South Broadway. Late last week, I got chef Olav Peterson on the blower (he…

Absinthe Minded

A swing and a miss. When we showed up at Sugar House on a Wednesday, it was closed. Had I looked at either of the Sugar House websites — www.sugarhouselounge.com, which describes a cool lounge for trendy, beautiful people who are tired of the downtown scene, and www.sugarhousedenver.com, which describes…

Herb’s

Brian, Matt and I are already good and stumbly by the time we fall into the dim red glow of Herb’s (2057 Larimer Street) via the back patio door. We’ve just spent the last four hours at Coors Field pawning our future firstborns to get this way, and although seventeen…