Check, Please!

Q:Perusing French-restaurant possibilities in a recent issue of Westword, I was very dismayed not to find The Savoy, at 535 Third Street in Berthoud, on your list. As a French-born Denverite, I consider the Savoy the most authentic — and certainly the best — French restaurant in the area. It…

The Best Is Yet to Come

If you paint a sign on your restaurant window that reads, “The best there ever was. The best there is. The best there will ever be,” you’d better be prepared to back up that claim. And Sami Kraydie, owner of the four-month-old Sinbad that bears that sign, is ready to…

Mouthing Off

Along Champa Street in downtown Denver, institutions are dropping like flies at a greasy diner. First the Changing Scene, the avant-garde theater that shocked audiences for thirty years at 1527 Champa Street, closed its doors at the end of 1999; Johnny’s Newsstand, at 1555 Champa Street, will be shutting down…

2nd Helping

You can always count on Imperial Chinese Seafood Restaurant. Among the things you can count on is that the food will be a mixed bag. During any given meal there, half of the dishes will be delicious and half astoundingly insipid. But the Imperial still has the nicest decor of…

The Inn Crowd

“I wish we’d never had kids,” announced the woman sitting next to us, as she poured the remaining half of her husband’s margarita into her glass. “God, it’s so good to be here without them.” Okay, so not everybody needs to get away as much as that couple, the parents…

Check-Out Time

One of the best things about a meal at the Table Mountain Inn (see review in this week’s issue) is that it’s hotel dining that doesn’t feel like it’s at a hotel; the food doesn’t taste like hotel food, either. And that’s pretty rare, although metro Denver does offer a…

Ship-Shape

The time is long past when John Wayne would swagger into the Ship Tavern and promptly tuck into a double scotch and a slab of prime rib as big as Kiowa County. Another old regular, Bob Hope, doesn’t get out much any more, and most of the flinty wildcatters who…

Check, Please!

Q: There was a recent column that mentioned pizza bread. Where can it be purchased and, more important, do they sell it retail? We moved here 28 years ago from New Jersey, and in the Berkeley Heights area we could buy pizza bread and make Italian hot dogs, which are…

The Gods Must Be Crazy

Since the word ambrosia not only means “food for the gods” but also “anything that tastes or smells delicious,” it’s an appropriate name for Ambrosia Bistro. This four-month old eatery serves up many morsels for mortals that taste or smell delicious — often at the same time. But not often…

2nd Helping

Sometimes a restaurant completely fails to find its niche; sometimes everything just falls into place. More often, though, adjustments are made here and there, a few things get changed along the way and, with any luck, an eatery eventually finds a modicum of success. Or much more, in the case…

Mouthing Off

Let me just point out that on March 9, I was not the one having lunch in Bistro Adde Brewster (250 Steele Street) on Project Angel Heart’s Dining Out for Life day wearing a mink coat, a T-shirt and a pair of jeans with a little dime-sized hole cut carefully…

Check, Please!

Q: I recently started doing business in Boulder, and I’d like to have a list of places to take clients for both lunch and dinner. Since I’m female and they’re male, I’d like upscale spots that would impress them but that aren’t romantic. I’ve never spent any time up there,…

A Slice of Heaven

On the sixth day, God made the beasts — some of them very tasty — and when He was done, He looked the beasts over and said, “Yes, this is good.” Then He paused for a moment and added, “But it might be better with sauce.” And so man created…

Place Your Bets

Red & Jerry’s is a cozy little nook containing fourteen full-sized pool tables (two of them cloaked in black light and featuring iridescent billiard balls), several acres of flashing, bell-ringing video games (including a roller-coaster “simulator” as stomach-churning as the real thing), enough dining tables to seat the U.S. Marine…

Dem Bones, Dem Bones

Although Big Eddie’s Bar-B-Q has closed its doors at 2260 South Quebec, the local barbecue scene is still looking good. Longtime favorites such as M&D’s Bar-B-Que and Fish Palace (2004 East 28th Avenue) and Sam Taylor’s Bar-B-Que (435 South Cherry Street in Glendale) are going strong, and newer kids, including…

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?

A good brunch is a mixed blessing. Once a restaurant becomes known for its brunches, customers tend to go there for that meal, and that meal alone. “How many times did you eat in Pour La France!, and how many of those times were for dinner?” asks Scott Holtzer, who…

Slow Food

Although five staffers are milling about Cucina Leone, no one seems interested in helping us — and we’re the only takeout customers in the place. A cook paces back and forth in front of the grill in case some item must be prepared to order — not that he’s about…

Saucy Behavior

Across the street from Seven 30 South (see this week’s review), a longtime Denver favorite is about to get the extra space it’s needed for several decades. Fourteen tables simply aren’t enough for fans of the Saucy Noodle, which has been serving up a quintessential red sauce at 727 South…

Check, Please!

Q: Do you have any restaurant reviews concerning a great brunch here? I haven’t been able to find much information on brunches in the area. A: First things first: Our Web site, at www.westword.com, contains an archive of my reviews — brunch and otherwise — as well as four years’…

Survival of the Fittest

Imagine the last dinosaur, its heavy, lumbering body unable to find enough sustenance to meet its vast energy requirements, all of its kind gone, nothing to do but hang around until the environment ultimately becomes so unfriendly that it finally dies a slow, painful death that’s torture to watch for…

Size Matters

No sooner had Sean Kelly opened his Aubergine Cafe, which celebrates its fifth anniversary this month (“The Eggplant and I,” July 5, 1995), than the pressure to expand began. Over the past five years, Kelly has considered adding on, moving to a bigger space, even opening a second Aubergine. But…

Chain Gang

Chain gang: The slow-growth approach of Red Robin CEO Mike Snyder (see review this week) is a rarity in the restaurant biz; most chain enterprises seem determined to conquer the world — and conquer it quickly. Exhibit A: Highlands Ranch, which just gained a new C.B. & Potts (its fourth…