Restaurants

Chef/restaurateur Lon Symensma is about to embark on a restaurant voyage that will expand his influence over the Denver dining scene considerably in the coming years. With the imminent arrival of Concourse Restaurant Moderne, Symensma will have three restaurants in his stable — after ChoLon and Cho77 — and has…

With food photos this tempting, we know you’ll want to run out and eat these five dishes right now — but you’ll have to wait a few days for all but one. You can eat your fill when three new restaurants open next Tuesday and Wednesday, or you can buy…

Southern food is one of the country’s hottest dining trends right now, as evidenced by the growing number of Denver eateries serving food from south of the Mason-Dixon line. The latest is Tupelo Honey, which brings its brand of New Southern cooking from Asheville, North Carolina, where the company was…

This week’s feature story, “Disappearing Denver: Looking Back at Buildings We’ve Lost,” reminisces about old favorites — from the Tabor Grand Opera House to Celebrity Sport Center — that shaped Denver’s architecture and entertainment scene before giving way to the forces of modernization. Restaurants too, have come and gone, as a…

The Park Tavern & Restaurant at 931 East 11th Avenue has been slowly getting an overhaul both inside and out. After completing as much of the work as possible while keeping at least part of the twenty-year-old restaurant and bar open, owner Louie Belegratis closed the place for most of April…

Chef/restaurateur Justin Cucci doesn’t do subtle. From the “gastro-brothel” excess of Ophelia’s Electric Soapbox to the reclaimed mortuary mish-mash of Linger, Cucci’s restaurants turn unlikely spaces into full-on barrages of all of the senses. His newest, El Five, is no exception, converting the fifth floor of a LoHi office building…

Rooster & Moon closed at 955 Bannock Street last September, leaving one less option for coffeehouse dwellers in the Golden Triangle. A glimmer of caffeinated hope arose in January, when Eighth Day Coffeehouse announced its intention to sign a lease, but the deal never happened. But now coffee lovers —…

Now is just the right time for a restaurant like Sushi Cup. Andrew Castillo, who just opened the newest addition to the Governors Park food collective on East Seventh Avenue, was looking for a new opportunity to follow his passion just as the poke trend started heating up in Denver…

Thach Tran is the executive chef at Stella’s on 16th, a marketplace restaurant that opened downtown in January. This is his account of the journey that led him to this point, a tale that starts at a pho restaurant in Vietnam, detours through an obsession with hand-pulled noodles, stops at a lucky stint helping co-owner Toshi Kizaki wash and scale fish at Sushi Den, and includes a disastrous episode at the James Beard House.

Matthew Lackey was the opening executive chef at Arcana, the subject of this week’s restaurant review by Gretchen Kurtz. Lackey passed away on April 10, 2017, after a rock-climbing accident at Mount Princeton. He was no longer with Arcana, having parted ways only weeks after the Boulder restaurant’s February 2016…

Arcana started out with an ambitious, confused mission that led to an identity crisis. But under chef/owner Kyle Mendenhall, the Boulder restaurant is focusing on the menu, and the result is promising.

A familiar favorite on Platte Street at the foot of the 16th Street pedestrian bridge will be closed for the next several days. Colt & Gray has temporarily shut down dinner service to hire new staff after a walkout by several members of the kitchen crew. The restaurant released the following…

Just Be Kitchen, the paleo breakfast and lunch eatery from founder Jennifer Peters and chef/co-owner Carrie Baird, opened today at 2364 15th Street, just a few months after the two took possession of the space formerly occupied by Mona’s. Just Be offers gluten-free, grain-free options in a fast-casual setting. The…

Thanks to Taco Bell, Americans know the chalupa as little more than a outsized taco, a puffy fried flatbread of questionable origin stuffed with the Bell’s standard ingredients. But even in Mexico, the chalupa takes on various forms and isn’t always easy to identify by sight alone, depending on the…

In honor of the Cherry Cricket reopening this month after repair work necessitated by a late November fire, we served up our list of the Ten Iconic Burgers in Metro Denver. The Cricket definitely made the cut, and fans lined up on reopening day for another taste of the Cricket burger. But some readers don’t get it.

The variety and volume of new bars and restaurants have kept up the pace so far this spring, with Italian, Korean and Ethiopian restaurants joining speakeasies, barbecue joints and bakeries. Here are the ten most recent bars and restaurants to open in and around Denver, along with links to our…

Maybe we’ve got the munchies from all the pot smoke lingering in the air after yesterday’s 4/20 activities, but our watch list this week is filled with craveable burgers, sandwiches, fried chicken and pizza. But there’s also a new French bistro and some equally French-inspired pastries. Here are seven spots…

It’s a tale as old as time: two Midwest boys, brought together over a shared love of the outdoors, playful sports rivalries, health-nuttiness and the Colorado housing shortage. Tom Miner and Reed McIntyre shared all of this — and then they shared a plan to launch Unwrapp’d, a new company…

Phillip Simonson is obsessed with chocolate — but not just any chocolate. As a kid, he eschewed cheap, mass-produced milk chocolate and finally developed a love for the good stuff as an adult, when he discovered artisan, small-batch producers. He founded Chocolate Lab and introduced his truffles to Denver seven…

There’s a new bakery in Denver, rising from some familiar names in the restaurant world. Alex Seidel and Matt Vawter of Fruition and Mercantile Dining & Provision have teamed up with Keegan Gerhard and Lisa Bailey of D Bar to form Füdmill, a wholesale pastry production company that launched this week…

Nearly a year ago, Elise Wiggins left her longtime position as executive chef at Panzano to pursue her vision of opening the Italian restaurant she’d always wanted. And the day has finally come; Cattivella opens to the public on April 19 at 10195 East 29th Avenue.