New deli: People moving to Denver from bigger cities–any bigger cities–invariably miss their hometown delis. I haven’t been able to find anyone who can give me a reasonable explanation as to why so few delis here cut the mustard, but much of my mail comes from transplants desperate for good…
Restaurant consultants make a lot of money telling eateries to change the color of their curtains and to put tiramisu on their dessert menus if they want to attract more customers. But the truth is, featuring all the recommended fads du jour doesn’t guarantee prosperity in the food business–just ask…
Things to do in Denver when you’re fed: The executive editor of Food & Wine magazine, Denise Martin, ate her way through Denver this past weekend. Here to check out some of our finest chefs for possible inclusion in the publication’s annual “Ten Best New Chefs” awards, Martin relied on…
With new Italian restaurants sprouting around town like mold on a piece of old focaccia, it’s easy to forget that several trattorias have been plying the pappardelle for some time–and doing a good job of it. One of those standbys, Al Fresco, has been undergoing a few growing pains of…
Most restaurant owners fall into one of two categories: chef or businessman. The chef usually winds up with his own place after suffering for years as a misunderstood artiste forced to conform to the mad wishes of the money people, only to discover that you need dough to make a…
Spread the word: Sundays are open again. The holidays are over. The Super Bowl is over. The nice weather is over, and I don’t care what that goofy groundhog says–it’s going to stay cold for a while. Is there a better way to fill these now-free, if still frigid, Sundays…
Some people don’t have the luxury of their own neighborhood joint–a warm, welcoming place that locals call home, with a bartender who knows everybody’s usual and all the good O.J. jokes. Then again, some people don’t want to encounter their neighbor in a social setting, especially if he’s the schmuck…
What’s the difference between an eleven-ounce, dry-aged, corn-fed, USDA Prime piece of beef at a big-name, nationally known restaurant and the same hunk of meat at a small, local steakhouse? Oh, about fifteen bucks. That, and such subtle nuances as these: At the homegrown joint, a spokesman doesn’t come out…
Twenty-two inches of fresh powder and the sun shining like the caps of a ski instructor’s smile. After eight hours of carving turns and cruising for serious speed, the last thing I want to do is shell out $200 for a meal in a stuffy place where I might spot…
Ever since Yankee Doodle stuck that feather somewhere and called it macaroni, this country has been in love with the noodle. What’s not to love? It goes with everything–dripping with butter, buried in cheese, smothered in any kind of sauce–and it’s cheap, filling and fast-cooking. Still, it wasn’t until last…
People who have nothing better to do than track trends already have proclaimed fusion the fashionable food of ’96. Asian-influenced anything was the rage last year; fusion adds any and all types of cuisine to the melting pot. Not that fusion is really anything new–melding of, say, French and Asian…
It may have been the Year of the Pig on the Chinese calendar, but in Denver, 1995 will go down as the Year of the Restaurant. Through official announcements, phone calls, word-of-mouth tips and simply stumbling into places, I counted no fewer than 67 new restaurants in the city alone…
We screeched to a halt in front of the Brown Palace Hotel in our luxury Toyota, two minutes late because the first movie we’d seen in a theater in sixteen months–yes, that’s how old our kid is; how’d you guess?–had 27 previews, 5 more than we’d counted on when we…
Try to remember the last time the tuxedo-clad manager of a restaurant ran, actually ran, outside into the parking lot so that he could breathlessly call “Thanks again for coming, and drive safely” because he’d missed saying goodbye to you at the door. Can you recall arriving for dinner at…
By now, even Americans raised on Spaghetti-Os know the infamous differences between Italy’s northern and southern cuisine–but that’s just the tip of the boot. In fact, anyone who’s been to fewer than half of the country’s twenty or so major regions can’t claim to be an expert on Italian food…
Heaven help us if someone does a study that shows eating dog food lowers cholesterol and helps us live healthier, longer lives. Within weeks Denver would be overrun by “poocherias,” and restaurants could get a leg up on the competition by offering the freshest, just-kibbled ingredients. All it took was…
Over the past year the neighborhood around Coors Field has exploded with new eateries. Now, with the baseball fans gone and a long, cold winter ahead, some of those restaurants are going to make lunchmeat of the competition. But until they do, people who work in LoDo have a smorgasboard…
Even a restaurant that set up shop in the Sistine Chapel and employed Capuchin monks who devoted their lives to serving others would eventually have to rely on the quality of its food to keep it in business. You can only drink in beautiful scenery and subsist on sheer subservience…
Few caterpillars crawl as much as Radek Cerny has on his way to the butterfly stage. After the Communist government took away his family’s farm in Czechoslovakia, Cerny (pronounced “chair-nee”) had to fight hard for his culinary training in Prague. He ultimately escaped the country by slipping away from a…
You can’t make all the people happy all of the time–especially if you’re a restaurant. A few years ago, trendy dining establishments tried to offer something for everyone: a few beef and chicken dishes, some fish for the pretend vegetarians, a selection of pastas and maybe some pseudo-ethnic dishes. But…
Judged by its cover, the Fourth Story is looking good. This restaurant has what might be my favorite dining room in Denver. There’s an endless supply of books to pull down and peruse, and in this library, eating and drinking are not only allowed, they’re very much encouraged. All the…
It started with wine dinners at a handful of restaurants, monthly culinary happenings where cellared vino was uncorked and paired with complementary dishes. Next thing you knew, everyone but McDonald’s was doing wine dinners. Then came the boutique wine sellers, a handful of small, focused stores that catered to the…
