In case someone missed it the first several hundred times I said it, I don’t like chain restaurants. They generally have all the charm and warmth of a metal Christmas tree; their service is usually non-existent; their food is almost always of substandard quality; and, worst of all, they frequently…
“I’ll take you anywhere you want to go,” said my husband of seven years (as of that very day). “No review, no analyzing the food, no eavesdropping on conversations. We’ll just relax. You pick the place.” I didn’t need to give it a second thought: I wanted to eat at…
Here’s the beef: Ivan Utrera’s letter to the editor published in this issue is itself filled with so many “ignorant criticisms” that I feel compelled to reply. Utrera, the president and CEO of Rodizio Restaurants International–which isn’t quite international yet, since the only location so far is in Denver–writes to…
Book ’em: International restaurant reviewer and cookbook author Patricia Wells wasn’t originally scheduled to come to Denver on her book tour to promote Patricia Wells at Home in Provence ($40), but when she saw that Houston was on her itinerary, she called the publisher. “I asked them if I could…
In Denver to promote her latest cookbook, Patricia Wells, restaurant critic for the International Herald-Tribune, complained about cooking’s newest trend: fusion. “Most of the time it’s throwing foods together from different cuisines, like an experiment to see if they work,” she said. “I don’t think the chefs actually sit down…
This sud’s for you: The Wynkoop Brewing Company is looking for a few good men…and women. The search is on for the 1997 “Beerdrinker of the Year.” What’s that? Your guess is as good as ours. Wynkoop, Denver’s first–and still biggest–brewpub, located at 1634 18th Street, is accepting beer drinkers’…
Leaving a depressed Europe in the early 1900s, two groups of immigrants–one German, one Italian–found new homes in the high plains of southern Brazil, and soon they were reaping the benefits of the area’s fertile soil and rich grazing land. As a way of showing their appreciation for their new-found…
When Robert Tournier opened his first Le Central in Santa Monica in 1978, the likes of Jane Fonda were beating down the doors to get at his affordable provincial French food. The place was so successful, Tournier says, that he envisioned popping into each major city in the country to…
On a roll: You can smell the cinnamon from the street outside a modest home near the defunct Lowry Air Force Base, where single mom Minnie Rhodes bakes the most wonderful cinnamon rolls in Aurora–and maybe Colorado, and possibly the country. Butter-drenched–although Minnie will make them with less butter if…
Pulling up steaks: The covered wagon in the parking lot at Emil-Lene’s Sirloin House (16000 Smith Road in Aurora) stood in an oval of gravel and browning grass like a beacon from the Old West–or at least the Old West of the 1950s, when this steakhouse opened its doors under…
If the beef in Kansas City always tastes like the beef at the Prime Rib Restaurant and Steak House, well, then, Kansas City, here I come. It would be cheaper, though, to revisit the Prime Rib. This smartly decorated eatery–done in the wine-tone colors and dark wood typical of many…
Homegrown advantage: No one ever talks about “Denver-style pizza,” but after eating a few not-so-humble pies from local pizzerias recently, I’m convinced we have a few originals. Of course, everyone knows about Beau Jo’s (I ate at the original Beau Jo’s, the cavernous space at 1517 Miner Street in Idaho…
Loopy. That’s the word New York Times food writer Bryan Miller used to describe the service he encountered at the handful of Denver restaurants he visited during a recent trip. Having visited hundreds of Denver restaurants over the past several years myself, I not only agree with that assessment, I…
Where are they now?: Denver’s frenetic dining scene makes it hard to keep track of chefs and restaurateurs, but some are worth tracking down. I’d heard that Christian Schmidt had been lured away from Baci (25958 Genesee Trail Road in Genesee), where he’d been quietly cooking up beautiful Italian food…
In his exhaustive reference book The Food of Italy, Waverley Root marvels at how “curious” it is that the Tuscan province of Siena “has so little to offer of its own…its gastronomic prowess seems to be limited to desserts.” Otherwise, he notes, Siena borrows the food it eats “from Florence…
I’d thought that I would never find authentic–much less great–Mexican food in this town. I’d worried that manana would never come. Now, finally, it’s here–by way of California. Sergio and Alicia Hernandez were running two successful restaurants in predominantly Hispanic areas of that state when their tortilla purveyor told them…
LoDo lowdown: Coors Field has brought a large new clientele to LoDo restaurants, and while there are the usual arguments about whether that’s good or bad, there’s no denying that it’s different. In response, places such as McCormick’s Fish House & Bar, at 1659 Wazee Street, have found it necessary…
I’ve just returned from a trip to Park Meadows and, funny, I don’t feel that it was at all “like a three-hour family vacation,” as the radio advertisement I heard on the way there touted a visit to the mall. Oops, I mean “retail resort,” the preferred term for this,…
Ethnic restaurants can have a tough time in Denver because there aren’t enough ethnic neighborhoods to support them–no Chinatown, Little Italy or Little Havana here. As a result, local eateries specializing in foreign foods find themselves straining against the chains of suburbia, trying to convince burger-and-fries types that there’s something…
Get a life: A storm cut the power the night of the big party, but weather wasn’t the only thing that tried to put a damper on the celebrations at Tosh’s Hacienda two weeks ago. To celebrate its fiftieth anniversary–that’s a lot of burritos smothered with great New Mexico green…
Barry Fey has a bone to pick with local steak joints. The professional concert promoter and full-time amateur restaurant critic is disgusted by what he considers the low quality of beef being purveyed in this here cowtown’s growing number of steakhouses. “We’re supposed to be known for our steaks, for…
Food to go: Transalpin has not only shut its doors, it’s been locked down by the taxman. A decade ago, Robert Tournier–the man also responsible for bringing us Le Central–introduced tapas to Denver at Transalpin, his once chi-chi spot on Seventh Avenue. (Arguably, Transalpin was also the first spot in…
