FOOD & DRINK

When the legislature is in session, lawmakers chew over more than the latest lobbyist's proposal at a J. Beatty's lunch. Some go for the quirky lamb quesadillas served with apple salsa, some for the nap-inducing chicken-fried steak. And those who just can't get enough pork at the State Capitol take on the BLT, a five-inch-high monster served on fat slices of butter-toasted sourdough. The bacon--which is meaty and not smoked--is piled on as thick as rhetoric, with plenty of leaf lettuce and ripe tomatoes along for the ride. The sandwich comes complete with manly fries or a cup of soup--the perfect amount of food for three martinis, which J. Beatty's also does well. If the place is too crowded for you to get a seat, try yelling that the IRS is on its way to inspect receipts--that'll clear things out.

Best Pig-Out
Charlie Brown's
980 Grant St.

We will sell no swine before its time. Instead, wait for the end of the week--when Charlie Brown's Friday Afternoon Club encourages you to go hog wild. Every Friday through the summer, the manager roasts a huge oinker on a spit on the patio and hands out the pork, free of charge, to all comers. (Chicken wings are available for the squeamish.) The first round of drinks is a two-fer (no Hamm's), and the crowd tunes in to classic tracks until the piano player shows up at six. There's no better way to start a night snout on the town.

Best Place to Eat and Act Like a Pig
Diamond Cabaret Steakhouse
1222 Glenarm Pl.

Watch grown men shell out a mere $5.95 for the all-they-can-eat-and-leer-at lunch buffet Fridays at Diamond Cabaret. Watch them gnaw like starved hyenas on barbecued baby-backs (ribs on Fridays only; the $3.95 buffet is stocked every day) while hot babes (stacked every day) reveal their innermost body parts. Watch that your wife doesn't catch you in there.

Best Pigs-in-a-Blanket
Kalamath Korner
1381 Kalamath St.

They're called "stuffed sauerkraut" on the menu, but most Americans would immediately recognize them as pigs-in-a-blanket, that mainstay of potluck church suppers and family gatherings. Kalamath Korner--Denver's last surviving Hungarian restaurant--stuffs pickled cabbage with pork, rice, bell peppers, eggs and seasoned breadcrumbs, then bakes the little porkers eight to ten hours. Finally, they're served up to you with a side of sauerkraut mixed with onions, stewed tomatoes and garlic, and with sour cream for extra flavor. Feel free to make a pig of yourself.

Best Pig's Ears
Nipa Hut
11385 E. Colfax Ave., Aurora

Nipa Hut, the area's only Filipino restaurant, is up to its ears in flavor. Specifically, the flavors of sisig na baboy--a delicacy of pig's ears chopped up with garlic and jalapenos and cooked in a vinegary sauce. The cartilage itself is chewy, but it's covered with a thin layer of crisp-cooked meat that resembles bacon...if you close your eyes. If this little piggy still isn't for you, try Nipa Hut's roasted pork--a mound of meat cooked so tender that the chunks fall apart into strings, coated with a garlicky tamarind sauce.

Best Unexpected Appearance by a Pig
Mexico City Lounge
2115 Larimer St.

It's been a long night. A very long night. A very long, liquid night. Your head is pounding, your eyeballs hurt. And they're not going to feel any better when they catch sight of what's swimming in your medicinal bowl of Mexico City's menudo: pig's feet. But have faith--by the time you're done doctoring the tripe-and-hominy soup with raw onions, lemons, oregano and hot-pepper flakes, you'll have burned out enough of the poisons to appreciate just what a delicacy pig's feet can be. Although the hog hoofs are a sometime special, the menudo is always hot on Mexico City's stove--and the place opens at 6:30 a.m., which can be a lifesaver.

Best Place to Get Your Goat
Herbs and Spices Restaurant
9538 Montview Blvd., Aurora

Most people are only interested in the lowly goat for its cheese, and some just for its milk. In Europe, South America and parts of the Mediterranean, though, goat meat is prized for its delicate similarity to lamb. At Herbs and Spices, a teeny African eatery, you can get your goat in gumbo or soup. Either way, you'll be amazed at its velvety tenderness--the kitchen even uses kid, the young goat whose meat is much softer than that of a mature adult. A bowl of the soup--goat, peanuts and fufu (a cooked sweet potato) in a thin, spicy broth--is enough to bring out the animal in you.

Best Soft-Shell Crab
Rose's Cafe
731 Quebec St.

Owner Rose is Vietnamese, and her husband, Tom, is Italian, so it's not surprising that this cafe does a nice job with both cuisines. And there's no better example of their multinational dexterity than the soft-shell crabs, which they offer in the styles of both Vietnam and Italy. The Vietnamese soft-shell is an appetizer, dipped in a cross between batter and breadcrumbs and fried in oil until the crab's skin seals in the juices (they'll spray at you at the first poke of a fork); it's served with lettuce for wrapping and Rose's vinegary fish sauce for dipping. The Italian version is sauteed in lemon butter and then served over linguini. True crab lovers should double their pleasure and order both.

Readers' choice: Chives

Best Oyster Roster
McCormick's Fish House & Bar
1659 Wazee St.

We're often reluctant to order oysters in Denver--sometimes these bivalves aren't fresh, and at other times they're the cheapest to fly in, which means bland, bland, bland. We'll come out of our shell anytime for McCormick's, though. The oysters here are shipped in from the coasts every three days, and they're treated with respect once they arrive: wrapped in damp towels and refrigerated, with the larger side down. McCormick's always offers the original bluepoint from Blue Point, Long Island, one of the best for serving on the half shell; the rest of the list of five or six possibilities changes depending on what's available around the world. In addition to eating them raw, you can try the oysters served Rockefeller, pan-fried, Breton (with lobster, cream and Asiago cheese), stewed and piquant. At this seafood stalwart, the oyster is our world.

Best Chicken Feet
Ocean Garden
1205 S. Havana St., Aurora

Don't chicken out. Ocean Garden puts its best feet forward on Saturdays and Sundays--which is when we put them in our mouths, along with the rest of this restaurant's addictive dim sum offerings. These chewy chicken parts must be deep-fried, then boiled for an hour and steamed fifteen minutes more just to become edible; after that, Ocean Garden wets them down with a garlic pepper sauce. It sounds fowl, but it tastes divine.

Best Chicken Wings
Pint's Pub
221 W. 13th Ave.

Many menus claim their chicken wings are just like the ones you get in Buffalo, but bawk is cheap, and they usually turn out to be pallid imitations smothered in sauce. Pint's Pub wisely makes no such comparisons, and as a result, its wings fly right. Crisp-fried and soaked with Bruce's Hot Sauce mixed with oil, these are more than mere appendages. The wings are hot and heavy with flavor, but not so fiery you can't wash the burn away with a pint o' Pint's draught Guinness--also the best in town.

Readers' choice: Hooters

Best Chicken-Fried Steak
Bayou Bob's
524 17th St.
5650 Greenwood Plaza Blvd., Greenwood Village

Fry me to the moon: Bayou Bob's offers a Cajun take on this Southern specialty and comes up with a winner. For its chicken-fried, Bob's starts with a cube steak and pounds it thinner than a crocodile's smile, dips it in egg whites and flour and then fries the hell out of it. This toothsome slab comes smothered with peppery, white-wine-based cream gravy and the only sides that make sense--mashed potatoes and a mess o' mustard greens. It's easy to go South on food like this.

Readers' choice: Black-Eyed Pea

Best Fried Chicken
Three Sons Restaurant
2915 W. 44th Ave.

Uncle Charlie could have taken a few cooking lessons from these Three Sons. The fried chicken tastes like the original bird was raised on pasta back behind the Italian restaurant--plump, juicy meat hangs heavy from the bones. But the key to this recipe is breadcrumbs, coarsely crumbled and only sparsely decorating the chicken so that the skin beneath gets deep-fried crispy, too. Go ahead and use your fingers--you can come back to the fork when you take a break and tackle the accompanying mound of spaghetti blanketed by Three Sons' red sauce. Add the oddly serene atmosphere--the suave dining room looks like it was decorated by a museum curator obsessed with Julius Caesar--and this is one offer you can't refuse.

Best Roast Chicken
Aromas Market
2510 S. Colorado Blvd.

The early bird catches the...award. Aromas Market staffers are like the guy who makes the doughnuts: Every day they show up bright and shiny to start stuffing chickens with onion, lemon and garlic. Ten types of crunchy-skinned, rotisserie-roasted chicken result--lemon-pepper, Mexican spice and Jamaican jerk among them--but our favorite is the Italian spice, lovingly sprinkled with oregano and thyme and rubbed with Aromas' secret seasoning. Call by 2 p.m. and your roast chicken will be ready and waiting at 4:30; a mere 50 cents over the regular price gets you wild-rice stuffing--better for you than doughnuts.

Best Affordable Steakhouse
Luke's
4990 Kipling St.

Where's the beef? All too often, at overpriced men's clubs where you have to take out a loan in order to purchase a piece of meat. Sure, it's good stuff--but we're on a budget here. That's why when we're paying, we head to Luke's. For just under $30, you get an eleven-ounce, dry-aged filet, choice of potato or spaghetti, a salad, just-baked blueberry muffins, a Scotch on the rocks and have enough left over to leave a substantial tip. Which you'll want to do, because the food comes as ordered, the service is great even though the staff doesn't make $50,000 a year, and the atmosphere at this quintessential Western-style steakhouse is friendly to all.

Best Hot Dog
Mustard's Last Stand
1719 Broadway, Boulder
2081 S. University Blvd.

The wiener and still the chomp. There's been a lot of barking about natural casings, free-range ingredients and no preservatives--but when it comes right down to it, are you eating a hot dog for the health of it? Mustard's Last Stand serves Chicago-style Vienna red hots in all their greasy glory, and we're not ashamed to say we love them. We get particularly worked up over the Works, with a puppy dressed in mustard, relish, onions, tomatoes, pickles, hot peppers and sauerkraut. The drink of choice? Alka-Seltzer, of course.

Readers' choice: Mustard's Last Stand

Best Carrot Dog
Frasier Brazier
406 U.S. Hwy. 40, Frasier

It's true: You can teach an old dog new tricks. The Frasier Brazier takes an ordinary carrot, marinates the hell out of it, then throws it on the grill. The vibrant veggie that results is tucked inside a hot dog bun and covered with ranch dressing, onions and whatever other condiments suit your fancy. At just $1.34 a carrot dog, it's surprisingly good and--need we say it?--good for you.

Best Frozen Pickle Juice
Sands Theatre
211 Clayton St., Brush

As desserts go, this one's a dilly. Pickles were big sellers at the snack bar of the Sands Theatre, and owner Joe Machetta hated throwing away all the juice that came along with the pickles in the industrial-sized jars. So he came up with the idea of freezing the juice in little plastic shot glasses, which he now sells to kids (and any adults brave enough to try them) at 25 cents a pop. From sour losers to a real winner, his invention is one to relish.

Best Links House of Bar-B-Que
760 Peoria St., Aurora
What's missing in most links are the right seasonings; the sauce is expected to cover up for bland sausage. House of Bar-B-Que is a rare exception to that rule. It fills its sausage casings from scratch, starting with a well-ground mixture of pork and beef heavily spiced with cumin. Two to an order, these plump links come swimming in a house sauce that oozes tomatoey sweetness and pungent hot chiles, yet still lets the cumin shine through.

Best Barbecued Ribs
Sam Taylor's Links at City Park
2500 York St.

At the Links, the rib bone's connected to the sauce of our dreams. Sam Taylor slathers his pork ribs with a thick, sweet, sticky concoction that is nothing short of heaven--and burns like hell. The ribs themselves are smoked into the kind of tender submission that requires nothing more than a touch to make them fall apart. Which we do every time we even start thinking of this place. An added bonus: It's located on the scenic City Park golf course. Fore!

Readers' choice: Sam Taylor's Links at City Park

Best Surprise Ribbing
Warhorse Inn
19420 E. Mainstreet, Parker

Let's face it, Parker is no bastion of grand cuisine--the town's overjoyed just to have the major retail outlets. But park your carcass in one of the Warhorse's wooden booths and you'll be rewarded with the tastiest slab of ribs this side of Colfax Avenue. The meat-falling-off-the-bone baby-backs are swabbed with a sweet sauce that's made on the premises. Served with a sack-of-potatoes' worth of curly French fries, this Warhorse is meal enough to make anyone hot to trot.

Best Burger
Cherry Cricket
2641 E. 2nd Ave.

Get your buns over here. In these lean times, what's a restaurant to do when the health-conscious insist on a better burger? Put in a Charglo grill, that's what--and that's exactly what the Cherry Cricket did. The Charglo, filled with lava rocks that quickly sear an outer shell to hold in all the juices, even coaxes flavor out of a 70-percent-lean piece of meat. Of course, the Black Angus trim thrown in there helps, as does the roster of toppings, including eight cheeses (try the hot Jack) and grilled Bermuda onions. Wash the best burger in town down with one of the 75 bottles of beer on the wall or the 18 on tap. Although Cherry Cricket--the quintessential neighborhood bar--won last year, too, we have yet to find a better burger.

Readers' choice: Good Times/Red Robin (tie)

Best Burger Toppings
Spanky's Roadhouse
1800 E. Evans Ave.

We brake for Spanky's burgers--and their toppings. There's the sauteed mushrooms with Monterey Jack cheese, the green chile with cheddar and roasted chile strips, the blue cheese with bacon, the Cajun hot sauce with Jack, the avocado with Swiss and bacon...and that's just half of the choices. We like to go Hawaiian with the half-pounder layered with ham (and not that deli stuff, either), pineapple and Swiss. Our gang especially appreciates that Spanky's is overly generous--the toppings usually spill out the sides of the super sourdough buns--and that the burgers themselves are lean but still flavorful. Splurge for a side of Spanky's beer-battered onion rings and a thick, old-fashioned milkshake. This roadhouse is a must-stop.

Best Sandwiches
Old-Fashioned Italian Deli
395 W. Littleton Blvd., Littleton

The Old-Fashioned takes two opposing philosophies--bigger-is-better vs. quality-not-quantity--and sandwiches them between two halves of a chewy baguette. The fifty monsters that result (they weigh up to two pounds) are labeled things like "Terminator" and "Mobster," and they live up to their names: They're real killers. The Destroyer will snuff out your appetite for any other sandwich--and possibly anything edible--for two or three days. It combines ham, salami, Polish sausage and cappocola (a spicy Italian ham), the three cheeses that the deli puts in nearly every sandwich--cheddar, provolone and mozzarella--and the usual lettuce, tomato and mayo. And don't forget to ask for the Ba-tampte, a Jewish pepper that's mild and sweet but packs a light punch; the Old-Fashioned has it flown in from New York, and it makes the sandwiches.

Best Club Sandwich
Moondance
1626 Market St.

Moondance's club sandwich could also be the best sandwich in a club--and here's one club we'd like to join. Along with live entertainment and neighborly camaraderie, this sleeper of a piano bar features a steady playlist of innovative entrees, soups and sandwiches, including an excellent club. Don't come looking for the typical skyscraper of dry toast, however: This is a club roll-up, with a tortilla holding together ham, turkey, lettuce, tomato and Swiss, all moistened by a spicy aioli sauce. It's just as filling as a standard sandwich, but without all the crumbs. Can we just have one more, Moondance?

Best Cheesesteak
Acappella's
1336 E. 17th Ave.

There was a time when Acappella's cheese-steak was inconsistent--sometimes there would be too little cheese and sometimes too little meat. But these days Acappella's is singing a different tune. Every time we eat there (and in the last year, we've done so a gluttonous number of times), the cheese-steak is superb, boasting just the right balance of cheese, beef and grilled onions. A side of French fries--still among the best in town, although they're no longer made from scratch--and a cold beer put us in perfect harmony.

Readers' choice: Philadelphia Filly

Best French Fries
Firehouse Bar and Grill
1525 Blake St.

This spud's for you. A side order of fries isn't even on the Firehouse menu, but if you ask for one, you'll be thrilled with what you receive--an enormous mound of fries served in a medium-sized salad bowl. And at just a buck a serving, you pay less than you would at most fast-food joints for a third as much food. There are so many fries, in fact, that you could make a meal of them--and might want to, considering how tasty these are. Be adventurous and try some of the table-top hot sauces instead of ketchup.

Readers' choice: McDonald's

Best Mashed Potatoes
Brick Oven Beanery
1007 E. Colfax Ave.

After going out of vogue during the food-as-art phase, mashed potatoes are back, big-time, as everyone rushes to make food comfortable again. But the Brick Oven Beanery--or BOB's, as it's affectionately known--never left the comfort zone; they've been serving up soothing, home-style cooking for nine years. And doing it well, we might add. What they're especially good at is the ultimate in granny fare: mashed potatoes, as in unpeeled, hand-smashed, peppery and drowned in your choice of gravies (we go for the creaminess of the corn). Butter up!

Best Mashed Potatoes With Fish
240 Union
240 Union Blvd., Lakewood

As soon as mashed potatoes were cool again, chefs began playing with them, taking them beyond the basic butter-and-milk and, quite frankly, doing some really silly things that made no sense at all. Mashed potatoes mixed with fruit salsa? Give us a break. But the old pairing of meat and potatoes was revised to good effect, because once you've had mashed potatoes with fish, the world is a very different place. One of the first in Denver to boldly go where no restaurant had gone before was 240 Union, which not only serves fish with mashed potatoes but has made them mesh together beautifully. Chef Matt Franklin usually offers one special per day (the menu changes frequently) featuring such pairings as tuna with wasabi potatoes or sea bass with garlic potatoes. Feel free to mix and match, too--if you want a piece of red trout with the tarragon potatoes that ordinarily come with the salmon, just ask.

Best Fish and Chips
Yorkshire Fish & Chips
7272 Pecos St., Westminster

The only thing that would make the fish and chips at Yorkshire seem more authentic would be for a permanent cloud to hang over the place. Listen here, guvn'r, this is the genuine article: cod coated in batter and deep-fried in super-hot oil until crisp waves of crust cover the soft flakes of fresh fish. The chips are appropriately soggy with crunchy edges, just right for slogging with malt vinegar. The place is a bit of a dive, and there's no pint to wash it down, but no matter--this is food, glorious food.

Best Potato Salad
Hummel's Delicatessen and Sidewalk Cafe
2360 E. 3rd Ave.

Hummel's recipe came from the Dutch owner of a German deli that sat on South Broadway forty years ago. "My father kept asking this guy for the recipe," says deli owner Gordon Hummel. And we're glad Dad finally managed to badger it out of the Dutchman, because this potato salad is terrific. The two key factors: steaming the potatoes in their jackets before peeling and dicing them, and tossing the tubers with a vinegar and homemade mayo made with corn oil. The end result is too good to save for a picnic.

Best Potato Pancakes
Cafe Berlin
2005 E. 17th Ave.

No flash in the pancakes, Cafe Berlin's kartoffelpuffer are the ultimate in German comfort food. These hot potatoes are half-grated, half-mashed, fried oily-crisp and served under a slab of sour cream. But the crowning glory is the applesauce, a simple, sweetened meltdown spiced with cinnamon. Would we like some more? You're darn Teuton.

Best Baked Beans
Brown Sugar's Burgers and Bones
2415 Welton St.

Behind every successful pit man is a woman--or at least her recipe. For Brown Sugar's owner George Brown, that woman is his wife, Bonita, and the recipe is for baked beans, all sugar and spice and everything nice. Bonita's secret formula creates the sweetest, stickiest, spiciest baked beans you've ever tasted, and they're the only accompaniment worthy of George's superior barbecued pork-backs. Brown Sugar's doesn't have a liquor license--never had one, never will--but that's a small quibble for food this good. Slake your thirst later. For now, you're content to be full of beans.

Best Pasta e Fagioli
Geppetto's
699 W. Littleton Blvd., Littleton

Father knows best--at least when it comes to pasta e fagioli, a pasta-and-bean stew. Geppetto's owners use their father's recipe, and even though Dad still lives in Napoli, he maintains strict control over the assembly line. Two kinds of beans--cannelini and kidney--and elbow pasta make up the main event, and pancetta, a salty Italian bacon, gives the stew its intensity. But it's the pungent base of fresh tomatoes cooked down with garlic and celery and livened up with a sprinkling of red-chile flakes that really packs a punch. This dish is a knockout.

Best New England Clam Chowder
Chowda House
11104 W. Colfax Ave., Lakewood

Clam chowder shouldn't look like an alternative to wallpaper paste. This is a soup, not a casserole, and you should be able to eat it with a spoon, not a knife and fork--or a spatula. At Chowda House, the clam is treated with the respect it deserves. Large pieces of the succulent bivalve float freely in a milky broth filled with potatoes, carrots and celery and seasoned with plenty of salt and pepper; the oyster crackers are the only side dish you'll need to make a meal. Dip into a bowl in Chowda House's austere, wood-planked, bottom-of-the-boat atmosphere and you embark on a voyage of delicious discovery. Ahoy, matey!

Best Manhattan Clam Chowder
Mesquite House East
9668 E. Arapahoe Rd., Englewood

The controversy over whether chowder should be made from milk, as in New England, or tomatoes, as in Manhattan, is moot in Denver, where such geographic loyalties mix and mingle over a steak sandwich and a martini. More important is that the chowder--no matter which version--must be good. And that's where Mesquite House East comes in. Its tomato-based chowder is more Italian gravy than broth, a cooked-down blend of sauce and seasonings, thick with skin-on potato chunks and fresh, fresh pieces of clams and fish. It's available by the pint or quart--and guaranteed to be quite a catch.

Best Pho
Pho Duy
945-G S. Federal Blvd.

Start your day the Vietnamese way--with a bowl of pho. This soup is a real cereal killer: Once your tastebuds wake up to its subtle complexities, you'll never look at another box of Cheerios. But pho is just as good at lunch and dinner: It's a simple, satisfying meal, filling and cheap to make. Where so many restaurants go wrong with their pho, though, is in the embellishments, an essential grouping of fresh bean sprouts, sweet Asian basil, lemon or lime slices and a spicy sauce to augment the meats. We like to go pho it at Pho Duy, where the bowl--even when you order a small portion of the soup--is typically enormous. It's filled with beef and a broth flavored with star anise, and served with sweet hoisin and potent red-chile sauces as well as the standard condiments. Don't be shy--the long tables fill quickly with Asian families concentrating on nothing but the steaming bowls. And remember: In any language, soup is good food.

Best Chicken Soup
J's Noodles
945-E S. Federal Blvd.

The fragrant tom ka gai at J's Noodles knows no cultural boundaries. The management of this tiny, popular room says the soup contains only chicken, lemongrass and Laos root, but you'd swear that Jewish and Asian mothers collaborated on some sort of extra ingredient for the healing, spicy-but-soothing, off-white brew. And the way that it arrives at your table--in a lovely clay pot with a wooden, ladlelike instrument--only adds to the soup's charm and mystique. Whassamatta with you? Eat, eat.

end of part 1