One Tributary Eatery Plans Expansion, Another Opens Today

Tributary Food Hall & Drinkery opened just a month ago at 701 12th Street in Golden, and already changes are afoot.

The first is an addition in the food hall's one remaining vacant slot. What was initially announced as a spinoff of Biju's Little Curry Shop never came to fruition, but the food counter that has been empty since the August 2 grand opening has now been filled by Brandon Bortles, owner of Abejas just a few blocks away, and Noah Heaney, co-founder of Miners Saloon. The partners launched SurMesa Taqueria today to bring tacos to Golden's growing food scene. Bortles is also still working on Nosu Ramen, right across the street from Tributary, which is expected to open closer to the end of 2019. Between the two of them, Bortles and Heaney are becoming big players in the Golden restaurant and bar scene.

New to Golden is Nate Rajotte, who debuted his second location of Fringe Pizza when Tributary opened. Rajotte, a classically trained chef with fine-dining experience in Atlanta, Los Angeles and San Francisco, opened the original Fringe just a few months ago at 5400 Spine Road in Boulder. With two Neapolitan-style pizzerias under his belt, the chef is already eyeing expansion. He's looking to open Fringe number three at 29th and Valmont streets in Boulder, in a space that will be big enough to install a much larger oven and serve a bigger menu. It will also be the only one of the three Fringe locations with a liquor license (although beer, wine and spirits are served at Tributary). Rajotte says he'd like to see the newest member of his restaurant family open by next February.

Fringe's pizzas are made with dough fermented with a natural sourdough starter that the chef has been keeping alive for about two years. He named his starter Dewey (after a close friend), then created a second version named Dart (after the baby monster in Stranger Things) to increase the overall volume once his second pizzeria opened. Although the dough is cold-fermented over a two-day period in the traditional manner, not all of Fringe's pizzas hew to Old World styles. The margherita is certainly recognizable to pizza purists, but Rajotte uses lamb pepperoni made by Heywood's Provisions in Atlanta for his pepperoni pizza, and he slow-roasts pork shoulder overnight for his Canadian, which also comes with charred pineapple, jalapeños and a tangy, fruit-based sauce.

Rajotte adds that after taking a few years off from the restaurant world, he opened Fringe with growth in mind and hopes to open several more in Colorado in the coming years.

Tributary is also home to Generous Coffee Shop, Mr. Miner's Meat & Cheese, Kona Bowls Superfoods, Woodgrain Bagels, Amore Gelato, The Bar @ Tributary, and Working Title, a raw bar and small-plates specialist. The food hall is open daily from 7 a.m.; visit the Tributary website for more details.