What, you thought I was done talking about burgers? Not quite. One of the best burgers I’ve had in a long time was the Triple Prime at the Ruby Tuesday at 14100 East Iliff Avenue. Yeah, it’s part of a chain (as are both Five Guys and The Counter, reviewed…
I know: Small plates are supposed to be dead, right? A fad. Last year’s news. And yet one of the most notable new restaurants in the city (Beatrice & Woodsley, reviewed this week) is doing small plates. And one of the best expansions of the year — Delite, which Dylan…
For photos from inside Beatrice and Woodsley, see the slideshow at westword.com/slideshow A room inspired by the story of two lovebirds: Beatrice, the life-loving daughter of a French wine-making family who relocated to California in the early 1800s to create a small vineyard. And Woodsley, the handsome and crafty son…
You know why I love this town? Because Denver is like a good boxer, a solid bet to go the distance. There was this guy, a Mick, who was a monster just the same way. He would stand in the center of the ring, toe-to-toe with some of the most…
This is my fear: Someday, this modern turn toward the glorification of quote/unquote regional American cuisine and New American and modern American fusion will destroy what little we have left of the true American cuisine. Someday, many years from now, some smart-ass food writer is going to start waxing metaphoric…
It’s one of those things that has come to define a floor that’s actually concerned with the happiness and comfort of its guests, a little thing that shows a staff out for more than just tips and a night with no complaints. Fixing a wobbly table. True, a restaurant that…
I recently caught up with Dan Landes, owner of WaterCourse Foods, City, O’ City and WaterCourse Bakery, to talk about his new joint, WaterCourse Cafe at the Aveda Academy, set to open November 17 at 17th and Market. He told me that the deal for the new cafe — which…
Play a game with me. I promise it won’t take long. Say you’re dying. Say, for comfort’s sake, that all the crap you learned in Sunday school or Hebrew school or wherever is true. Your god is a god of love and mercy and forgiveness, but has a wicked sense…
I didn’t order the ribs at the Berkshire for one simple reason: Ribs should be saved for a place that specializes in them. Baby back pork ribs, in particular — which is where Big Papa’s BBQ comes in. When you get your baby backs here, you pull one bone free,…
After finishing my review of The Berkshire, I called owner Andy Ganick to find out what freaky pig savant was running his kitchen. Turns out the guy with the porky jones is Ganick himself. “I was raised in a Jewish household,” he told me, and while his family wasn’t kosher,…
Just as Marco’s Coal-Fired Pizzeria presents an uncompromising take on authentic Neapolitan pizza, with its magical pizza ovens and transplanted pizza man, Armando’s Ristorante in Aurora (one of three metro locations) presents an uncompromising take on another Italian-food experience. Here it’s a museum-quality reproduction of the classic (and, some would…
Wednesday night, I had a pizza. Doesn’t matter from where — let’s just say it was from a well-known chain, well-known for serving halfway-decent ingredients atop cardboard crusts to drunken frat boys, suburban families and, occasionally, lazy restaurant critics. Let’s just say the name rhymes with Papa Juan’s. Friday night,…
The Landmark development in Greenwood Village is a strange kind of place, a “European-style village,” according to its website, springing from the ground like a weird, sci-fi bubble-city in the middle of what used to be a strip-mall-and-office-park nowhere. But not springing up too fast; the project has undergone numerous…
Following service Saturday, Mel’s Bistro at 1120 East Sixth Avenue went dark. After lots of back-and-forth and sniffing around by some of Denver’s best-known chefs, Mel Master finally signed a deal to sell the last restaurant in the Master family empire to Steve Mursuli. He’ll turn it into a Cuban…
I’d heard about Snooze long before it opened and was excited about the place, juiced to have a hip, eclectic, chef-driven breakfast joint in the Ballpark neighborhood. And then I finally got there in July 2006 and found the staff rude, the food uninspired and the vibe operating at such…
Once again, I find myself wishing I were a big fat man, one of those renowned, infamous gastronomes of old. I wish I were James Beard, who could put away a dozen oysters, a pound of Gulf shrimp, a whole chicken and maybe a few of its eggs, scrambled, as…
I took my first cooking job in 1988. Fifteen years old, I walked into a neighborhood pizza shop knowing precisely nothin’ about nothin’ and proceeded to prove it at every opportunity. That I wasn’t fired after my first night was odd. That I survived my first week, near miraculous. It…
I’d intended to waste the bulk of this column on a vain, poorly researched, smarty-pants essay about the cuisine of the ’80s and Denver’s best practitioners thereof — but then actual news had to happen and wreck my plans. Remember just seventeen days ago, when things seemed relatively tranquil? Well,…
Before there was Limón or the Arvada Grill, chef Alex Gurevich had Cafe Bisque. I first wrote about the restaurant not long after it opened, and excoriated the harebrained international floundering of the menu. I was much more effusive about the restaurant in 2005, and even welcomed Cafe Bisque back…
Lemon-braised artichoke with roasted garlic herb butter. Venison carpaccio with Humboldt Fog blue cheese, organic olive oil and black pepper. Steak Diane with truffled garlic mashed potatoes, and a New York strip with white cheddar sweet-potato fries. There was also a quote/unquote Niçoise — a loose chef’s interpretation with Colorado…
It didn’t take long to learn who’d done that amazing cupcake gelato served at Relish up in Breckenridge (see page X). In fact, had I turned just a few neurons to the matter, I probably would’ve been able to guess. Because it was Pete Arendsen from Ice Cream Alchemy in…
I was thinking that they could probably hear my stomach rumbling from three tables away. “So, what are you going to have?” Laura asked. “Everything,” I said. “One of everything. Maybe two.” “I’m serious, Jay. What are you going to have?” “What are you going to have?” “I don’t know…
