Reader: A hamburger should taste good without anything on it!

Burgers! Burgers! Burgers! As summer heats up, so does America’s obsession with burgers. And Denver not only has a number of stand-alone spots that serve up decent burgers, but several Denver-based chains devoted to burgers, as well as many national chains — including Steak ‘n Shake, which just entered the…

Colorado tourism hopes go up in smoke

A week ago, the state’s tourism office announced that 2011 had been a record-breaking year. And 2012 will break all kinds of records, too — but not the ones boosters like to shatter. Most disappointing ski season. Rafting industry drying up. And the rest of the summer tourism season going…

Reader: Red Robin’s Burger Works Coke machine ties up traffic

Red Robin’s new spinoff concept, Red Robin’s Burger Works, is a smaller, less-dramatic-and-more-metallic version of the original, meant for smaller urban spaces. It has less hustle and bustle than the original stores, and also much less less square footage. But the Greenwood Village-based company did put a handful of its…

Reader: Midnight Cowboy qualifies as true tragedy porn

“Commercial media looks at things in terms of heroes and villains,” Sapphire said before she came to town this week to tout to tout her new novel, The Kid (a semi-sequel to Precious — the Hollywood adaptation of her ’96 novel, Push). “And we all know that the psychological reality…

Doug Lamborn touts his record — a real reign of error!

Voters “like having someone with a proven record,” Representative Doug Lamborn said after winning yesterday’s primary. And what a record! Hell would have to freeze over in El Paso County — which doesn’t look likely, given the Waldo Canyon fire raging there — before voters would skip sending this serial…

Reader: Michael Trundle Q&A inspires a vortex of For Real Emotion

“If you’re from Denver (or you’ve lived here for more than eight consecutive months) you know how small it can feel,” says Bree Davies. “It’s like three degrees of separation between you, your favorite barista at Pablo’s and your best friend from eighth-grade summer camp. Because that favorite barista is…

Westword‘s next restaurant critic: food for thought

This week’s Westword includes Laura Shunk’s last review, of Fruition; earlier today, she posted her list of “Denver spots I’ll miss most..” Since we announced a month ago that Laura was moving to New York, Westword has received a smorgasbord of applications for her food-writing job. And although Eater recently…

Reader: Comments about contrary vegans are not funny

Hugo Matheson, the co-owner of the original Kitchen in Boulder, along with the new Kitchen Denver, is obsessed with the business. “I live and breathe every detail of the restaurants,” he says in this week’s Chef and Tell interview. “I can’t imagine doing anything else.” No matter how stupid restaurant…