8 Rivers puts lunch on hold

8 Rivers, Scott Durrah’s modern Caribbean restaurant that opened last October at 1550 Blake Street (after a successful stint in a much smaller spot at 3609 West 32nd Avenue, now occupied by Venue), is changing its hours for the winter. And they’re very ishy. The restaurant, which also bills itself…

Wake-Up Call: Matthew Shepard, eleven years later

This past weekend the largest gay-rights demonstration in close to a decade descended on Washington, D.C., where lawmakers may finally approve the Matthew Shepard & James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, a measure that would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the categories covered by federal hate crime…

Remembering Frank Finn of the Gold Hill Inn

The inn at Gold Hill, ten miles up from Boulder, has been around about as long as Colorado has been a state. Poet Eugene Field stayed there, and described his visits in “Casey’s Table d’Hote,” the first poem in his 1889 book A Little Book of Western Verse. Oh, them…

Wake-Up Call: A noble, if not Nobel, calling

Yesterday was a long day in Idledale, the tiny town in the foothills where Dawn Engle and Ivan Suvanjieff put up their feet when they’re not pounding the pavement on behalf of PeaceJam, the non-profit they founded over a dozen years ago that links up youth from around the world…

Guess where I’m eating?

It’s not easy baking at 8,000 feet, but this pastry chef seems to have hit the jackpot. Want to be rolling in dough? Then guess where I’m eating…

A sign of the times at Aviano Coffee

Coffee’s on at Aviano Coffee — and so is the heat. Owner Doug Naiman, who opened his spot in the beleaguered Beauvallon back in 2006, never anticipated the building being obscured by scaffolding and swathed in plastic. “When this scaffolding goes up over my business, what’s it going to look…

What’s the best dive bar in Denver?

What’s your favorite dive bar in Denver? Drew Bixby, our Drunk of the Week columnist, features nearly a hundred great lounges, taverns and saloons in his book Denver’s Best Dive Bars: Drinking and Diving in the Mile-High City, due out November 3. But while Bixby includes a list of the…

Wake-Up Call: Remembering John Parr and Sandy Widener

In the 21 months since John Parr, Sandy Widener and their daughter, Chase Parr, were killed in a horrific car accident, I’ve trained myself not to grab the phone to call Sandy, a wonderful writer and college pal who was one of the founders of Westword, to hoot over some…

Are you Westword‘s new pot critic?

Is this the most attention you’ve ever gotten?” asked the national reporter. Westword got bomb threats when we broke the news about University of Colorado coach Bill McCartney’s daughter being pregnant by dying quarterback Sal Aunese, a story that’s gotten a second life on ESPN now that their son is…

No Big Lots skewer for Sketch

Sketch has a limited menu, but as Jason Sheehan noted in his review, what Jesse Morreale and Sean Yontz (the subject of this week’s Chef and Tell) are serving there is choice. Still, when the place opened in March, we couldn’t resist suggesting that — in addition to the exotic…

Tilted Kilt goes for a liquor license

The Tilted Kilt has been called a Celtic Hooters — a label that its Arizona-based owners don’t appreciate, we hear. They prefer “The Best Looking Sports Pub You’ve Ever Seen,” the slogan on the web site. A sports pub with waitresses who wear naughty school-girl skirts. There are already 22…

Wake-Up Call: Hold your horses!

Twenty-five years ago, the Department of Defense took over 235,000 acres of ranchland in southeastern Colorado — the largest condemnation of private property in the country. And the Army’s not done yet. Six years ago, word surfaced that the feds would try to add another 400,000 acres to the Pinon…

A warm slice for a warm coat at Abo’s NY Pizza

For the next two months, if you drop off a new or gently worn winter coat at either of Gunther Mueller’s Abo’s NY Pizza locations — in Centennial at 7475 East Arapahoe Road, and in Littleton at 8440 Kipling Parkway — you’ll get a free slice of cheese pizza as…

Kevin Taylor goes ahead with catering; steaks on back burner

Last March, chef/restaurateur Kevin Taylor announced that in September 2009, he would be opening Kevin Taylor Steak in the aloft Hotel at Arista in Broomfield. It would be his seventh restaurant (if you count the one in Central City’s Teller House, which is only open in the summer), one that…

Wake-Up Call: Mile High City going to pot

Yesterday, Westword’s quest for a medical-marijuana critic made the New York Times, after already being featured in the Wall Street Journal, MSN and CNBC. My e-mail box overflowed and my phone rang off the hook. It’s funny how the national media has jumped all over this. “Is this the most…

Peeling off a recipe for Three Onion Soup

Every month, the Colorado Department of Agriculture shares a recipe created by chef Jason Morse of Valley Country Club in Aurora. The October recipe, Three Onion Soup, focuses on one of the state’s major crops and comes just in time for these suddenly cold days. In 2008, Colorado produced 270…

End of the line for Kapre Lounge

For decades, Kapre Lounge, at 2729 Welton Street, served the town’s best fried chicken. After Wilfred O. Thomas closed his place six years ago, Stage 2 moved into the space, ostensibly serving up Kapre’s old recipe — but it just wasn’t the same. And now the joint’s closed for good,…

Walnut Room under way on Broadway

John Burr, owner of the Walnut Room at 3131 Walnut Street, spent two years searching for a location for his next venture. And now the Walnut Room Pizzeria is taking shape in the former home of Freaky’s, a space at 2 Broadway that suffered a fire last year. Originally, Burr…

Wake-Up Call: Steer clear of this DMV office!

I’ve always had good luck at the Division of Motor Vehicles office at 2736 Welton Street. Sure, the tiny parking lot is a nightmare, but the DMV employees are friendly, if not always fast — and you can always take a quick stroll around Five Points if there’s a wait…

Atomic Cowboy Karl Allis wants to be a millionaire

Watch Karl Allis, restaurant manager at Atomic Cowboy and Fat Sully’s and an occasional on-air personality at KKFN (his dream is to have a show called “The Hungus Amongus”), takes a shot at winning a million bucks on Who Wants to be a Millionaire, which airs at 9:30 a.m. today…