There are certain spots that I just don’t think of as places to eat. The Rio, for example. Although I know a lot of people who for some reason like to eat there, for me, the drinks and the drinkers are the draw. Just a couple of blocks away from…
Fuck Man Law. You know what I’m talking about: those now-canceled Miller Lite commercials where a panel of dudes drunk on their own testosterone decided what was manly and what wasn’t. Examples: When toasting with beer, the bottoms of bottles should be clinked because clinking the tops would swap saliva…
When they use the “cow town” descriptor, what most folks mean is podunk, provincial, lacking in the sort of taste and culture found in the big cities on the coasts. They’re saying that while we, the people of Denver, may be urbane enough to understand that going out for a…
I asked the Mexican what he wanted to eat during his visit to Denver. In addition to being the author of Ask a Mexican, a weekly column now published in 31 papers, Gustavo Arellano is the food editor at our sibling paper, OC Weekly, in Southern California. So finding the…
On Friday at five-thirty, six, seven at night, The Corner Office is less a restaurant than a three-ring circus filled with liquored-up yuppies doing all their best tricks, elephantine captains of industry getting hot under the collar, fierce and beautiful female executives stalking the bar like lionesses in heels, and…
There’s news in Cherry Creek, where Eric Laslow, formerly of Corridor 44 and Restaurant 4580, has just been named chef for the Iron Mountain Winery that will be opening in the space at 235 Fillmore Street, home to the original Mel’s. Although Iron Mountain’s owners announced that they would be…
Most bars are so five minutes ago. While I love trying the trendy/beautiful-people spots, my attention span is shorter than the dresses on Dancing With the Stars. After I’ve experienced the shlock of the new, I’m usually on to the Next Big Thing or retreating to an old standby for…
In this space, I’ve dehumanized Denver’s homeless to a disgusting degree (The Ginn Mill, October 4), comparing them to open-sored, echolalic zombies worthy of scorn and contempt. I’ve also championed our city’s homeless (Star Bar, October 11), celebrating one man as a hardworking, down-on-his-luck type of guy worthy of my…
There are easy lunches and then there are really easy lunches. At the Corner Office, lunch is easy enough — a good menu (chicken and waffles!) in an interesting room, with excellent service. But lunch is even easier at McCormick’s Fish House & Bar, a place where you can stop…
In the Best of Denver 2007, Jason Sheehan named Ha Noi “The Best Taste of Hanoi,” saying this: “If you’re from Vietnam, this is comfort food. If you’re not, it’s a fantastic education in the less common flavors of Southeast Asia. Gelatinized duck’s blood, fishscale mint, sawgrass and other, even…
When I lived in Manhattan, my office was next to one of the city’s oldest bars: P.J. Clarke’s. As a relatively new legal drinker, I was fascinated by that bar’s century-old history and the classic cocktails it served to well-heeled Midtown businessmen. And when I moved back to Denver and…
Maggie and I arrive at Pat’s Philly Steaks and Subs (1624 Market Street) just in time for fifty-cent beers. Except according to the bartender, there’s no such thing. “Fifty-cent beers?” Charlie growls at us. “You think you’re going to find fifty-cent beers anywhere in this town? Shit, man. I get…
Back in the day (June 2004, to be specific), I hated Julia Blackbird’s with a rare and fiery passion. I hated it for its knock-off New Mexican cuisine, for its terrible earth-tone decor, for its cheap, up-from-frozen appetizers and the people who ordered them — smiling blissfully as they shoveled…
I have this dream of going to France. Paris, sure, but also (and mostly) Lyon. In my dream, I have a small, upper-story room in one of those old hotels, and every morning, invisible elves deliver café au lait, piping hot, the Times international edition and magical crepes that cure…
Using liquid nitrogen, chef Ian Kleinman makes magical sorbets at O’s Steak & Seafood (“Mr. Wizard,” October 25). But the magical ice cream served at O’s comes from Peter Arendsen, the owner and only ice cream-maker at Ice Cream Alchemy up in Boulder — a guy who’d done everything from…
The new restaurant is small — a shotgun storefront in the middle of the Highland Square action, surrounded by boutiques, bookstores, galleries and other restaurants, with seating for thirty, maybe, a small patio and a loud sound system that plays non-stop reggae that drifts out into the street and down…
Morning at Mama’s Cafe is all business. Eggs and more eggs, pancakes and waffles, toast and toast and toast. The kitchen is tiny, a steel box full of line cooks and fire, with room for one guy to work comfortably, two if they’re close as ballet partners. Put three in…
Chef Lachlan Mackinnon-Patterson has won a lot of awards, most of them for Frasca, the restaurant he owns in Boulder with partner Bobby Stuckey. The one honor he doesn’t yet have? An Emmy. And maybe that’s what he was working toward when I caught him on my TV at three…
I planned a girls’ weekend up in Beaver Creek when I doubted the Rockies would even make the playoffs, let alone the World Series. So the last Saturday in October, there we were in the mountains, hunting for a place to watch game three. First we tried E-Town, but between…
During the two-plus years I’ve lived in Denver, I’ve watched the menu at Atomic Cowboy (3237 East Colfax Avenue) transform from a one-page leaflet offering mini-corn-dog nugs and potent garlic fries to an impressive array of American-meets-Southwestern options (including some of the richest mac-and-cheese in town); I’ve watched Tuesday nights…
Tom’s Diner holds a special spot in the pantheon of Denver’s 24-hour dives, a special spot in the hearts and bellies of the cops who police it, the night creatures who haunt it, the off-duty strippers, cabbies, hookers and bartenders who frequent it. It’s not every place that can get…
When I was talking with Tom Ryan for my review of Smashburger, he told me that Icon Burger — the classic burger joint at 2755 Dagny Way in Lafayette that was the first burger property picked up by Cervantes Capital — will soon be shut down and turned into a…
