Beer tourism is a booming industry in Colorado, but until recently, unless visitors to this state packed an extra suitcase for their canned and bottled loot, they didn’t have a way to take last-minute souvenirs back home for friends and family — or for their own refrigerators. That changed in…
In the Logan’s Run-esque TAXI development, there’s a sanctuary from the demands of office and industry that offers more than the Sci-Fi movie’s menu of plankton and sea greens and protein from the sea. Fuel Cafe debuted along with the mixed-use development in 2008, opening to the public what could have…
Colorado’s two best-known sour-beer specialists are puckering up for a fight at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office over three beer names that the companies both use. The battle will pit Crooked Stave Artisan Beer Project, which has been in Denver since 2010, against Trinity Brewing, founded in Colorado Springs in…
Local pickle purveyors Tyler DuBois and Justin Park of The Real Dill have been partnering with Colorado breweries for a while now, at food-and-beer pairing events and with one of their jarred offerings, Titan Dills, which incorporated Titan IPA brewing ingredients and techniques used by Great Divide into the pickle-making process…
Colorado’s breweries continue to experiment with new styles, new ingredients and new ways of melding flavors. As a result, several breweries have now packaged beers aged in barrels that once held the potent fruit of the agave plant. River North Brewery, for instance, released a tequila-barrel-aged version of its J…
When the hip Avanti food court opens in mid-July at West 32nd Avenue and Pecos Street, it will have an odd-for-Colorado beer lineup and, in particular, one beer that came about as a result of an unusual collaboration between the world-renowned Dogfish Head brewery and Denver’s Prost Brewing. Call it Delaware meets Denver…
The Ama-zingh at Baur’s Restaurant & Listening Lounge As bar manager at Baur’s Restaurant and Listening Lounge, Brittany Wangsness (who we last encountered mixing up a buttery cocktail at TAG) enjoys challenging guests with unique flavors in her cocktails. “I want guests to leave here, having their questions answered and…
Back when John Hickenlooper and his partners founded the Wynkoop Brewing Company, Hickenlooper was insistent that Colorado’s first brewpub pronounced its name “WINkoop.” As he would tell anyone who would listen, “After all, we don’t produce WINE.” But Colorado definitely does, and its current governor – one John Hickenlooper –…
“Money is not the goal,” says Eric Wallace. “It’s a means to an end.” And the end? To support his community, to provide a stable living for himself and his employees. Oh, and to “change the world” with craft beer. On Thursday, Wallace, who co-founded Longmont’s Left Hand Brewing in…
The romance of train travel hasn’t disappeared just yet. The renewed and revitalized Union Station offers the Brief Encounter magic of a mid-century rail station, without having to climb into a train and spend countless hours next to a musty grandpa who gasps like a fish in his sleep. At…
Good beer and good marketing have gone hand in hand at Oskar Blues for as long as the brewery has been canning — and one of the key components to that marketing has always been the aluminum vessels themselves. Oskar Blues hands empty cans out by the hundreds at festivals…
Thai Mai Tai at Nocturne “I had very little exposure to music growing up,” says Topher Hartfield, lead bartender at Nocturne, a new jazz venue and supper club that opened in March in the Ballpark neighborhood. But when he opened Nocturne with owners Scott and Nicole Mattson and chef Dustin…
There is no food more evocative of the Fourth of July in America than watermelon. It comes into season right about now and serves as the perfect refresher on a hot summer weekend full of barbecues and beer. But, what’s that? You’d like to combine your watermelon with your beer?…
As Colorado’s brewery scene expands, there continue to be changes at the top of the brewhouse ladder. The most recent comes from Dry Dock Brewing, which has hired Alan Simons to run its production facility. For the past seven years, Simons held the top job at Backcountry Brewery in Frisco, where…
As if the brewery scene in River North wasn’t hot enough, now Great Divide is getting ready to open its new tap room, the Barrel Bar — probably sometime next week. It’s the first phase of a $38 million new brewery that the company is building on five acres of…
The Bindery on Blake building in River North will soon be home to a trio of new food and beverage establishments, notably the new location of the Rackhouse Pub (after owner Chris Rippe’s original spot was closed to make way for the expansion of Stranahan’s distillery), and Bierstadt Lagerhaus, a brewery…
Need a little zest in your life? Craving some pep in your step? Want to add a little “zip” to your daily “a-dee-do-dah?” Here’s a hint: Take the parts of your daily routine that bug you and spice them up, Cajun-style. Boring commute? Cajun-style. Unfulfilling relationships with your step-children? Cajun-style…
Denver’s southern suburbs continue to chug along when it comes to new craft breweries. The latest to start pouring beer: Barnett & Son, which quietly opened earlier this month in Parker at 18425 Pony Express Drive, #125, with several beers on tap and a rotating caravan of food trucks. Owned by…
The Phuket at Fuel Inspiration often comes from the unlikeliest of places. For Jaci Hernandez, it happened on a vacation to Mexico. In early June, the bar manager at Fuel Cafe left Denver for a friend’s wedding in Puerto Morales, near Cancun. The idea for her newest cocktail didn’t actually…
Few adults willingly walk into Casa Bonita without having first enjoyed an alcoholic beverage or two: It takes a lot of fortification to stomach the Casa Chilada platter while trying to keep track of your kids in Black Bart’s Cave, plus, most of the Skee-Ball machines are usually broken. Then…
Denver will lose its biggest brewer this weekend when Breckenridge Brewery officially opens its massive, twelve-acre campus on the banks of the South Platte River in Littleton. But the city’s loss will be a major gain for Colorado beer drinkers and beer tourists, who will gain a malty, hoppy adult…
LoHi SteakBar is in an enviable position in Highland: by the standards of this ever-changing ‘hood, the modern steakhouse is an elder statesman, about to celebrate six years at 32nd Avenue and Tejon Street. But it’s also facing competition up and down the street, a quiet, polite battle that only…
