Fondue brings out a person’s true nature. First there are the control freaks, the folks who begin coordinating the fondue forks the second the pots start heating up. “Okay, Sally, Jim and I will use the court bouillon for the first fifteen minutes while you guys cook in oil, and…
When the Melting Pot opened, it featured one of the cheesiest campaigns imaginable. Diners were supposed to order their servers to “fondue me” — and, in fact, the resulting service was so bad that those diners probably would have preferred being dropped in boiling oil to suffering through another meal…
Question: What do you get when two California lawyers decide to open up their own pizzeria? Answer: A lot of pizzerias. But the California Pizza Kitchen is no joke. As of last week, when a second Colorado location opened at FlatIron Crossing, there are 83 full-service CPKs, as they like…
It was the first restaurant I reviewed for Westword , and in the years since, both Fratelli’s and I have gone through a few changes. Fratelli’s made its debut as a Colorado pizza kitchen more than twenty years ago, which puts it way ahead of the California Pizza Kitchen (see…
Skydiner, bo-biner, banana-fana fo-finer, fee-fi mo-miner, Skydiner. Before they opened their second venture, the principals from The Hornet — Dave French, Brewster Hanson, Paul Greaves and Lisa Quinn — held a contest to name the space they’d taken over at 1700 Vine Street, the spot long occupied by Juanita’s Uptown…
You are not finished,” the seventy-year-old waiter scolded as he grabbed a spoon and scooped the bottom out of my seafood-filled potato boat, plopping the sauce-soaked spuds mound in the center of my plate. “You eat this, and then you are finished.” I wasn’t about to argue. After all, this…
I thought I was done for when the Bay Wolf went down,” says Rich Salturelli, remembering his Cherry Creek hot spot. “I got a divorce, and I gave the restaurant to her, and then she ran it into the ground. Me and my brother, Thom, who has the Cricket on…
Like so many other great culinary creations — cheese, jerky, prosciutto, pickles — sushi was invented as a way of preserving food. In early Japan, slices of raw fish were sandwiched between layers of heavily salted rice, with a stone then placed on top. Months later, the rice/fishwich was ready…
Raise your hand if you didn’t leave Sacre Bleu satisfied — or get satisfied shortly after leaving. No? You are soooo in the minority. This what’s-old-is-nouvelle-again restaurant specializes in feeding all the appetites — the hunger for attention, the hunger for food, the hunger for sex. Even the name is…
Years from now, we’ll look back at the turn of the century and remember a time when you could have cybersex with a perfect stranger who remained a perfect stranger, buy a car from someone whose hand you never shook and have your precious retirement money moved around by someone…
When I first visited Great Northern Tavern, the place was a virtual train wreck, with some ill-conceived dishes colliding with poor timing (“Train in Vain,” December 10, 1998). But today it’s the best brewpub in Denver. So how did Great Northern get back on track? First and foremost, the restaurant…
Americans make movies about violence and sex, and the Japanese make movies about violence and food. So who do you think makes the better noodles? If you’ve seen the film Tampopo, you know that the noodle house is serious business in Japan. In that movie, a truck driver, Goro, who…
What’s in a name? The Latin colloquialism for “talk of the town” was a good fit for La Fabula; long before the restaurant actually opened, the neighborhood was talking about what kind of eatery would be brave — or foolhardy — enough to take on a location with a long,…
Even though we’re tasting from the same plate, the lamb shawarma I eat and the lamb shawarma my friend Gerry eats are two different dishes. When Gerry takes a bite of the grilled, marinated lamb, she’s eating a traditional dish created by her Lebanese ancestors, an entree that her grandmother…
No city is more revered for its culinary prowess than Paris, and certainly, its restaurants boast gastronomic delights without equal. Still, after several visits and many, many meals there — sometimes I ate two dinners in a day just to get to all of the places “they” said I had…
The first step in dealing with an addiction to Thai food is admitting that you have a problem. The second is accepting that there are no more steps — because who can contemplate a cure that bans curry?Chile peppers can be physically addicting, according to recent medical evidence. The reasons…
I’ve eaten at Le Central many times over the past six years, and I’ve always encountered some kind of problem. Often they’ve been production-oriented glitches, ranging from tardy courses to overcooked seafood (“Waiting for Gateau,” October 17, 1996); sometimes servers have failed to refill water glasses or replace silverwear. Out…
Ohana. That’s a Hawaiian term that translates as “the family and aloha spirit,” says Alex Fabrigas, the general manager of Roy’s Cherry Creek. But when Fabrigas left a Hawaii Roy’s to bring us this new restaurant in the Cherry Creek Shopping Center, he didn’t just bring ohana with him –…
When Hemingway’s Key West Grille first opened in 1996 — actually, it sort of reopened, since a Hemingway’s (minus the words “Key West Grille”) occupied the same building on Old South Gaylord from 1977 to 1985 — the author must have been rolling over in his grave. I know a…
A friend just back from Vietnam has been recounting the mouthwatering food she enjoyed there: dishes that involved dozens of fresh, just-plucked-from-the-ground- or-ocean ingredients; abundant feasts that brought platter after platter of multilayered concoctions; snacks much more inventive and healthier than a bag of potato chips. All things, of course,…
You can bet that while Wally and the Beav were washing up for supper, June wasn’t busy ripping the lids off to-go containers. And no way did Ward stop by the takeout market after a hard day at the office to pick up some ready-made pasta and sauce. Making dinner…
When Uncle Bobby comes visiting from Connecticut and college roommate Susie stops by on her way from Chicago to L.A., they always want to “experience” the Old West in a way that lets them return to friends and families and confirm that, “Yep, out there in Cularada, they eat that…
