Where to Eat and Drink in Colorado in 2018
The Best of Colorado – Food and Beverage
BEST RESTAURANT :: BREAKFAST
There's a reason there's always a line to get into Snooze, An A.M. From one restaurant, Snooze has grown into a behemoth breakfast, brunch and lunch spot with eight restaurants in Colorado; four in California; five in Arizona; and seven in Texas. It's recently added another location in the Denver Tech Center and three more in Texas. Snooze's menu features interesting twists on classics, as well as dishes that are far from ordinary. Take the Breakfast Pot Pie, a flaky puff pastry tohttps://samsno3.com/pped with an egg any style and smothered in Snooze's homemade rosemary sausage gravy – breakfast bliss.
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SAM'S NO. 3
BEST RESTAURANT :: LUNCH
Range Restaurant's New American West cuisine focuses on the ingredients, cultural influences and cooking techniques inherent to the Rocky Mountain West. Located at 17th and Champa streets inside the Renaissance Denver Downtown City Center Hotel in the restored Colorado National Bank building, the restaurant has a spacious bar with a wide selection of local beers, liquors and wines, a private dining room and a wood-fired oven where much of the fare is prepared. The menu changes seasonally and offers a large selection of shareable plates, entrees, side dishes and desserts. The restaurant can also accommodate private parties.
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BEST RESTAURANT :: DELIVERED LUNCH
Jimmy John's is the perfect answer for anyone who's stuck at the office during lunch. The fast-casual restaurant bakes its French bread and slices its all-natural meats in its stores every day. The franchiser, which has 2,727 stores across the country, creates about 210 new jobs each week. Its restaurants support thousands of small businesses in the markets it's in by using local plumbers, electricians, contractors and repair companies for store upkeep and maintenance and using local companies to build its stores.
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BEST RESTAURANT :: PATIO
There's a lot of outdoor space to enjoy at Avanti Food + Beverage, a modern-day food hall located at 3200 Pecos St. in Denver's LoHi neighborhood. From the patio or the bleacher seats overlooking Coors Field, people can nosh on a variety of cuisine while they're taking in the stellar views of the downtown Denver skyline. Avanti offers two bars and a collection of seven different restaurants: American Grind; Brava! Pizzeria Della Strada; Chow Morso; Kaya Kitchen; QuickFish; Quiero Arepas; and The Regional. Avanti is open from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Sunday through Wednesday and 11 a.m. to 1 a.m. Thursday through Saturday.
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BEST RESTAURANT :: VEGETARIAN
City O' City uses local produce whenever possible in the vegetarian meals it dishes up for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The restaurant, located at 206 E. 13th Ave., even has its own urban micro farm, which provides much of the produce it cooks with during the summer. The menu includes waffles topped with vegetable ragu and vegan cheese fondue; breakfast burritos with scrambled eggs or tofu, pinto beans and cheese with green chile or gravy; quinoa and pinto bean burgers; and pizzas. The restaurant, which is open from 7 a.m. to 2 a.m., also pours specialty coffee, craft beer, wine and cocktails. City O' City supports local artists by hosting monthly in-house gallery shows.
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BEST RESTAURANT :: VIEW
There's a reason it's called The ViewHouse. The massive restaurants in Ballpark, Centennial and Littleton offer mountain and city views. They also have lots of activities on the patios and lawns that are scattered around the buildings. There are 40 local craft beers, and the menu features everything from tacos to slow-cooked barbecue brisket sandwiches. There's even a Thai peanut chicken bowl. The restaurant serves premium meat products that don't have antibiotics, growth hormones or byproducts , and it uses locally sourced organic products whenever possible.
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BEST RESTAURANT :: WESTERN SLOPE
Bin 707 Foodbar owner and Executive Chef Josh Niernberg reinvents classic dishes using ingredients sourced from the farms, orchards and wineries surrounding the restaurant in the Grand Valley. The Grand Junction restaurant's menu is regularly rotated to offer whatever is in season from local farms, with a goal of creating a sustainable economy, while providing a work environment with high standards and commitment to its mission. No matter how adventurous the menu gets, the Bin Burger served with beehive white cheddar and truffle fries will always be a staple.
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HECK'S TAVERN AT DEVIL'S THUMB RANCH
BEST RESTAURANT :: WINE LIST
The wine list at Osteria Marco is deep. A number of bottles offered in the all-Italian lineup are in the $40 range. And what goes better with Italian wine than Italian food? Restaurateur Frank Bonanno's Larimer Square eatery dishes up pizzas and paninis, as well as tried-and-true favorites like eggplant parmesan and lamb meatballs. Sunday night's special treat is a slow-roasting suckling pig.
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BEST RESTAURANT :: BAR-HAPPY HOUR
Located at 17th and Champa streets inside the Renaissance Denver Downtown City Center Hotel, the Range Restaurant is a cool place to hang out and enjoy a happy hour menu that offers great deals. It offers $4 drafts and cans of beer, $6 house wines and $5 Colorado cocktails, just $7, include CNB Gine & Berries, the Trust Vault Margarita and a Blonde Cosmo. The snacks, priced from $5 to $9, range from warm olives and candied habanero bacon to mini smoked bison brats and buffalo-style chicken wings.
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BEST RESTAURANT :: SPORTS BAR
The row of TVs above the bar at Highland Tap and Burger shows all the sports anyone could possibly want to watch while sipping on one of the dozens of beers the bar serves. There's also an array of game-day-worthy snacks, including nachos, wings, tacos and even an IPA Mac N Cheese. HTB, as the neighbors call it, is also known for its burgers – there are eight version to choose from. HTB's Shrrom Luvas (sauteed mushrooms, Ementhaler cheese and white truffle aioli with shaved fois gras) was the people's choice winner at the Denver Burger Battle.
BEST FOOD TRUCK
Pihilippine native Kathy Poland opened A Taste of the Philippines, which she says is the first Filipino mobile restaurant in Colorado, in October 2011. Her vision was to introduce the Filipino culture. The business offers catering and special events, and Poland donates portions of her sales to feed the Binunsuran Elementary School in Camiguin Island, Philippines. She plans to open a second truck in Chicago this year, at farmers markets and throughout the city.
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BEST CATERING COMPANY
The staff at Epicurean Group knows a thing or two about preparing drinks, serving food and throwing big parties. Epicurean caters 1,000 corporate events a year, provides the food at Denver Broncos games and other sports, is the exclusive caterer of the Denver Center for the Performing Arts (DCPA) and the Denver Art Museum, and even has some restaurants as clients. The company also caters many, many weddings.
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BEST COFFEE SHOP :: FRONT RANGE (LOCALLY OWNED)
Boyer's Coffee slow-roasts its beans at high altitude, sells bags of coffee to take home and also prepares specialty drinks. The company has provided much service to the community over the 53 years it has been in business. Boyer's donates coffee to the Denver Rescue Mission, partners with Adams County Sheriff's office for benefits and holiday toy drives, and currently is working with a farmers' cooperative in Peru to rebuild a schoolhouse. Throughout 2018, proceeds from Peruvian coffees will support the efforts.
The 16-location Ink! roasts its coffee in its roaster/retail location on 29th and Larimer streets.
"We train all of our people in the same training room, so we have a really tight group of people learning to make coffee the same way," says Keith Herbert, founder and CEO. Also he says, Ink! has control over it sourcing. "We control it from tree to cup, from the farm all the way through roasting of that bean, into the hands of our baristas."
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BEST COFFEE SHOP :: WESTERN SLOPE (LOCALLY OWNED)
INXPOT KEYSTONE COFFEEHOUSE
Whether you need caffeine and a hot breakfast sandwich before skiing or snowboarding, or lunch before or after happy hour, or you just need a comfortable place to sit and ready while everyone else does a few more runs, inxpot is the place. Located in River Run Village near the base of the gondola in Keystone, inxpot is open every day at 7 a.m. and offers hot food, pastries, coffee drinks, and wine and spirits.
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BEST BREWERY
BRECKENRIDGE BREWERY
Breckenridge Brewery opened its doors in 1990 in … wait for it … the mountain town of Breckenridge. The business says it is the third-oldest craft brewery in the state. In 1992 it added a location in Denver. The brewery kept making craft beer and outgrowing its facility, until the summer of 2015, when a 12-acre stretch of land that was once a carnation farm became the new production home in Littleton. Today the brewery offers guided tours.
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