L'Heure Heureux At The Horseshoe - What Do You Want on Your Tombstone? Pepperoni and Sausage

Horseshoe Lounge
414 East 20th Avenue
Denver, CO 80205-3201 http://www.thehorseshoelounge.com/

Horseshoe Lounge is perfect if you like the following:

1) Getting drunk and eating pizza on the cheap.
2) Avoiding painus Lodo-ers.
3) Relaxing with booze.

The cozy, hodge podge, loungy attitude of the Horseshoe isn't screaming I'm FANCY WORLD, to my face, like so many other places in this city.  Denver is confused, for the most part, what it wants to be.  On one hand, so fucking rado and outsdoorsy and laid back, and yet, simultaneously contrived in its desperation to look metropolitan, glamorous and fancy in hopes to be worthy a visit by Anthony Bourdain, who has said on many occassions that he has no intention of coming to Denver (even though I saw him on a two minute excerpt about Mizuna being the only super delicious place in town - and he is mostly right - which reminds me to tell you that I will post a dissection of "SHIT I AM SO SICK OF HEARING ABOUT - referencing my personal disdain for the amount of publicity and "best of" type shit that certain undeserving restaurants receive. But that is another story. 

My point is that I love the Horseshoe because it is exactly what it should be. Not fancy, just comfy. Not calling itself a gastro something or other - or an eatery this and that.  Just a bar - which gets tons of light in the afternoon to avoid the heavy and dark depressing feel of the winter months and enough regulars sitting at the bar, with plenty to say to one another that you can feel comfortly soothed in anonymity. Isn't that every girl's dream? Drinking anonymously during winter's abyss and eating the shit out of a little pizza.  PS, the menu claims that everything is "housemade" but I have a hunch this house is made by Tombstone. Nonetheless, it is good. I haven't had a Tombstone pizza in awhile because I am partial (with my incredibly sensitive palette) to the Totinos party pizzas. But the pizza was still very nice.  I love a thick little crunchy pepperoni as much as the next girl and appreciate it for what it is, sustenance for my inebriation.

Beatrice and Woodsley - Lady Dining

Beatrice and Woodsley

38 South Broadway
Denver, CO 80209
http://www.beatriceandwoodsley.com/



Hey Gurl.

Are you interested in some full-on lady dining?

How about an unnecessarily romantic dinner, possibly with someone you prefer not to be romantic with?

Well if you answered yes to either question, Beatrice and Woodsley is for you, gurl. Talk about glamorously and romantically radochic. Aspen trees and distressed horizontal wood panelling everywhere say hey, please dine comfortably in my romantic bosom. While much more successful in appearance than the Olive Garden, Beatrice and Woodsley wants to fool you into believing you are eating outside. If you are dining with one other person, no matter who it is, be prepared for romance. The tables for two are annoyingly set for sexy dining. I learned this when my mother came to visit a few years ago. This experience, while turning out to be quite lovely, was only slightly less awkward than the time me moms and I were booked in the honeymoon suite at some B & B in England's countryside. We had to request that someone split the twin beds that had been pushed together for lovemaking king. Super gross.

Do I sound complainy? Because that is not the direction I wanted to go. I do like the food. Yes, there was a time when I loved it. I had pork belly a few years ago and it was the most wonderful piece of fattie fuck yeah I had eaten in a long time. However, I went there for a lady brunch very recently and I will say I was minimally disappointed with a few things. For one, I ordered the jalapeño grits brulee because it sounds amazing doesn't it? The only way that one could possibly improve grits is by bruleeing them am I right? Well, the crispy layer was nice enough, but the grits were disappointing. Throwing in a chopped jalapeño to a lumpy bland bowl of grits does not a fancy dining experience make.

(Side note If anyone knows where a girl can find some decent grits in this town please let me know. I have had it up to my eyeballs with shitty grits and shitty biscuits and gravy in the Denver. I did have biscuits and lamb gravy once at Table 6 and I am salivating at the memory - but I want to find some gorgeous classic biscuits and gravy. Some asshole at Pete's Kitchen (which will appear on my list of most horrible restaurants in the city of Denver - so why do people keep telling me how good it is....along with Vesta Dipping Grill) once gave me biscuits and gravy made with ham gravy. Have you ever in all your life heard of anything so incredibly tragic? Well, I never. How dreadful. My brain has been stained with this memory I cannot shake.

Back to B&W, I hate to say, that I was also a little disappointed in my sausage. It was chewy, maybe it was overcooked or too gamey or maybe this whole organic thing isn't working out for them, but I don't think they understand how much effort goes into my Sophie's choice of sausage or bacon for my Sunday morning breakfast. The entire meal is based on my preference at that particular moment and I worry about my decision as I wait for my food and thus its success is often dependent on whether or not it satisfies the way I had hoped when I came to the conclusion in the first place. So while everyone else is discussing the lady goings on of the week - I am sweating bullets wondering if I made the right decision. As it turns out I would have been much happier with the open faced Kentucky Hot Brown, which I knew would be good but did not order, regretfully, because I was powerless over my desire for sausage in that one moment when asked - and what would you like ma'am?  In conclusion, I spent the entire meal seething at the site of the Kentucky Hot Brown down the table from me.

Please do not misinterpret my above digression into bitchiness with anything other than the fact that, having been to such a delightful place on several occasions previous to this I expected something close to perfection. As I mentioned earlier, I was there with several ladies, to celebrate a lady at a lady brunch. I wanted our celebrated lady to love it and I am pretty sure that she did enjoy her lyonnaise pain perdue. The other ladies I brunched with also seemed to love their food which made me happy. Everything on my plate, aside from the sausage was great, but I put all of my hopes and dreams in that sausage and so I felt just a little violated.

Finally, let's talk quickly about the lady cocktails. They are elegant, ladylike and pretty fucking delicious make for a very pleasant and crunk-ass morning. They have lovely lady ingredients like lavendar, peaches and sparkles. I love being a lady for the lavendar and the sparkles.  So thank you sweet Beatrice and Woodsley for living up to the ladiness of it all.

So to make a long story long. This place is quite nice and would very much suffice. However don't go there if you hate ladies and romance.

TAG - Who 5280'd Whom?

TAG

http://tag-restaurant.com/

1441 Larimer Street
Denver, CO 80202-1704

Even though I heard from a reliable source that TAG was fantastic I avoided it because I mistakenly thought it was a steakhouse and most steakhouses suck. If you would like to know more about my feelings on the subject, please read the "Why Most Steakhouses Suck" blog entry. If need be, we can fist fight or verbally debate the matter, whatever you like.

Anyway, I decided to 5280 TAG - (for the thousands of readers not familiar with 5280 week, which is actually 2 weeks - restaurants all over the city create mini fixed price menus for a couple of weeks and charge $52.80 per couple in an effort to boost the restaurant scene.) I hear this happens all over the country so whatever. If you would like to know how to properly 5280, please read my blog entry, "How to 5280, you fucking idiot". So the pros of 5280 are that many of the fine-ish dining houses are super cheap. The cons, most of these places don't give a shit about expanding their clientele and think 5280 week is a huge pain in the anus, which it probably is, so most places phone it in. I assumed that TAG would do just that.

But I was wrong.

Praise Jesus the food was amazing. I mean perfect. I loved every single second and every single bite. From the jalapeno kumquat mojito - which sounds so fucking pretentious, because it is, but when something is that amazing, who cares, to the empanadas, the pork and the unbelievable dessert which I cannot remember exactly because I had several mojitos, but remember feeling the need to stick my tongue on the plate and lick it clean. Here is a tip - just order one mojito. No need for multiples. The first one was one of the best drinks that has ever crossed these chapped lips, but the second one was meh. Back to the food, whatever you order will be phenomenal. If TAG puts this much effort into its 5280 menu, I can only imagine how exquisite the full-priced menu is. Also, I cannot wait to summer here. The happy hour from 2-6 looks fantastic. Dear day job, I'm busy after 2pm getting shit-faced on delicious cocktails and eating small bites of excellence. PS, I will need a ride home at 6. Super.

PPS, they have Absinthe. I do not understand why absinthe is so popular. I remember its allure in the late 90s because it was illegal in the US and because I was young enough to believe that more than a couple shots of it would make me go all PCP and shit. Not the case, which in retrospect I am very thankful for. I don't personally care for it because I think it tastes like shit. Oh, sorry, did I offend? It tastes like licorice dipped in shit. Is that better? I will accept it being offered in bars, but it is such a production with the sugar cube and the freebasing spoon and theoversized jar of water that I do not need to see it at my dinner table thank you very much. It seemed like a drinky version of a hookah, which I am also not interested in participating in because everyone always seems to be watching each other as they pull the fruit laden smoke into their lungs and the whole thing looks weirdly and uncomfortably sexual.

Anyhoo, long story short - if you like food, go to TAG. If you do not, go there anyway.