Lou's Food Bar - Guess who totally got raptured this weekend!

Lou's Food Bar - 1851 W 38th Ave - Denver, CO 80211

Lou's represents everything I have ever wanted in a happy hour. I have never felt so free and vibrant and should I die before I wake I pray the lord my soul to take.... on down to Lou's and leave it there for eternity.

How do I love thee, Let me count the ways.

1) Best happy hour food in Denver - by far, possibly America but I am only one lady with no jet pack so I will stick with the best of Denver for now.

Apparently, the happy hour food is not served on Saturdays - but our waiter was not aware of this until after we ordered so he gave it to us anyway. I am going to name my firstborn son Waiter or whatever his name was. 

2) Best cocktail happy hour in Denver - Aside from beer they have a pretty extensive list of super glam cocktails for $5.  I tried my friend's moscow mule which I normally hate because I don't like ginger beer but the ginger in this ginger beer was noticeably fresh and gorgeous and I will do anything for Lou's from now on.

3) Crabcake - In general the crabcake is up on my list of the most overrated crappetizers - so often dry and tasteless - but this was somehow creamy and rich and delicate and subtle and elegant and beautiful and my first bite began my hour long ascencion into the rapture of deliciousness.

4) Escargot - Dear Jesus, thanks for making snails.  I cannot wait to eat them again in heaven. (Not on the happy hour menu but made my hour super happy).

5) Pork Sliders - I know I have said that I disapprove of the slider with all of my being because I don't eat at White Castle for a REASON, but, a little pulled pork plus a little fancy slaw equals whatever the spankbank version of fantasizing about food would be.

Anyway, I am boring myself at this point, so I will say this. Lou's raptured my brains out and I feel confident saying this is by far the best happy hour in the city limits of the Denver.  The food is far superior to any other hh and at these crazy discounted prices - you would be an idiot not to love it.  I If you don't like this place there is nothing I can do for you so please move to another city.

Max Gill and Grill - How Does $1 Taco night turn into $100 Taco night? Real Easy

Max Gill and Grill
1052 South Gaylord StreetDenver, CO 80209

This place is fun.  A Bff and me like to go here whenever the lord, or government gives us working people a day off.  We like to think of it as our own little boozy staycation - because the back patio looks just like Key West, if Key West were frigid and snowy in the wintertime.   I love it partly because it reminds me of the greatest buddy / cop comedy of all time, Running Scared. You get the Key West warmth and the Chicago cold all at the same time. Lest you confuse this rather elegant comedy with some other annoying Running Scared - this is the brilliant film starring Gregory Hines, Billy Crystal and a hot young newcomer named Jimmy Smitts, and not the one with that Paul Thomas Walker person, or Paul Walker Thomas, or Jonathon Taylor Thomas, you know what I mean. 

Anyway, last night we decided to try out taco night because as L said - Hey-  its a dollar a taco!  Well apparently, we had 100.  I was very happy with the service and the food was pretty decent even though the tuna tacos were a little overcooked, the swordfish tacos were a little fishy and some painus behind us kept screaming about hockey.  As one who inherently strives to overcome adversity, I along with my team of happy hourers, managed to power through some oysters, tacos and beer.  You are welcome America.

Max's isn't going to win any most delicious awards (with me at least - who the fuck knows in this town - if Stuebans wins one more goddamn award I am going to start cutting myself). But I still recommend it considering that we went specifically to eat highly discounted seafood which is basically an unwritten rule of NO in the food industry. So Huzzah!

Z Cuisine - You are my everything

Z Cuisine and À Côté
2239 W. 30th Avenue Denver, CO 80211

Dear Z Cuisine, I love you.  I don't care what anyone says, you are prettiest.  You are also the most smartest and the best damn tapper.

The food is perfect.  I say this, not because I love superlatives, which I do, but because it is true. Any person who disagrees with me needs to be shot, with a bite of their foie gras, which tastes as described, like butter.  It is so fucking amazing.  My tongue is totally boning as I think about what glory touched my lips on my last visit.  I had some beef bourguignony number (Hachis Parmentier de Boeuf Bourguignon to be exact -  ~ Colorado grass fed beef flat iron marinated and slow baked in a roasted spices, merlot wine, roasted beef marrow & oxtail broth slow braised with root vegetables on a bed of onions and topped with yukon gold pommes purée & aged parmesan cheese served with a salade vinaigrette).  Basically - it is the best Shepard's pie you will ever eat.  Also it is marinated for 4 days.  My waiter indulged or the opposite of indulged - because it was pretty boring and I zoned out most of it - but he gave me an incredibly detailed description of enitre process and I remember the 4 days part.  A few years ago, I had this lamb nicoise salad that I would have made love to if legal.  That sounds weird but that is how unbelievably pure and simple and elegant this dish was - and I am not a fan of salads because they are too busy filling me up with lame lettuce, but I remember the waiter mentioning the delicacy to which the lamb was cooked and I was sold.  I always feel like an anus when I eat there because I spend so much time moaning, and saying shit like oooooooh myyyyyyyy gaaaaaawd you have to try this.  Like I am drunk with lust for the food so much so that I lose all dignity, not that I was loaded to begin with but in retrospect, I am always embarrassed because I basically belt out eternally:

"where I was a Flower of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the Moorish wall and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes!"

This place epitomizes romance and not in the "I am feeling romantic for sexy time" but in the "life is full of romance" and "everything is glamorous".  Plus there was some incredibly freaky and wonderful old timey movie with a lot of dancing and a midget dressed up as a baby - tap dancing - so the infotainment is also exquisite.  Why do the french enjoy dressing up like babies? 
Anyway, if you want to have the greatest experience of your life.  Go there.  If you hate happiness and joy then don't go and I will look forward to never seeing you.

Ale House at Amato's - You + Me = Frowny Face

Ale House at Amato's
16th and Central (or something like that)
their website is currently just popups - surprise


I love to Happy Hour on Saturdays.  Sun and beer and some sort of a cured meat are really my favorite tongue equation.  Since Denver has more sunny days than San Diego (I am still waiting for this to be our city's motto) Saturday happy hours give me the much needed excuse to take a break from my role as Sysiphus and sit in the sun and get a little drunk.

When I told a friend of mine that it was time to get happy houred, he suggested Amatos or whatever the stupid name is - because he heard it has a yuge patio, a shit load of beer and good food.  He was exactly right. It has all of those things. Apparently the patio seats 500 people and there is a super long list of Colorado beers and the muffaletta slider (which goes against my core beliefs of hating all sliders - full full report to appear on the shit I am sick of post coming soon) was pretty good.  So why don't I like this place?  If it has all of the ingredients in making my Saturday happy?

First of all they don't happy hour on Saturday. So fuck you for that. Secondly, they don't have a single lager or any lighter beer that isn't a fucking wheat beer.  Dear wheat beer, college called and said you can go fuck yourself.  I am very Sam I am about wheat beer.  I will not drink it anywhere.  After trying a couple of different "pilsnery radobeers" we ended up saying fuck it and getting drunk on wine.

We did enjoy ourselves but no thanks to Amatos.  It was too chilly to sit outside and while this patio was incredibly large, I am not sure why everyone raves about the view.  It overlooks I-25.  I already have that view on a daily basis.  I would in fact prefer that I have the opposite view.  Sure, there is a view of downtown in the background but it is basically like sitting on the highway, so no thank you.

Secondly Amatos whatever its called was created by the Breckinridge Brewery and I am pretty sure this is how their design process went.  Dude, what do Coloradans love most? RadoBeer, RadoSunsets and RadoSports.  Let's give it to them, fuck yeah!  We are so fucking Rado YEAH!  I really don't understand their need for profanity in this moment, but I totally can see them swearing a lot while fancying themselves over the top Rado. What they did not consider, in this very (one can only assume extensive) design process, was giving the facility for which to appreciate these very Rado experiences any kind of personality whatsoever.  It is the lamest looking TGIFridays I have ever seen. Aside from the little statue of David in the ladies room, which I assumed to be an homage to the original namesake of Amatos, (a crazy statue birdbathy place) it was horrendously boring.  Sans Ambience.  Sans anything. So technically the most interesting aspect of the entire bar was the shitter?  Thank you but I am busy hating this place.  What kind of assholes take the namesake of one of the most incredibly weird and interesting locations in the entire city and rape it of its originality?  If I could punch a bar in the face (or a brewery I would punch this bitch square in the mouth).  How could Amatos fix this problem?  Go back in time 6 months and instead of tearing the site to shit, leave it as is, string up some lights and throw in a crooked bar with a few too busy to be interested in serving you waiters and you will have probably the coolest little bar in the city.  Covered in birdbaths and statues, I bet this place exists in Austin somewhere so maybe it wouldn't be that original but it would beat the cock off of this Applebees 2.0.