Restaurant Week - Denver

Restaurant Week in Denver is finally behind us and, save a few bumps on the road (eye surgery), that kept me from enjoying eating out, we basically tried most of the restaurants we were looking forward to try!

I have to say that I was very disappointed with Restaurant Week overall. I’d never market my own restaurant with minimal portions of food, something traditional or bad service. The whole purpose behind the event is to present the cuisine to new customers – potential customers who might become regulars – and this should be taken seriously.

We visited the following: Café Brasil, The Tuscany, Ondo’s Spanish Tapas Bar and Del Frisco’s Steakhouse.

Café Brasil: This is not, by any means, a Brazilian restaurant. My last hope on finding authentic Brazilian food was chattered when we visited this place. We ordered caipirinhas that tasted more like mojitos or margaritas. All of the items on the menu were extremely spicy – we do not eat spicy food in Brazil. And the portions were like French sized portions: tiny. Really tiny. The main dish I chose was lamb and what do I get? Lamb and yogurt, tasting like a kebab, like Arabic food. Who decided that was Brazilian food? It wasn’t bad; it was just not Brazilian and very small portions.

The Tuscany: this restaurant is located inside the Lowes Hotel in Denver, a traditional place serving Italian cuisine. The portions were also small, but much better than Café Brasil. The food was absolutely delicious, I ordered a cheese plate that was the perfect size and my boyfriend ordered butternut squash soup that smelled amazing. The main dish was Fish and Risotto and everything was perfect. Only desert was really small, but still very tasty.

Ondo’s Spanish Tapa’s Bar: This is a new restaurant in Cherry Creek featured in 5280 Magazine's Best Restaurants issue and we have been dying to try it out. Even though Denver has lots of Mexican and Tex-Mex restaurants, the place lacks in Latin or European cuisine overall – no good French or Spanish restaurants so far. Portuguese? Forget it! But, this Tapas Bar did not disappoint. Not only are they very close to home, but I can see it becoming one of the regular places we will visit this summer.

It was, hands down, the best restaurant we visited during Restaurant Week.  They served us six portions/tapas. Each one better than the next. We had croquettas, sandwiches of ham and cheese, pescado fritto, black rice (it’s squid paella with the squid ink to make it black) and the best beef with mashed potatoes I probably ever had. The meat was melting, that’s how good everything was. Desert was rice pudding – arroz doce – made exactly how it’s supposed to, the Spanish way. My boyfriend loved it. It’s so interesting when something that’s so familiar to me is so foreign to him and vice-versa. The Sangria was one of the best I ever had with semi-sparkling red wine and $12 for 1 liter is almost free (compared to the $30 for 1 liter in La Paella in NYC).

It’s a shame I did not take any pictures. I’m a bad cookie. 

Images: Ondo's Spanish Tapas Bar

Del Friscos' Steakhouse: The place has the cold decor you expect at a traditional steakhouse.   The menu did not surprise in any way, traditional salad or soup and the choice of fish or filet mignon for dinner. Nothing special or that would attract me back to the overpriced steakhouse.  To make matters worse, my filet mignon, a fantastic cut of meat, perfectly cooked was ruined by an over abundance of pepper. It was a shame. My boyfriend's salmon, while good, lacked imagination and was accompanied by steamed broccoli that was a blend as the white table cloths. The desert: a extremely small portion of chocolate mousse with whipped cream.