Denver Food Blog

​Pete Marczyk and Barbara Macfarlane do not leave their work behind when they leave Marczyk Fine Foods and head for their great old Denver house with the big, new kitchen. They often bring some of their market's choicest ingredients home with them, and cook up a feast.

Last month, Pete and Barb created a multi-course autumn menu. This month, in honor of Thanksgiving, they'll continue to add recipes until they have a complete, multi-course turkey day menu. Pete's already fattened us up with his Gorgonzola dip and taught us how to confit a turkey leg and roast a turkey breast. Earlier this week, he prepared a carrot and winter squash puree; today, he's doing wild rice bread pudding stuffing.

After fifteen months of reviewing sandwiches, it's time to take a step back, time to consider what has passed between many, many slices of bread, time to take a break from sandwiches and offer a countdown of the ten best I've had.

It's easy to pick twenty good sandwiches, but narrowing those down to ten is hard. Still, eating all those sandwiches has given me some stomach fortitude, so here, in reverse order, are my favorite sandwiches of the past fifteen months.

​10) Spanish Ham and Cheese
Fisher Clark Deli
723 South University Boulevard, 303-722-2091
Nine bucks is a lot to spend on a sandwich, but the ingredients used here are so good and so fresh that I always find a stop is worth it. On this sandwich, I'm not sure what I like better -- the incredible, tangy-sweet onion and pear jam, or the ham and chorizo, or the soft, fresh focaccia made Bluepoint Bakery-style. Fair warning: Try to take small bites, as the meat is piled high. Yes, just try to take small bite - if you can.

​Right, so I just received the following e-mail from Perky Cups, which, as you can gather from the note, is apparently a java joint -- maybe -- that employs bikini-clad females.

Lori,

Thank you,
Perky Cups!

I can only conclude that the discriminating folks at Perky Cups assumed I had the perky goods to pour a decent mocha; otherwise, the subject header of said e-mail -- ** Bikini Barista** TONS of TIP$ ** (Aurora) -- was nothing more than a cruel joke.

Happy Friday, kids.

​
The Drink, the first of the three spots that Paul Piciocchi, owner of Tryst, is putting into the former home of Alto at 1320 15th Street, will hold its grand opening tonight, with free Coors Light from 6 to 7 p.m., and other deals through the weekend, including a free shot toast at midnight both tonight and tomorrow, and free Sam Adams Light from 6-7 p.m. tomorrow. For more details, go to www.thedrinkdenver.com.

Look for the Downtown Gastropub to open in a week or two, with the Mix, a music lounge, coming a week after that.

​
Number 93: BBQ Masher from Cabin Creek Smokehouse

That unlovely picture up there? Don't let it fool you. What the eye might not find to be beautiful, the mouth occasionally argues is damn near to heaven. And thus is the case with the BBQ masher from Cabin Creek Smokehouse.

"What am I looking at?" you ask. Well, let me tell you. It's a Styrofoam to-go container full of mashed red skin potatoes, topped with a full and generous serving of the house's excellent, deeply smoked pulled pork, topped again with melted cheese, a dab of sour cream on the side, and a heaping spoonful of barbecued cowboy beans. It is, in some ways, the best dish ever designed for Irish barbecue enthusiasts. In other ways, it makes for an excellent hangover cure. And in still others, the BBQ Masher turns the greatest single item at Cabin Creek (the pulled pork) into a full meal, all mashed up together into an ugly but delicious hash of a thing.

​Every year, on a seemingly random day at the end of November, America celebrates Thanksgiving. (Canadians, as usual, get this completely wrong and hold it in October.) It's a day of tradition, a day to give thanks. And a day, or so it's become over time, that we all do inexplicable things just because it's Thanksgiving.

Some things are holy and central to the day: turkey, stuffing, potatoes, pumpkin pie, football. Most everything else is mutable. And then there are some things that have just plain worn out their welcome. These are things that might be better off slaughtered in the background of a Sarah Palin interview.

​For decades, University of Denver students have downed beers at the Border Restaurant and Lounge, a sometimes Mex joint tucked into a strip mall at 2014 South University Boulevard. Some of those students even did so legally.

But for the past thirty days, the Border has been dark: Its liquor license was suspended because the bar got caught serving an underage drinker in July -- its fourth official under-age violation since February 2006. The suspension expired yesterday, but under a deal with the city, the Border is still closed, and the business is supposed to be sold by December 1, when its liquor license comes up for renewal.

Want to own a college bar? Border owner REM Capital Corp. is asking $195,000 for the contents, which is being brokered by Sanborn and Company.

​Head up to the Avery Tap Room, 5763 Arapahoe Avenue in Boulder, which is hosting A Decade of Decadence: Ten Years of the Reverend Belgian Quadrupel Beer Dinner and Vertical Tasting. The meal, which starts at 7 p.m., includes five courses and lots of beer; admission is $60. Drew Bixby rhapsodizes about the event here; for more details, call 303-440-4324 or visit www.averybrewing.com.

For information on dozens of culinary events around town, visit our online Food & Drink listings.