A fine swine of a time at the Berkshire's first pig roast

Lori Midson

In the midst of all this swine flu hysteria, there's just one thing to do: Eat more pork! The H1N1 influenza outbreak is not transmitted in any way, shape or form by anything with a snout, curly tail or hooves, as Jason Sheehan reported last week. And if you don't believe him, just ask the smart people at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Or talk to Denver's own king of oink, Woodie Thomas, the exec chef at the Berkshire (7352 East 29th Avenue), who hammed it up last Friday, May 1, in honor of the recently maligned swine, by offering the pork-centric restaurant's first pig roast of the season.

"I'm not poking fun at the swine flu at all, but people just have so many misconceptions about where it comes from, and all this grandstanding by the media is scaring the public and causing a huge crisis, when none of this has anything to do with eating pork," said Thomas, whose brilliant display of a sacrificial pig's head and butt on a wooden carving board generated lots of curious looks from patrons, but not a whole lot of eating action -- except from me, of course, who can't get enough pig.

Especially pigs in peril.  

And there was glorious pig in all guises: sliced loin sauced with honeysuckle and ginger; housemade croutons baked in bacon fat, and haricots verts with shitake mushrooms and bacon. And while dessert wasn't included in the $18 per person pig-roast price tag, I couldn't pass up the white chocolate and bacon cream puff that's just been added to the menu.

"As momentum builds and the pig roasts become more popular, we'll expand it, adding a few themes here and there, like Hawaiian and Caribbean, but we're starting out simple just to see what people like," explained Thomas.

The Berk's pig roasts will resume at 4 p.m. every first Friday of the month through August. For all the piggy details, call 303-321-4010.