Cucina Colore inaugurated happy hour, cicchetti menu this week

After resisting for years, Cucina Colore has caved to pressure and started a happy hour. They never really needed it, says general manager Chris Millette. Plus the "whole discounting concept" just didn't seem to pair well with the restaurant's upscale sensibilities.

But all that changed Monday when the Italian restaurant at 3041 East Third Avenue started up its first ever happy hour featuring a number of cocktails and drink specials as well as a small menu of Venetian small plates called cicchetti. "Quite honestly, we were getting asked [about happy hour] every day," Millette says. "It's a long overdue thing."

The cicchetti includes a selection of seven hot and four cold small plates, among them familiar items like wings and calamari but also more inventive ones like the asparagus "tartufo" with truffled egg salad and speck and the salmon "scapece" with watermelon, avocado, tomato and citrus vinaigrette. All are priced between $4-7.

An assortment of cocktails all run $5 each; a small selection of wines and beer run $4/glass and $3.50, respectively. Some of the cicchetti will be folded into Cucina Colore's new spring/summer menu, designed by Chef Michel Wahaltere, which will be coming out in the next few weeks.

Happy hour runs from 3 to 6 p.m Monday through Friday. For more information, call 303-393-6917.