Third time could be a charm for Aviano Coffee. The local shop that got its start in the Beauvallon and then moved to Cherry Creek in 2010 had to move again last month -- with two weeks' notice. Fortunately, owner Doug Naiman already had his eye on a nearby spot, where they built "a temporary style bar at the very front side of the space," he explains, while working on a bigger build-out in the back.

Now that front portion is finished and has all the proper permits, so the coffee will be on this morning at the new Aviano.

See also:
- Aviano Coffee could be pouring soon
- Aviano Coffee delivers on promise to take coffee to a whole new level
- Aviano Coffee's grand opening in Cherry Creek

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Jorel Pierce out on Top Chef? We never sausage a thing!

Three Colorado chefs started out on the season premiere ofTop Chef Seattle last week, and two moved on. But Euclid Hall's Jorel Pierce was out, booted by Tom Colicchio. And how did that feel?

"While the pressure was intense and intimidating," Pierce says, "I know now that I learned a lot about myself and why I do what I do, and it's an experience that's helped me to recenter my purpose in cooking and my goals and motives in the kitchen -- to be progressive and thoughtful and playful and to inspire people both on my staff and the people who walk in the doors expecting something different. For me, it's about the thought-provoking aspect of cooking, and it was kind of frustrating for me that I couldn't be thoughtful or playful with the tasks that Tom gave me -- I couldn't create. Instead, he asked me to do a routine thing -- cutting a chicken -- that I do my way, and he does his way. That said, I don't know who died and made him the fucking be-all and end-all of butchering chickens..."

See also:
- Euclid Hal's Jorel Pierce on being booted from Top Chef Seattle
- Chef and Tell: Euclid Hall's Jorel Pierce
- Tyler Wiard meets Tom Colicchio, his "celebrity chef who needs to shut up"

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Chef Craig Dixon at Cafe Options: Where's the chicken sandwich?

Politics aside -- if you can set politics aside -- Chick-Fil-A has lots of fans of its sandwiches. For those who are boycotting the chain for its anti-gay-marriage stance, yesterday Jonathan Shikes served up five chicken-sandwich options in town.

Turns out we missed one: at Cafe Options, a terrific downtown spot that not only serves good food, but serves the greater good by training people for careers in the food industry.

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Katie Reinisch managed to keep her cool through four years at the Colorado Legislature, when she was communications director for the Senate Democrats, so it's not surprising that she's having a blast running her own frozen-yogurt spot. "It's so fun, and I'm learning so much," she says. "I'm actually creating jobs, when before we would just talk about it."

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Gustavo Arellano, author of Ask a Mexican, returned to the Su Teatro stage last night, where eighteen months ago he'd discussed immigration with Tom Tancredo. Before that debate, Tancredo and Arellano had met across the street for dinner at El Noa Noa. And no matter how he feels about Mexicans, "Tancredo likes those tamales," Arellano told the crowd.

But then, who doesn't? For his third book -- the first was a compilation of his columns, the second a personal history of Orange County, where he grew up and is now the editor of the OC Weekly -- Arellano researched Mexican food across the country, chronicling how it spread throughout all fifty states. The result? Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America, which was released last month to rave reviews.

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Smashburger's store on the 16th Street Mall will be taking burgers to the street.

Here's an idea that sounds like a definite smash: Smashburger, the homegrown chain, will introduce its first-ever SmashCart next Tuesday on the 16th Street Mall, one of the first physical signs of the extra effort that the Downtown Denver Partnership is putting into its mall vendor program.

Smashburger already has a store on the mall -- one that features late hours and inventive cocktails -- but with this cart, it will be taking its burgers to the streets.

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Think this is a taco from some taqueria on Federal? You're all wet.

Can you guess where I'm eating?

Special bonus: Anyone who gives the first correct answer to the week's Guess Where posts is entered into a pool -- and every Monday, we select one lucky winner who'll receive an EatDenver dining deck, worth up to $520 in discounts at independent restaurants. Read all about EatDenver dining decks here.

Happy thirtieth birthday to Marlowe's, which opened in February 1982 on 16th Street -- before there was even a 16th Street Mall. We'd gotten to know Phil "Zoom" Roberts as the owner/operator of Govnr's Park, a '70s fern-bar hangout that remains a sports bar hangout today, and when he and his partners decided to put a third restaurant in the then-vast dining wasteland of downtown (they'd already opened Caldonia's, a still-smoking barbecue joint in Aurora), we were all for it.

Mostly because they were opening Marlowe's in the historic Kittredge Building, at the time the office of our typesetters...a group who worked very cheaply because they were followers of the Guru Maharaj Ji, head of the Divine Light Mission that was headquartered in Denver.

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After two months of renovations, Club 404 will officially reopen today as the Denver Wheel Club 404. The watering hole that Jerry Feld bought back in 1951 is now in the hands of Craig and Andrew Caldwell, and Brad Evans, the designer who also keeps the Denver Cruisers rolling, has transformed the place into a hipster hangout with a bicycle theme that still has the great, divey atmosphere of the original.

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The future home of Squeaky Bean...and the site of last night's LoDo residents meeting.

Chefs are Denver's rock stars, and lower downtown is one hell of a stage. Last night I was lucky enough to moderate a panel of four LoDo chefs -- Jen Jasinski, Matt Selby, Tom Coohill and Max MacKissock -- who dished out restaurant tidbits (both literal and figurative) before an appreciative crowd of 200-plus lower downtown residents.

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