Elk Sausage and Halibut BLT- Dining in Denver

The thing about food conventions is that the food is definitely better than, say, a computer graphics convention. I’ve ended up with two great meals at the IACP in Denver–Rioja Restaurant and Biker Jims Gourmet Dogs.

Rioja Restaurant claims Mediterranean influence but it is equally Asian inspired. By a set of coincidences, I ended up eating there twice in two nights, with some of the same people. “Garden-friendly” someone said and it’s true. Layers of flavor on fresh peas, an Indian spiced fava puree, and the best sweetbreads I’ve ever eaten. Plus some chefly tricks with a Parmesan Bacon tuile–or using an Orange Beef style sauce on the sweetbreads or blue prawns and bacon over a papaya salad with a nice undercurrent of heat. Not to mention a chocolate pot de creme that you could swim in and drown happily.

And the other best meal we ate was at Biker Jim’s Gourmet Dogs, a hot dog stand downtown. Elk Jalapeno Cheese sausage, Alaskan Reindeer, Pheasant, Louisiana Red hots. The Elk came with carmelized onions (I declined a cream cheese squirt) was my favorite. Coarsely ground, juicy, hot enough to bite but not to obscure the other tastes. Jim, who is well worth talking with while you wait for your sausages to finish, has, among other things, stolen over 12,000 autos (legally-as a repo man), gotten a Journalism degree and started a cheesecake factory (swooning as I was with the sausages, I can’t remember the names of the flavors, but suffice to say they are way past anything plebian).

Lacking any skill with a camera (or a camera for that matter), I took no pictures. I’ll post some links to Jim’s.