Taste of Colorado – Not Everyone’s ‘Cuppa Tea’

Taste of Colorado is a popular event, well-attended for many years, over the Labor Day

weekend. I didn’t get to go, but my daughter did. She was very excited, so I asked her to write a guest post.

Very Crowded Taste of Colorado

Amanda loves big crowds and lots to see and do, so I thought this would be just her ‘cuppa tea’. Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite the experience we hoped.

I think part of the issue was, this was her first time attending an event like this with a baby. Kids do change things!

Here’s my daughter’s thoughts on Taste of Colorado:

So this weekend I went to a Taste of Colorado with my family.  And since I usually love any event that gets people of all kinds to go outside and mingle I was very excited about this.  I had “friend-ed” them on Facebook so I wouldn’t forget to go this year and waited for months.  I envisioned wine tasting booths from Grand Junction, fruit and veggie vendors from the Eastern Plains and many stages filled with local music.  There actually were many stages and what music I heard was good but I think I envisioned a much higher class event than I actually attended.

First of all, while entry may be free, you have to buy tickets with cash and then use the tickets to purchase anything in the show.  Of course all the tickets add up to weird combinations so you have to buy more than you need.  Then, I never saw a wine booth (although there most likely was one) but long, long lines at beer booths.  Don’t get me wrong I like beer too, but I had pictured it more like local businesses representing themselves and less like liquor lines at any average event.

There were actually a ton of food booths, local Denver restaurants like Ling and Louies and things like roasted corn. So ok, maybe I’m being a bit harsh in my tone.

But I couldn’t let go of the fact that I so badly wanted this event to show off the best parts of Colorado with a little bit of class and instead I found myself being pushed, shoved and tripped over by a drunken mob on a very, very crowded corner of Colfax and Broadway.

And while I may get slack for saying this (because it was an outdoor event), I could not stand how many people were smoking.  It was outrageous!  We tried to sit down in the grass with our son and we kept having to move the cigarette butts out of his reach.

So after a very long uneventful hour we decided to leave and go eat at the actual Ling and Louies restaurant.  We had a Groupon for it.

Ling and Louies was amazing! The first thing you notice is the gorgeous decor, but because it was a beautiful Colorado fall evening, we decided to sit outside with everyone else.

The waitress treated us like we were important and she even brought a little cooked veggie tray for our 8 month old, Jayden to munch on.  We tried the Lemongrass Wheat beer and LOVED it, although I am a huge fan of wheat beers.  I had the chef’s special sushi which was good, but I unfortunately cannot remember the name of it.  It wasn’t the best sushi I’ve ever had, but it was good.  My husband however, had the Evil Jungle Princess Chicken, a peanut red-curry with mint sauce in a bowl with veggies and chicken and a side of rice!  It was creamy, spicy, sweet, unbelievably good.

Mmmm, making myself hungry just thinking about it!

The view of the 16th street mall from our table and the friendly conversation of other patrons of the restaurant, the waitress and even the manager who stopped by, led to a really really good end to our evening.  Definitely try it out when you get the chance!

So – there you are. Amanda’s advice is – skip Taste of Colorado, head straight to one of the great Denver restaurants, like Ling and Louies.

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I write posts on real estate issues and local events in the Denver metro area, especially those *communities between Denver and Boulder, as a public service. My hope is to give people an idea of the ‘flavor’ of our community, in case they’re new or moving to the Denver area.

I am a residential real estate agent, happily helping folks buy a house or sell a house in the beautiful and friendly *suburbs northwest of Denver.

*Arvada, Broomfield, Lafayette, Louisville, Superior, Westminster; also Thornton, Golden, Wheat Ridge, Northglen, Lakewood

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