Food and Wine
Another day at the office: Matthew Jansen, owner of Mateo’s, serves up a light lunch after climbing for the Boulder Ventures team.
When we’re not climbing and skiing with our clients, Mountain Guides like to eat and drink. Food and Wine is a critical part of the guest experience and our most memorable tours include eating and drinking at familiar places we love to share with our clients.
Experienced Mountain Guides focus attention on favorite restaurants and huts in their terrain, and form lifelong relationships with the proprietors of these classic spots. This Guide/Hutkeeper relationship adds immeasurably to the quality of our client care in the field.
Restaurants are a critical piece of our Venture Capital infrastructure as well. We do a lot of lunches and Board dinners in the VC business, and our authentic relationship with entrepreneurs and investors is enhanced by our ability to serve up a fantastic meal at a place where we’re known, liked, and welcomed.
As a result, we’ve worked hard over the past thirty years to support our local restaurant scene in Boulder, one of the foodiest towns in the US. The quality, variety and competence of our favorite Boulder restaurants is startling.
That a midwestern college town of 100,000 souls can consistently serve up the best food and wine for 1,000 miles in any direction is surprising to sophisticated newcomers, but not to the local Mountain Guides.
Here are our favorites:
Boulder Wine Merchant - while a casual storefront, master sommelier Brett Zimmerman’s wine shop is a marvel of world class inventory and expertise.
Cured - pro cyclist Will Friskhorn and his adorable wife Coral (whose Dad was my childhood climbing hero) own Boulder’s best cheese shop on Pearl Street. It’s a favorite for sandwiches, roses and party plates. Boxcar coffee is co-located, with one of the best pours among Boulder’s many excellent local coffee stores.
Frasca - Bobby Stuckey’s destination gourmet Italian restaurant, which has won awards and stars for years, is world famous. Bobby’s excellent pizza joint, Pizzeria Locale, is next door.
Jax - legendary restauranteur Dave Query’s signature raw bar and fish place is always crowded and delicious. His Cuban restaurant down the street, Centro, is high on our list as well.
Mateo’s - heir to Tony Laudisio’s Boulder fine dining legacy, Matthew Jansen serves up delicious Provencal lunch and dinner on Boulder’s best Pearl Street patio.
The Kitchen - chef Hugo Matheson’s original Pearl Street location has expanded up, down, and across the country, but his original store is an homage to the cuisine of Alice Waters of Chez Panisse. Hugo’s devotion to healthy American cuisine from local organic producers makes for an exceptional dining experience.
After a fine fall day of climbing together on Ponta Brolla, the author and his old friend, Bergfurher Walter Fetscher of the Canton Uri, sit down to a lunch of truffled pasta and Italian white wine at the Grotto America, a gourmet restaurant built into the ancient walls at the base of the crag.