Local Jones — Restaurant in Denver

A great evening in a good restaurant. We planned a birthday dinner for 7. I went in a week in advance to begin the conversation. Camille, the host, was terrific to work with. So friendly and accommodating. She set us up in a beautiful private room that was cozy and quieter, but still had a great view of the restaurant where we could take in the great energy of a Friday night.

Ambiance/atmosphere is terrific. Several distinct spaces to choose from, with a few that nicely combine restaurant tables in a bar/lounge vibe room. Also terrific indoor/outdoor options. A great buzz throughout the restaurant.

Food was excellent. Salads = great. Prime rib = very good! Chili roast beef = excellent. Tomato soup = very good. Bucatini = good flavor, a little dry, and I found the chef's choice of the spaghetti-like bucatini to be a challenging choice for diners because it's so difficult to eat elegantly in this restaurant's chic setting. Save the spaghetti/fettucini/angel hair/bucatini for Nona's house on Sundays. There are far easier pasta shape choices that would bring the same flavor with far less fear of drips on one's shirt. :) Steak frites = really delicious (although the menu claimed the cut was New York Strip, I'd bet money that was a flank steak. Still, delicious.)

Gabby our server was so sweet and pleasant. Just the right attitude you want a server to have -- she aimed to please! My guess is that she's still relatively new and finding her way. So the service was a bit inattentive. I had to get up and go find her once or twice. And the bottle of wine we ordered sat in its ice bucket in the corner. Neither she, nor any other helper, ever remembered to refill the wine glasses. We ended up having to get up from our seats to go get it and serve ourselves. Also, she'd been assigned several other tables in addition to our private room. Understandable, of course. As I watched her serve other parties, though, she had tables assigned throughout the entire restaurant, long distances apart. The poor thing had to run around a lot. So between the sheer number of tables, their distance apart, and maybe a bit of inexperience, at times we felt like we were at the bottom of a loooong list of her responsibilities. If her management invests in her training and experience, and maybe concentrates her attention to a defined section of the dining room, she will shine!

Again, a great night at a good restaurant. Thank you Camille, Gabby, the chef and kitchen staff, and...

I had never been in and since I live in the area -and had received a promotional offer in the mail thought I’d invite a friend over and give it a shot! For Thursday evening, nice amount of energy and things going on. Grabbed two seats at the bar quickly and there were several open spaces inside and out. Bartender was attentive and made a wonderful cocktail for us. We decided to grab a little bite enjoy our snack and cocktail. We ordered the carpaccio. The delivery of the appetizer did not take long it was a very small plate with no accoutrements such as toast points or crackers. We asked the bartender if we could get something. You would’ve thought we asked for a five course tasting meal. They had to consult with each other to figure out how to get a simple request such as that taken care of. Needless to say when they did finally get it figured out we had sat there for over 15 minutes the manager walked by asked the staff if they were OK they all said yes we continued to sit there and on a warm evening such as last night the carpaccio proceeded to get warm. We asked the bartenders several times what was taking so long and they all just shrugged their shoulders. I had set a timer for another five minutes and decided that was done I was over it. Needless to say the bread rived right as we were getting up. The manager came over and I was a palled at the lack of customer service. Many places in our current environment have a shortage of staff. He blamed the fact that they were busy - they were not busy when we walked in there and ordered our food they had since filled up. But a simple request for some crackers and or toast points should be simple enough but nobody does a follow through needless to say they show little concern for their patrons I don’t think I’ll ever go back - There are many restaurant options in the Cherry Creek area we found a place around the corner and even though they were busy with all new staff they gave a higher level of customer service and customer...

This is one of the three restaurants in the Halcyon Hotel in North Cherry Creek, billed as a neighborhood bistro and bar. It is on the first floor of the hotel and includes a large dining room, a central bar, quite a bit of seating on the bar side, and a private dining room/meeting room.

We sat in the dining room on a previous visit, but were seated on the bar side this time. The bar seating includes a huge sofa against the back wall instead of the usual banquette. My handicapped friend sat in the corner of the sofa and pronounced it the most comfortable restaurant seating ever.

The space is both elegant and comfortable with lots of wood and all sorts of nice seating. There's also a large outdoor patio.

I ordered the crispy salmon which came with rings of delicata squash, a celery root purée, small chunks of apple, and a brown butter sauce. Every item was perfectly cooked and the combination of flavors was marvelous. The dish was absolutely delicious. I did find it very difficult to scrape the purée out of a rounded dish with only a knife and fork, though.

My friend ordered the "proper" turkey club. The sandwich was huge and the ingredients were first-rate. He also requested a "side" Caesar salad. The salad was enormous and we both shared it which was great because it went perfectly with my salmon dish.

The restaurant was not at all busy, but the kitchen remained as slow as on our previous visit several years ago. The waiter annoyed me by completely disappearing after serving our food. I would have liked a refill on my Arnold Palmer and a spoon to deal with that pesky purée, but it was not to be. He did handle the check promptly once we were finished.

The food here is excellent and the space is gorgeous. Just don't expect a quick meal or attentive service. Valet parking...