Lucky Pie
Please join us on Tuesday, October 16th
Denver Happy Hour is the way you want networking to be. Here's the Concept. A New Co-Host(s) & Bar/Restaurant Once a Month. Free Appetizers and Happy Hour Cocktails from 5:30pm to 7:30pm. A Great way to meet new people, catch up with friends, help local businesses and Explore Denver. It's the Best Excuse to mingle during the week. www.denverhh.com
Lucky Pie
Happy Hour Specials from 5:30p to 7:30p
Networking 5:30p to 7:30p
303.825.1021
1610 16th Street, Denver, CO 80202
+More About the Co-Host
Dr. Lisa Bobby
Dr. Lisa Bobby is a marriage counselor and life coach, and specializes in helping her clients find Love, Happiness and Success.
She meets with her private clients at offices in Cherry Creek, Broomfield, and online through video conferencing. She hosts a podcast, "Everyday Experts" where she speaks with people who have figured how to be happier and more successful in one way or another. She also writes extensively, sharing ideas, tips, and insights that help you get more of what you want from your relationships, and from your life.
You can also check out one of her classes: Her next class, "Happiness: The Class" will teach you how to combat the three big happiness stealers-- Stress, Anxiety & Depression -- and cultivate more JOY in your life. It starts Tuesday, October 30th.
Learn more about Dr. Lisa and her services at www.growingself.com.
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Lisa Huybrechts Bobby, PhD, LMFT
lisa@growingself.com
www.growingself.com
Office: 720-443-1110
Cell: 720-208-6806
~Lucky Pie
http://luckypiepizza.com/
The friendly staff at Lucky Pie is quick to answer questions; clearly, there is communication between the kitchen and the floor. (Cyrus McCrimmon,The Denver Post)
The art of making pizza is deceptively simple: Combine dough, sauce, cheese (usually) and the option of sundry other ingredients, then apply heat.
What could go wrong?
Well, plenty. Which on second glance at the question should be no surprise. The number of variables give pizza makers nearly as many ways to blow the task as the Rockies employ to lose games.
That's why a first-rate pie is so satisfying. With a 'za, even mediocrity tastes pretty good. But excellence feels like a gift.
So hats off to the folks at LoDo's Lucky Pie Pizza & Tap House for getting it right.
The newish establishment on the corner of 16th
Lucky Pie's contemporary room occupies part of the former Dixons space at 16th and Wazee streets. (Cyrus McCrimmon, The Denver Post)
and Wazee streets turns out a proper pizza with a sturdy, toothsome crust and an array of creative toppings. The good news for traditionalists: For all the odd-duck ingredients available on the menu— shaved Brussels sprouts, apples and acorn squash among them — Lucky Pie knows how to serve a straight-outta-Brooklyn pizza with mozzarella and San Marzano tomato sauce.
But there's more going on than pizza in this contemporary room that occupies part of the former Dixons space.
House-made cheeses, top-shelf charcuterie, soups, salads and a half-dozen entrees also vie for attention on the menu. There is also a commendable cocktail program.
The two-room restaurant is handsome. Walls are exposed brick, worn with age, with red cast-glass lighting fixtures hanging over the booths, and a crimson panel behind the long bar. Ductwork hangs beneath a stamped-tin ceiling. A big bank of windows looks beyond a sidewalk patio onto Wazee.
Two recent visits found superior pizzas, plus other dishes — some good, others struggling with their ambitions.
A word of advice: It's easy to fill up on this menu before your pizza even hits the oven. I arrived to find my dining companion munching on fried "squeaky curds," which amounted to crack in a bag.
The dairyland goodness continues with the mozzarella bar, a fine opportunity to learn just how sublime this simple cheese can be. Four cheeses are offered, and you can pony up $12 to sample them all: fresh and smoked mozzarella, ricotta, and stracciatella, which is torn mozz doused with cream.
Charcuterie includes prosciutto and air-dried salami, plus Benton's smoked ham, a wonderfully silky Tennessee variety.
We tried the Carnivore Spreads plate ($16), a trio of pate-like dips meant for smearing on griddled bread. The robust, peppery deviled ham bore no resemblance to the canned stuff you had as a kid. An Iowa white spread was spiced lardo whose pure fattiness benefited from downing it with one of the roasted garlic cloves accompanying the platter. The salami spread, oddly, was hardly identifiable. Spice, yes, but beyond that it could have been a flavor delivery system for anything.
Soups rotate through the menu. On one visit it was tomato bisque, creamy and flecked with crisp croutons. Its warmth and deep flavors were welcome on one of those spring days where a cool breeze threatened rain.
A kale salad ($7) was problematic. Great flavors, yes, thanks to bacon, red onions and creamy peppercorn
From left, Kenny Vigil, John Donahue and executive chef Joe Troupe at work in the kitchen of Lucky Pie Pizza & Tap House in LoDo.
dressing. But the raw kale was too chewy; it would have been less so if the tough stems had been shucked.
Pizza proved the big winner.
We opted for the Southwest version. At $15, it came with San Marzano tomato sauce, roasted fresno and poblano peppers, chorizo, garlic, mozzarella and fontina — baked atop dough that is made daily.
The flavors were bold but balanced, and the peppers' fruit notes were up front.
A roasted red pepper pie ($14) was basically a Greek pizza, with mozzarella, feta, olives, oregano, chile flakes and, natch, olive oil.
It's great to offer a variety of ingredients, but a good parlor's litmus test is the basic cheese pie. This one is dubbed the Cheech ($10), just smoked mozzarella, that San Marzano sauce and a sprinkling of oregano. The simple ingredients came together beautifully on a Neapolitan-style crust.
The staff is friendly and quick to answer questions about ingredients and food preparation. Clearly, there is communication between the kitchen and the floor.
That's good, because Lucky Pie has competition.
In a one-block stretch sit two rivals in the pie sweepstakes: The venerable Wazee Supper Club and the newer Wazee Wood Fire Pizza, a sister establishment to District Meats, just renamed Charlie Palmer's District Tavern.
One thing: It would be nice if Lucky Pie offered pizzas in sizes other than 14 inches. That's too much for any non-teenager to tackle, and sometimes more than two adults hanker for. And why don't more pizza places offer individual slices, at least on basic cheese or pepperoni pies?
A word on drinks. There are 27 beers on tap, plus an array of reasonably-priced wines. Craft cocktails are also offered, including the Ward Cleaver, made with Old Overholt rye, lemon juice, a squeeze of orange and a splash of soda. (Do Wally and the Beaver know?)
In any event, lucky us for having Lucky Pie.
William Porter: 303-954-1877 or wporter@denverpost.com
LUCKY PIE PIZZA & TAP HOUSE
Pizza and more
1610 16th St. 303-825-1021 luckypiepizza.com
** Very good
Atmosphere: Two big, contemporary rooms with big windows and a sidewalk patio.
Service: Friendly, knowledgeable
Beverages: Wine, cocktails and long list of craft beers on tap
Plates: Snacks $4-$6; appetizers $6-$16; soup and salads $4-$10; pizza $10-$16; entrees $14-$21
Hours: Lunch 11 a.m.-4 p.m. daily; Dinner 4 p.m.-until; Happy hour 4-6 p.m.
Details: Parking on street and lots
Read more: Restaurant review: Denver's Lucky Pie gets pizza right - The Denver Post http://www.denverpost.com/food/ci_20675673/dining-denvers-lucky-pie-gets-pizza-right#ixzz28510VBtP
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