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With my parents in town for just two nights, we decided to hit the town one night and cook one night. On our night-on-the-town, we debated heartily before settling on Ute City Bar & Grill because its menu looked good, it was expensive but not outrageous, and its location is on that strip of see-and-be-seen restaurants in Aspen (Social, LuLu Wilson on its side, Jimmy’s, Cache Cache, Campo di Fiori, Bruno’s on the other side).
I’ll save you the trouble of reading all about my experience and say: The food was good. The service was terrible.
We were not to be see-and-be-seen, as they sat us at the furthest back table in the restaurant immediately next to the kitchen. Alright, we didn’t have reservations, we’ll take it. We order a bottle of wine, not cheap, not expensive. We toast, and I’m looking at the lint in my glass before I sip when I spot a FLY in my wine. I very nicely point this out to our waiter, who, flustered, grabs me another wine glass, pours most of the rest of the bottle in, and says, “oh, we’ll take a couple of dollars off for that.”
We’ll take a couple of dollars off for that?!
After appetizers (good but small calamari, delicious beet salad), she offers me another glass of wine, to make up for the missing glass from our bottle. I decline.
We have dinner – out of five diners, we only ordered two dishes, the halibut and the eggplant-sweet potato “lasagna” (no noodles). The veggie lasagna was good but lacked a certain pizazz. The halibut was excellent in flavor, but lacked in presentation–it’s a white fish, served on a white plate, over “spanish” pinkish rice. We also ordered the quinoa artichoke side–delish! and the summer vegetable medley, which was good but not particularly memorable.
When the bill came, the bottle of wine, at full price, was still on there.
The manager was super friendly, and I wish we had told him about our experience. But we didn’t, so now the universe gets to hear about it. If you’re looking for just one Aspen restaurant to enjoy, Ute City wouldn’t be my top recommendation, but it’s worth trying if you’ve got several nights in Aspen.
The quail featured three styles: legs, sausage, and bacon-wrapped. I at first refused to eat the legs–I’m a texture person, and meat off of bone is not a texture I enjoy–but after some prodding I tried the sweet meat studded with seasame seeds and it WAS good. Though I couldn’t eat another because of the texture. The sausage was unlike any I’ve ever had, very soft and very sweet, with a sort of jerky flavor without the toughness. Sounds strange, but ’twas delicious. The bacon-wrapped quail were the best of the quail apps:
Pretty good when you’re fighting over which entree was better rather than worse, no? The veggie dish was similar to the one I had at the wedding, with a very rich and very creamy wild mushroom sauce. The walnuts in it were a delicious texture contrast to the doughy dumplings, which were extremely tasty. I’d like to make them at home.
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