Denver’s newest restaurant — at least for another 10 seconds, until the next one opens — has a different sort of concept. Beckon is a tasting menu-only restaurant that’s set up to be a sort of interactive dinner party experience.
The 17 diners sit around the open kitchen and watch all of the eight courses being prepared right there in front of them. There’s no menu and no choices to be made, unless you count the optional wine or beer/cider pairings (an additional $65) as a choice, which I guess it is.
Beckon comes from the team behind next door’s Call (get it?), one of Bon Appétit’s top 10 best new restaurants in the country. It’s sort of the opposite concept of Call, which takes something we associate with being casual — a bakery/café — and kicks it up a notch. Beckon does fancy food, but in a relaxed, approachable way.
“We wanted to take that elevated fine dining and make it accessible and fun,” said co-owner Craig Lieberman.
Executive chef Duncan Holmes (formerly of Frasca Food & Wine) creates the constantly changing menu, which is as imaginative and refined as you’d expect for the $95-a-person cost of admission.
Some examples of what to expect of your eight courses: rich, velvety langoustine in a butter sauce with poached fingerling potatoes; a goat crépinette (little sausage) over carrot puree and dukkah (an Egyptian spice mix); a dill-heavy rye breaded oyster with caviar and seaweed; squab (talons still intact) with foie mousse and sweet lingonberry compote; and tangy buttermilk ice cream over warm dark chocolate for dessert.
And the bread — made with Aspen tree bark flour — deserves its own line, so here it is.
The interior is small (the restaurant only holds 17 seats after all) but it’s unique and welcoming thanks to a stencil-painted interior by local artist Sandra Fettingis. Once you see it, you’ll be amazed that it only took her three weeks to complete.
Beckon opens Wednesday, Nov. 21, and reservations for the two nightly seatings — the first at 5:30-6 p.m. and the second at 8-8:30 p.m. — must be prepaid online.
Beckon: 2843 Larimer St., Denver, 303-502-5800; beckon-denver.com; Wed.-Sat. 5:30-11 p.m.; Reservations: exploretock.com/beckon
