Food/Drink: Food news and what to try this week in Boulder County

FRYBREAD PLATE AT RIVER AND WOODS, $14. 2328 Pearl St., Boulder, riverandwoodsboulder.com

TRY THIS WEEK: Dr. Red Elk’s Frybread Plate @ River and Woods

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n Chili cook-off in Longmont

GROSSEN BART BREWERY will host the sixth annual Chili Chili Bang Bang cookoff on Saturday, Feb. 15 from 1-5 p.m. at its taproom and brewery (1025 Delaware Ave., Longmont). Enter your own chili for $20 and get the first Grossen Bart pint (excluding specialty brews) on the house. Or, don’t bring chili and get a $10 ticket, which provides unlimited chili tastings and the right to vote for your favorite. Proceeds benefit HOPE and the LeftHand Artist Group. Tickets at: eventbritecom/e/6th-annual-chili-chili-bang-bangcook-off-tickets-92580389437.

TUCKED next to a towering, modern condo complex sits the little blue house that holds fast to a strong culinary lineage. The former site of the esteemed John’s Restaurant, the building has been home for the last few years to Chef Daniel Asher’s excellent River and Woods, which serves elevated comfort food often culled from recipes donated by community members. One such borrowed recipe is Dr. Red Elk’s frybread plate, which is simply heaven. Short ribs are braised for eight hours until they’re succulent and life-affirming. They’re then shredded and topped with a savory-spicy green chili, cotija cheese and tangy sour cream. And it’s all assembled on doughy, fatty, crispy, chewy, wonderful frybread. It’s the food equivalent of sweatpants and a big blanket — familiar, comfortable and irresistible.

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n Denver Restaurant Week returns

n Craft beer fest on leap day

THE 10-DAY-LONG Denver Restaurant Week returns Feb. 21, providing diners the chance to eat at hundreds of the area’s best restaurants at three price points: $25, $35 and $45. Head out of Boulder County for special menus at Atelier by Radex, Coperta, Il Posto, Old Major, Safta, Tupelo Honey and more. Or, stop in at one of the participating Boulder County restaurants: 740 Front, Boudler Cork, Boulder Chophouse, Dagabi Tapas Bar, Jill’s, The Melting Pot, Riff’s, Salt and Via Toscana. More info at denver.org/ denver-restaurant-week. SUMMERTIME NEED not hog all the craft beer fests. De-ice yourself and head to the Balch Fieldhouse at Folsom Field in Boulder on Feb. 29 (Leap Day) from 1-5 p.m. for the Winter Craft Beer Festival. A $45 general admission ticket includes unlimited samples, a souvenir glass and entry to the silent disco. A $65 VIP tickets tacks on a “unique gift” (what could it be?!) and entry an hour early (at noon). This year brings a partnership with the Colorado Brewers Guild, and you’ll spot local favorites like Upslope, Twisted Pine, Odd13, Asher, Sanitas, Uhl’s and Wibby, along with welcome visitors like Bell’s, Loveland Aleworks and Prost. Tickets at wintercraftbeerfestival.com/tickets.

tour de brew:

Ale throughout history Travis Rupp, Avery’s Ale of Antiquity rascal, on Monticello by Michael J. Casey W ith 30 beers to choose from, a visit to Avery Brewing Co.’s taproom can be either a daunting proposition or an endless array of excitement — depending on your point of view. And if the choice is too much, just ask for what’s new. You could end up with a stout aged on malted milk balls, a hazy IPA loaded with pears and peaches, or a barrel-fermented persimmon wheat ale inspired by an early 19th-century recipe found at Thomas Jefferson’s Virginia estate.

Bearing the name of the historic home, Monticello is the 10th release in Avery’s Ales of Antiquity series, a line of historical recreations helmed by Travis Rupp, Avery’s resident “beer archeologist.”

Rupp kicked off Ales of Antiquities in 2016 with Nestor’s Cup: A Mycenaean-inspired beer brewed with 6-row barley, einkorn wheat, acorn flour, figs and elderberries. The recipe was recreated both from extensive archeological research — Rupp is a professor of Classics at CU-Boulder — as well as Rupp’s academic scrutiny of “art history and the anthropology.”

“What do we actually know of these people?” Rupp says of his process. “What was important to them? What’s readily being mass-produced, agriculturally, that we know they actually give up to make a beer?”

The results spoke for themselves — Nestor’s Cup was phenomenal: loads of fruit leather and a mouthfeel unlike anything else — and Ales of Antiquities was off and running.

Rupp has traversed great distances and eras to recreate beers from Egypt, Peru and Scandinavia, to name three. Recently, he spent time researching the 18th and 19th centuries to produce an IPA inspired by George Hodgson’s exported brew of 1752, an English-style por

ter favored by George Washington, and now Monticello, the second in the Presidentale [his emphasis] series. Thanks to Jefferson’s extensive archives, Rupp was able to reproduce the ale faithfully.

“I want to make it as authentic as possible,” Rupp says. “I don’t want to deviate from the historical record.” That starts with the name, Monticello: This was not the beer brewed by Jefferson, but for Jefferson and his estate by Jefferson’s slave, Peter Hemmings.

“The recipe for this is from 1822,” Rupp explains. “We know for a fact that Peter Hemmings had been trained to be the estate brewer in 1821. ... This is 100% most certainly his recipe.” Brewed with wheat and persimmons, Monticello is fruity and tart — think apples and tomatoes — with a full, creamy mouth that is rich and filling. According to Rupp, it’s similar to the persimmon bread baked at the time.

Monticello will be released at Avery’s taproom on Monday, Feb. 17, and Rupp will host a beer dinner on Feb. 19 to commemorate the launch (tickets are currently sold out). Rupp will also be talking Ales of Antiquity, 6-8 p.m. Monday, Feb. 24 at Denver’s History Colorado Center in conjunction with the center’s exhibit, Beer Here! Brewing the New West. Tickets and information at historycolorado.org.

n DRINK OF THE WEEK

Endo Brewing Co.’s Comfortably Numb

Brewing a big beer can be a tricky thing. You could double the malt and produce more fermentable sugars, dumping in a ton of hops to balance out the sweetness. Or you could use candied sugars to goose the alcohol without turning the brew into a syrupy sludge. In the right hands, both work wonderfully. But all too often, drinkers end up with a glass that smells of fusel and drinks like motor oil.

Neither is the case at Lafayette’s Endo Brewing Co. In the past, we’ve sung praises for the brewery’s spectacular bocks, but their expertise in strong ales is just as commendable, to wit: the recentlyreleased Russian imperial stout, Comfortably Numb, is a thing of beauty.

Clocking in at 9.8% alcohol by volume, Comfortably Numb is pitch black with a quickly dissipating soft brown head. The nose has a nice, subtle roast, but the mouth is an explosion of dark chocolate, coffee, roasted barley and molasses. It hides its booze between sweet and creamy flavors and a lingering bitter finish. Drink during a snowstorm, and pair with a roasted vegetable soup and garlic bread. — MJC

On barbecue... with Georgia Boys Nick Reckinger and Matt Alexander by Matt Cortina

Love is time,” says Georgia Boys co-founder Nick Reckinger. He’s talking about meat. If that’s not obvious, he continues: “Love is good spices and good seasoning.”

We’re talking over a plate of burnt ends at Georgia Boys’ Longmont outpost. It’s the fatty end of a brisket and after sitting in a dry rub and being smoked for hours, it’s fallapart tender, and the crispy, smoky bark is undeniable.

“The brisket we’re eating today, we started that two or three days ago,” says Matt Alexander, the other Georgia Boy.

Brisket was a late addition to the Georgia Boys’ lineup. It wasn’t cooked in the smokehouses and backyards of Georgia, where they grew up and learned to barbecue. Smoked meats in the Peach State borrow from a Memphis dry-rub tradition, and you’ll find mostly pork, chicken and sausage at barbecue joints down there. “People out here weren’t used to dry rub,” Reckinger says of coming to Colorado over a decade ago. “We’re doing traditional Southern, where the meat’s got nothing to hide. It’s why the sauce is always on the side.”

The recipes on the menu today at Georgia Boys haven’t changed from what they learned growing up and tasting around Georgia... for the most part.

“It’s exactly the same,” Reckinger says. “I mean, burnt ends, you still won’t find down in Georgia, but everything else, we’re pulling from family recipes, popular recipes down South. All of our sides are scratchcooking.”

Banana pudding, sweet potato casserole and green bean casserole are direct replications of family recipes while other sides like mac and cheese, smoky baked beans and chicken corn bread dressing are the amalgamations of their experiences eating barbecue on the regular growing up.

That commitment to staying true to Southern cooking is likely why Reckinger and Alexander outgrew their first Longmont operation (in a shack) and expanded to Frederick, with tentative plans for more restaurants.

They’ve developed their own kitchen secrets — each meat has its own rub, which differs from other barbecue spots that tend to use one universal rub for every meat. It’s understandably hard to pry the trade secrets from the Georgia Boys, but here’s one: the brisket is rubbed with cocoa. Of course there are a million other secrets to figure out if you want to replicate Georgia Boys barbecue; maybe ask Day Hayward at Savory Spice Shop, who provides the restaurant with all its spices and herbs, but it’s doubtful he’ll tell you either.

Besides, what might be the real secret to Georgia Boys’ success is their commitment to hospitality. Reckinger says he passed on the “five and 10 rule” to staffers: if someone’s within 10 feet of you, smile, if they’re within five, say hello. Reckinger and Alexander believe the key to transplanting not only Southern cooking but Southern hospitality is by keeping the staff happy: They’re one of the few restaurants in the county that provide full benefits to staff members.

“We’ll take care of the employees, and that kind of translates to the customers as well,” Alexander says.

From Georgia to the Rockies A lexander and Reckinger met as frat brothers at the University of West Georgia. They independently moved to Colorado, but stayed in contact and eventually moved into an apartment together in Gunbarrel. When they were both laid off during the Great Recession within weeks of each other, they turned to their roots in meat to make ends meet.

“I certainly miss the excitement in the beginning days,” Alexander says, looking back. “It was working 14 hours… didn’t even feel like you worked 14 hours. It was super exciting.”

For three years, Alexander and Reckinger stealthily built a barbecue business, cooking batches in the courtyard of their apartment complex, setting up shop at Left Hand in Longmont and Upslope in Boulder, and dropping off bagged sandwiches to workplaces at lunch time. Eventually they drew the eye of Boulder County code compliance, but by then they had built a reputation and were able to invest a paltry (by today’s standards) $16,000 to lease and outfit a shack in Longmont.

“That was all in… by the end of the day we had $500 left,” Alexander says.

They spent that $500 on food, and thanks to some luck and the reputation they had built, there was a line out the door on day one. They borrowed picnic tables from a business up the street until they could afford their own. They relied on friends and part-timers to keep meat smoking on their days off. They found innovative solutions in the “gray area” of code compliance until they could get in line. They were quintessential bootstrappers.

“Black market barbecue turned into real barbecue with a ask for forgiveness, not for permission approach to things,” Reckinger says. “That would never work now,” Alexander adds.

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Pulled Pork FROM GEORGIA BOYS’ NICK RECKINGER AND MATT ALEXANDER

1 8-lb bone-in pork butt Salt Brown sugar Black pepper Onion powder Garlic powder Paprika Apple cider vinegar and wood chunks (for smoking) 1. Rub the pork butt with salt, pepper, spices and brown sugar — “Coat it on there,” Reckinger says. Place in refrigerator for 24 hours. 2. “Start early in the morning. Have a couple of beers… not too many because it’s a long day,” Reckinger says.

3. Soak wood chunks (Georgia Boys uses apple and hickory wood) for a couple hours and place in smoker. Wait until smoker reaches 225 degrees. 4. Place pork butt in smoker and don’t open the lid. Cover any holes emanating smoke with tin foil. “Invest in one of those little thermometers that’ll go in the smoker,” Alexander says, so you don’t have to open the lid. 5. When meat reaches 198 degrees, pull it from the smoker, put it fat side down on a chopping block and give it a good whack, and “it should just break apart and then you’re good,” Reckinger says.

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TIPS FROM THE PITMASTERS

• Use wood chunks instead of wood chips. • Move the smoker vent to the side opposite of where the smoke enters the chamber — this ensures the smoker stays an even temperature as it moves through the tub. • Start your foray into smoking meat with pork butt, ribs or chicken — save brisket for when you have a few smokes under your belt. • Bone-in meat keeps the pork butt together and adds flavor. • Don’t inject the meat, keep it simple. • Even the cheap smokers for less than $100 will do. • Really, don’t open the smoker while the meat’s in there. • Even though the pork will be cooked at 165 degrees, let it go to 198, as it’ll be much easier to pull. • Soaking the wood chunks in apple cider vinegar or water increases the smoke in the chamber.

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