{"id":1032,"date":"2013-08-12T10:00:02","date_gmt":"2013-08-12T16:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/?p=1032"},"modified":"2013-08-09T11:33:30","modified_gmt":"2013-08-09T17:33:30","slug":"keystones-hidden-romantic-dining-gem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/articles\/keystones-hidden-romantic-dining-gem\/","title":{"rendered":"Keystone\u2019s hidden romantic dining gem"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Janice Sakata-Schultze, Examiner.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

After shredding the back bowls at Keystone Resort in winter or scaling the trails on your mountain bikes in summertime, you\u2019re running on empty.\u00a0 Thick crust combo pizza and a pint of Fat Tire might satisfy, but what if you\u2019re wanting to impress…and be impressed?<\/p>\n

If you are looking for something a little more elegant and completely extraordinary, ascend the River Run and Outpost gondolas to Alpenglow Stube.\u00a0 In business since 1991, they have the distinction of being a AAA four-diamond award winner 19 times, nearly every year since their opening, and at the highest elevation (11,444 feet) in the United States.\u00a0 If possible, arrive right around sunset (the \u201cAlpenglow\u201d), when you can take in the panoramic views from both lines and possibly watch either hardcore skiers or mountain bikers glide down the fir-canopied slopes.<\/p>\n

Walk into the rustic log cabin entrance, and you will be greeted by friendly waitstaff, who take your coats and shoes and offer comfy slippers to warm your feet and wear during your meal.\u00a0 Warm glowing light fixtures made from elk horns cast illumination on walls adorned with hand-stenciled green vines and paintings created by staff members.\u00a0 Choosing a wine to drink, you would be assured of excellent choices all around – Alpenglow Stube is a recipient of Wine Spectator Magazine\u2019s Best of Award of Excellence, offering 450 different bottles.<\/p>\n

On our visit, we were presented with menus printed with our party name – a wonderful personalized touch.\u00a0 Three fixed-priced options offer four ($69 per person), six ($92 per person)or seven courses ($99 per person).\u00a0 With the first two, we could select from the menu inspired by Colorado native ingredients such as trout, venison and buffalo.\u00a0 Feeling more adventurous, we could have also be open to executive chef\u00a0 Jeff Parker\u2019s creativity and enjoyed seven plates off the menu.<\/p>\n

We decided on the four-course dinner and sipped Argentinian Chardonnay and a California Pinot Noir by the glass to start.\u00a0 Both my husband and I decided that the six-course meal, with caviar and appetizer courses, might be too much of great thing.<\/p>\n

Sharing the woodsy venison currant consomm\u00e9 and the savory-sweet roasted beet and mache salad as a first course, we also enjoyed four different kinds of house-baked breads.\u00a0 These included a mini-brioche, a multigrain roll, lavosh with rosemary and a buttery strudel with Westphalian ham, accompanied by butter, herb butter and raspberry preserves.\u00a0 Almost a meal in itself.<\/p>\n

After a palate-cleansing strawberry-juniper sorbet, my husband enjoyed buffalo short-ribs with whipped potatoes.\u00a0 Even with my semi-vegetarian diet, I relented and savored the tender meat infused with pomegranate.\u00a0 My wild mushroom risotto was prepared perfectly, with silky consistency and a delightfully earthy flavor.\u00a0 On the menu, this dish was offered as an appetizer, but when I asked to order it as my entr\u00e9e, our terrific server Christina happily accommodated.<\/p>\n

The dessert course, with scrumptious chocolate hazelnut bars and creme br\u00fbl\u00e9e, provided the flawless ending to a magical dining experience high above Keystone.\u00a0 \u201cWe get a lot of repeat customers, people who come up here every year,\u201d said longtime hostess Harriet Bobo.\u00a0 We would readily join this lucky group on our next few visits to Summit County.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thick crust combo pizza and a pint of Fat Tire might satisfy, but what if you\u2019re wanting to impress…and be impressed? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1033,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[66,67,22],"class_list":{"0":"post-1032","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-articles","8":"tag-alpenglow","9":"tag-dinner","10":"tag-keystone"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-20 07:21:01","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSMT The Mountain","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1032"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}