You can tell a lot about a casual restaurant by its hamburger bun. And when a 13-year-old boy comments on the quality of the bread, you know it’s good.
That Wildrock Cafe uses a ciabatta roll from L.A.’s La Brea Bakery for its sirloin burgers is just one example of how this ambitious venture hopes to offer fine-dining quality in a casual setting.
Housed in a former Hooters on Fort Collins’ South College Avenue, the restaurant’s stone exterior stands out on the commercial strip. The stone theme continues inside, with a cool “water wall” in the entryway. Wood floors, tables and chairs extend the natural theme, but could use some softening with rugs and cushions.
Wildrock’s challenge is to lure diners away from chains (and Fort Collins has them all). “We’re in the middle, literally and figuratively,” says owner Lisa Casperson, referring to the restaurant’s central location, its menu and pricing.
After four meals here, nothing about the food struck me as middling. The coconut shrimp tasted like shrimp and coconut — not freezer and oil, as with so many bar starters. The goat-cheese appetizer was fun to eat — a generous hunk of cheese in olive oil with a tomato-y tapenade to spread on olive bread.
The cider-glazed pork chop set the standard for a cut that can often come out dry and chewy. The inch-thick chop arrived atop a mound of “sweet mash,” a yammy puree that pleased even the squash skeptic. And in a perfect example of the dessert my 13-year-old likes to call “cream burly,” crystalline sugar yielded to a vanilla-bean-flecked custard.
If it can stick with this quality, Wildrock deserves to become a family favorite.
Kristen Browning-Blas: 303-954-1440 or kbrowning@denverpost.com
Wildrock Cafe
Contemporary American. Lunch: 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Happy hour: 3-6 p.m. Dinner 5-9 p.m. Bar open to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday. Closed Sunday and Monday. 2631 S. College Ave., Fort Collins, 970-226-6200
