Rioja’s lamb burger made the list of TimeOut magazine’s 18 beset burgers in America. (Courtesy Rioja/Marc Piscotty)
in Denver just got a nice tip of the toque: has listed the restaurant’s lamb burger as one of the best burgers in the U.S. So raise a glass to Jennifer Jasinski, Rioja’s chef and co-owner, and her crew.
Making the news all the more cool is the fact that isn’t a burger joint at all, but a fine-dining establishment that leans towards pan-Mediterranean fare, with a particularly strong influence from Spain. And Jasinski has won a James Beard Award for Best Chef Southwest.
That wasn’t lost on the folks at TimeOut. “The world is divided between people who eat burgers in white-tablecloth restaurants, and fools who do not,” the citation reads. “Denver diners in the former category sing the praises of the Colorado lamb burger at this elegant Larimer Square spot from James Beard Award winner Jennifer Jasinski.
Rioja’s burger is an exercise in savory construction: Colorado-raised lamb is decked with peppery arugula and housemade mozzarella, then dolloped with zippy aioli. TimeOut noted the sandwich’s “Rocky Mountain swagger,” and they got it right.
The 18 restaurants making up the list are an impressive field. Among the burgers cited were the double-pattied cheeseburger at Husk, Sean Brock’s acclaimed room in Charleston, S.C. Other shout-outs went to the chargrilled burger with roquefort cheese at New York City’s Spotted Pig and the burger at Holeman and Finch Public House in Atlanta. Texas was not denied either, with kudos going to the Firehouse burger at Lankford Grocery in Houston.
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