Denver: Taste of Colorado Insider’s Guide

There is an art to discovering the events of a city.  Uncovering the hip lounge openings, art installations, and public festivals requires a good social network, an eye on progressive media, and good keystroke in to google.  However, there are times when the most fun events lie hidden under a swarm of labor day patrons.

I love the Taste of Colorado.  I’ve heard radio stations, news papers, and long time natives bash it.  Describing it as small portioned, over priced, and too crowded may be a correct assessment, but it’s not the case for the savvy visitor.  Here are my tips to make your own great experience.

Plan Your Menu

Walking through the maze of booths and stages in the one hundred degree heat can leave most hungers unsatiated.  The trick here is to plan ahead.  The events website lays out all vendors and menu options ahead of time in a printable menu format.  I printed mine out, highlight, and plan by theme.  One day I did Caribbean and tropical island foods, another Indian, and the last day I dined on Greek and Mediterranean.

Get In and Out

This event is crowded, but for the careful attendee, you can move swiftly.  On the same page that offers the menu choices, a pdf map is available as well.  By avoiding the outer circle and taking the connecting internal paths, you can easily make it from one end to the other without much interference from the other patrons.  Also highlight the booths you want to hit from your predefined menu.  I was in, out, and fed within 40 minutes on Saturday.

Know Your Currency

This typical festival changes your dollars in for coupons at an uneven rate.  You hand the ticket counter $5 and they return 8 tickets.  A quick and simple conversion I found helpful was using the rate of 2 tickets per $1.25.

Watch the Prices

There are many levels of prices at the event.  Most small vendors offer samples for 2-3 tickets and full meals between 8 and 12 tickets.  I think these are both reasonable prices.  Where you need to watch out are the combo meals and the products in between.  Combo meals can be as much as 18 tickets.  Instead, get one single item meal (8 tickets), and then walk around sampling a couple other items for fun.  Products in between samples and meals are often bad value as well.  An order of naan or fruit empanada for 6 coupons ($3.75) isn’t the sample value as a whole meal of saag paneer for 8 coupons ($5.)

Bargain

Since the coupons come in odd amounts, and you won’t necessarily use them all, often you are stuck with a few extra.  Simply tell the food vendor you have only 3 coupons left, and often they will give you an extra taster or size down a portion accordingly.  They still get money for the coupons, so they are usually happy to accommodate.

Teetotal

Beers and other alcoholic beverages are ridiculous.  Don’t buy them.  Simply walk a block away from the festival, sit in an air conditioned bar, and get your drink in a pint glass for half the price.