Colorado snags singular James Beard award for ‘outstanding restaurant’
DENVER (KDVR) — A Boulder restaurant was the singular establishment in Colorado to be named a winner in the 2025 James Beard Foundation Restaurant and Chef Awards.
Frasca Food and Wine, located at the corner of 18th and Pearl Streets in Boulder, was named “outstanding restaurant” by the James Beard Foundation on Monday night, another laurel to add to its already lengthy list of accomplishments.
The eatery was given a Michelin Star in 2023 and two James Beard awards, one for Outstanding Wine Service in 2013 and another for Outstanding Service in 2019. Chef Lachlan Mackinnon-Patterson was also awarded Best Chef by the James Beard Foundation in 2008 for the Southwest region.
The restaurant’s current executive chef, Ian Palazzola, worked at San Francisco restaurant Mourad, which earned a Michelin Star while he was there. He joined Frasca Food and Wine in August 2022 as a sous chef and was appointed executive chef in spring 2023.
On Tuesday, the restaurant shared its reaction to the award.
“To say we’re thrilled is an understatement. This morning, our hearts are full — with gratitude, humility and awe,” the restaurant said in its release. “We’re grateful to our guests, our team, and our community. For 21 years, you’ve supported a little restaurant on the corner of 18th and Pearl, inspired by the traditions and hospitality of Friuli-Venezia Giulia. You believed in us, and because of that, Frasca became more than a restaurant. It became the root of something bigger.”
A plate of grilled Mediterranean Sea Bream garnished with black rice, rapini and cauliflower with a meyer lemon condiment on Thursday, April 14, at Frasca Food and Wine at 1738 Pearl St. in Boulder.(Photo by Jeremy Papasso/Digital First Media/Boulder Daily Camera via Getty Images)
Peanut Butter Cup dessert on Monday, July 28, at Frasca Frasca Food and Wine on Pearl Street in Boulder. The restaurant is celebrating its 10th anniversary.(Photo by Jeremy Papasso/Digital First Media/Boulder Daily Camera via Getty Images)
Veal Meatball Salad at Frasca Food and Wine in Boulder, Colorado September 25, 2007. CAMERA/Mark Leffingwell(Photo by Mark Leffingwell/Digital First Media/Boulder Daily Camera via Getty Images)
A plate of whole salt-baked Snapper garnished with black rice, rapini and cauliflower with a meyer lemon condiment on Thursday, April 14, at Frasca Food and Wine at 1738 Pearl St. in Boulder.(Photo by Jeremy Papasso/Digital First Media/Boulder Daily Camera via Getty Images)
According to the Michelin Guide, Frasca is a “sleek” business that treats everyone patronizing it as a special guest while focusing on a hyper-specific way of Italian cooking.
According to its website, the restaurant “tells the story of Friuli-Venezia Giulia,” a region of Italy that borders Austria, Slovenia and the Adriatic Sea. The restaurant’s culinary and wine draws inspiration from the region, and the Michelin Guide noted that the menu showcases the lesser-known parts of Italy with ingredients that are “clearly Coloradan.”
“The plates are beguiling with a minimal, straightforward approach, as in cjalson, half-moon fresh spinach pasta pockets filled with an English pea and potato purée,” the Michelin Guide states.
The restaurant gets its name from the Friulano food tradition of the neighborhood frasca: a friendly and informal gathering place for farmers, friends and families to share meals and wine. The locations would be identified by a tree branch hanging over a doorway, the restaurant states on its website, and when the harvest came to a close, the branch would wither to indicate the end of the season and the frascas doors would close until next year.
