Louisville CO: The Empire

Louisville is a nice little Front Range town. Its old main street from the coal mining days has been revamped with a nice set of restaurants and small stores. Rhonda, Karl, and I spent a wonderful dinner at one of those restaurants, The Empire, catching up.

We started with a very large bowl of roasted brussel sprouts. This dish is one of the more enjoyable trends from the past few years. Our brussel sprouts had just the right amount of char and a nice twang.

Karl and I shared the Southwestern paella. It was a wonderful mixture of sea and land: mussels and shrimp; chicken and chorizo. The Southwestern bit came from the red peppers to give an extra touch of heat. The rice was creamy and rich.

Rhonda ordered the meatballs and gave them rave reviews.

We finished by sharing this flourless chocolate cake. (Does anyone ever make a flourless vanilla cake?) It had a hint of fruit, raspberry I think. The dense chocolate was a lot of fun.

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Atlanta etc.: Marilyn Wolf's Food Blog and Restaurant Blog

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