I got to spend about ten days during May vacationing in Colorado, and it was a great way to kick off summer. I went with my mom and sister to see a concert at Red Rocks amphitheater, and we decided to make a trip out of it. We traveled to different cities where we saw many beautiful mountain ranges, and lucky for me, got to eat some incredible and interesting food. Here's a list of the three places that stood out to me the most during our travels.

Root Down in Denver 

rice, quinoa
Helaina Cozza

This restaurant definitely had a ~hipster~ feel and is in an artsy feeling area. They offer many interesting food options and have a cute outdoor patio seating area with a great view of the city. We ordered risotto and the Colorado lamb sliders. The food was fun, brightly colored and fresh tasting, and I'd love to go back.

Ed's Cantina & Grill in Estes

salad, chicken, cheese, sauce
Helaina Cozza

After a day of seeing snow on the mountains, (in May!), which was insane and awesome, we ate here. I love Mexican food so this was appealing immediately. Ed's Cantina had some fun options, and we ordered lamb tacos and a bison enchilada. The enchilada was my favorite, and it made me realize that I like bison, or at least in the ground meat form they served it. It was adventurous, fun, and yummy, and I wish I could have a bison enchilada right now. 

La Tour Restaurant in Vail

salad, arugula
Helaina Cozza

When we went to Vail, we spent our day shopping and looking around at a ski resort type of area that had lots of cute shops and places to eat. Unfortunately, we couldn't ski since it's not ski season, but we did get the pleasure of eating at La Tour Restaurant, which is probably the fanciest place we ate at. We had truffle popcorn as a happy hour snack (I also had Prosecco, of course) which was rich and flavorful. For our dinner, we had a fish with a nice cream sauce, greens, and berries. It was light yet flavorful, and we were very happy with our decision after what felt like hours picking a place to eat.

If you plan on traveling through Colorado anytime soon, I would highly recommend checking out any of these three restaurants. I hope to go back there one day to see some more sights, and of course, eat at all of these places again.