Tocabe - Greenwood Village

Tocabe 2

One Year Later....

Like the song says, "Five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?"  Well, in our world, the answer is always, LET'S GO EAT!

Hey guys, we did it.  Today's restaurant was a celebration of MenuManiac's one year anniversary.  A year really does fly by when you are doing something you love.  In fact, the year went by so fast that admittedly we almost forgot about the anniversary!  However, when it came time to choose the restaurant for our celebration, we didn't even have to think about it.  We would go back to the restaurant that started it all, Tocabe, An American Indian Eatery. 

Although this is technically a repeat for us, it was like a brand new experience.  During the last year, Tocabe has opened a second location in Greenwood Village and we couldn't be happier for them.

The new restaurant is just as wonderful as the original location.  In many ways it is identical; however, there are enough differences between the two to make this visit just as new and exciting as our original trip was a year ago. 

Tocabe 2 carried over many of the decorative touches from the original restaurant.  For example, the textured wallpaper that represents the prairie grass covering the lands inhabited by the Osage tribe, the same colors decorate the walls, and the food line and great service is all the same.  They still offer bison ribs, fried bread tacos, and medicine wheel nachos, all with your choice of ground beef, chicken, ground bison with sage, or shredded buffalo.  All the wonderful salsa's are there including our favorite hominy and cranberry salsa. You must try the hominy salsa, it sounds weird but it is awesome! 

The biggest difference is the absence of the stuffed frybread taco and the addition of the grilled bannock taco.  Bannock is a type of grilled bread and is served on the side instead of beneath the taco ingredients itself.  They also have a bad hunter salad which includes Arcadia salad mix and up to five choices of seasonal toppings including nuts, grains, beans, vegetables, and house made dressings - our favorite being the maple vinaigrette.  The maple syrup used in this salad dressing comes from a Native tribe in Minnesota.  But never fear, the stuffed frybread taco is still available at Tocabe's original location.

On this visit, the side served with the bison ribs was squash and potatoes which were sprinkled with brown sugar.  This was incredible.  Simple yet flavorful, like most of our favorite things.

For dessert, we ordered frybread sprinkled with cinnamon and powdered sugar as well as an order of frybread nuggets dusted with powdered sugar.  Both were fresh out of the oven and just phenomenal.  We recommend ordering a side of Wojapi sauce to dip the frybread in.  It is a mixture of fresh blueberries and strawberries. 

John, one of the owners, came by our table.  He spent a lot of time with us explaining the philosophy of the restaurant and letting us know of upcoming projects and ideas they have regarding Tocabe.  As you may remember from our first blog entry a year ago, Tocabe was brought to our attention after watching Diners, Drive In's, and Dives.  During our first visit to the original location on West 44th in Denver, we were impressed by the way they use local ingredients and how they strive to keep the culture and Native influence alive through their food and restaurants.  In true Tocabe style, John impressed us even further by informing us that they have been working in conjunction with the USDA to create DVD's demonstrating how to make meals from the ingredients found in the commodity packages for people living on reservations.  He also informed us that the motto regarding their restaurant's procurement of ingredients is, "Native first and local second."  We absolutely love and respect this idea.  He also reiterated the fact that all items on the menu, with the exception of the chipotle sauce, is made fresh in house and is preservative free.  In addition, he informed us about their future plans.  Tocabe is looking to expand and open more locations (Northern Colorado, John.  Northern Colorado!).  They have intentions to work with Fiddler's Green to help promote both the concerts and their food by coming up with a way to cater to the crowd as they are on their way to the venue.

Tocabe is still the most unique restaurant we have visited since starting this blog.  It continues to surprise and delight us with both wonderful food and wonderful service to their community, heritage, and culture.

Of course we awarded Tocabe, John, and the entire staff of Tocabe the coveted Golden Spoon.

Please review our original blog entry from a year ago as well.  We want to thank all our Maniacs for their continued support.  We look forward to year two and hope to have many group events and outings for many years to come!

The Officially Unofficial Voting Legend
Take it with a grain of salt, we're not professionals.
	Awesome place, we’ll shovel more food in our face!
	It was okay. Not our favorite, but we’ll take another stab at it.
	Didn’t make the cut.