Well, I wouldn’t recommend this place to a vegan, but if you like Wild West kitsch (or you use antlers in all of your decorating), this is the place for you.

The Buckhorn Exchange is the oldest restaurant in Denver: it holds liquor license number one! It has served dinner to both Teddy and Franklin Roosevelt, Buffalo Bill Cody, Will Rogers, and numerous other historic guests. The menu of various game dishes is pricey but excellent—I recommend anything with the prickly pear glaze on it. And of course I ordered a Sioux City Sarsaparilla with my meal—all the while wishing I could do a decent impression of Sam Elliott in The Big Lebowski.

Oh, and ladies: if you go, be sure to check out the upstairs washroom. Not only are there two antlered buck heads in there, but the heads are jousting each other. I really should have sketched that, shouldn’t I?

Ah, well. A reason to return.