Eat under 575 taxidermy mounts holding Colorado liquor licence No. 1
Licence No. 1, still on the wall
A saloon and game restaurant opened in 1893 in the Five Points neighbourhood, and the oldest continuously operating restaurant in Denver. The walls carry roughly 575 taxidermy mounts and 125 antique firearms, and the room has changed very little in over a century.
Why it's unique
When Prohibition was repealed, Colorado issued liquor licence number one to this building. It still hangs on the wall, and no other establishment in the state can make that claim.
The taxidermy is the other half of it. Several hundred mounts — elk, bison, mountain goat, bighorn sheep, dozens of birds — accumulated over a century rather than bought as decor, and including a two-headed calf and a jackalope among the legitimate specimens. Theodore Roosevelt ate here in 1905 after his train pulled into the Rio Grande yards, which gives some sense of how long the room has been doing this.
Before you go
Ask to see the licence. It is displayed rather than hidden, and most people eat under it without noticing.
The menu runs to game — elk, buffalo, quail, and Rocky Mountain oysters. The upstairs bar is a separate room with its own character and is worth a drink before or after rather than heading straight to a table.