Dining
There is little difficulty in finding a nearby restaurant in Colorado Springs, no matter where you are in the city, as there are more than thirteen hundred dining establishments in the area. However, a few stand out as worthy of mention because, though they may not be among the best-known in town or most often recommended to visitors, they should not be missed.
El Tesoro in the Depot Arts District just west of the Antlers Hotel and the Main Library downtown offers authentic regional Hispanic cuisine. Generally referred to as Santa Fe style or Northern New Mexico cuisine, the description Southern Colorado cuisine might be applied just as fairly. Many of the featured menu items descend from the ancestral kitchens of the San Luis Valley of Colorado, one of the richest areas of farmland in the American West.
Blue Star on the far south end of Tejon Street is a miracle of gracious negotiations among assertive ingredients. With a nouvelle cuisine quality of innovation and adventure, the food is by no means inaccessible. Anything they do with salmon is spectacular; the salads are exciting, and the dessert options are so varied and appealing that there is an authentic moment of quandary before making any decision about how to end a meal at Blue Star.
Just about anyone in Colorado Springs would be happy to explain the city and its moods and preferences to you, but every explanation would differ. It is a city in which business and the arts, the military and the Olympics, longtime resident and relative newcomer, and even people of diametrically opposed political views can co-exist, at times quirkily, but peaceably and with a more generous helping of respect than can be found in many other corners of America.