John Lehndorff has hosted Radio Nibbles for more than 25 years. His first show on KGNU in the early 1980s was called the Generic Gourmet Show. He is the former food editor at the Daily Camera and Aurora Sentinel, dining critic for the Rocky Mountain News, and Chief Judge at the National Pie Championships; He … Continue reading
By JOHN LEHNDORFF (Originally published in the KGNU Program Guide 2019; kgnu.org) In the late 1800s, pie was kind of a big deal in Boulder. Early on, white settlers planted lots of rhubarb, pumpkins and apple trees and the crop often ended up in pies. They got sweeter as the area became known for beet … Continue reading
By JOHN LEHNDORFF (Edible Critic, Sensi magazine, 2/17) When I’m chopping onions with my chef knife I often don’t always glance down at my fingers. I’m looking for the next thing I’m going to slice or thinking about the next story I have to write. It scares people who watch me do it but I … Continue reading
By JOHN LEHNDORFF (Boulder Weekly 11/23/16) If you are hosting Thanksgiving at your house today, complete with “Alice’s Restaurant” playing in the background, you probably won’t read this until well after the feast. Hosts spend weeks getting ready for that peak moment when everybody is finally seated and filling their plates. They will grab some … Continue reading
Words and images by JOHN LEHNDORFF (Sensi Magazine 1/17) In the past year I have eaten more than 1,000 meals, maybe 1,500 depending on how you define a meal. How many of those meals do I remember in detail? Not that many, and I blame neither the sativa nor the indica. It just takes great … Continue reading
By John Lehndorff (Originally published in AAA Encompass Colorado Magazine November/December 2016; photos by Kim Long) Once upon a time, on the west side of Denver, you could smell green apple one day and watermelon the next. Jolly Rancher, for years Colorado’s most famous name in sweets, produced about 1 million pounds of hard candy a … Continue reading
By JOHN LEHNDORFF I’ll be spending part of my Labor Day weekend in the land of pie. On September 3 I’ll be the chief judge at the Hay Days Pie Contest in Hygiene . On September 5 I’ll be judging pies in Louisville. We need more pies and competitors to keep pie … Continue reading
https://johnlehndorff.wordpress.com/2016/07/29/rockygrass-16-guitar-gods-and-colorado-bluegrass-next-gen-style/ By John Lehndorff (7/29/16: 2 p.m. Lyons CO) – First there was Hot Rize. They took Colorado bluegrass values to a national audience. It was very good, and Leftover Salmon, String Cheese Incident and Yonder Mountain String Band, each bending Bill Monroe’s mashup of styles their own harmonic twist. The Infamous Stringdusters and Greensky Bluegrass, … Continue reading
By JOHN LLEHNDORFF (2:05 p.m 7/31/16 Lyons CO/ overcast with a chance a brilliance) – Saturday’s sets at the 44th annual Rockygrass Festival featured the return of many of the leading lights of this progressive bluegrass tradition fostered at Rockygrass over the past two decades. I first talked to Mark O’Connor backstage at Telluride when … Continue reading
JOHN LEHNDORFF (3:07 p.m. 7/30/16 Lyons CO / Sunny with a chance of more sun) – I missed the yoga session at 8 a.m. The fans on the field at the Rockygrass Festival pretty much knew when they wheeled the drum riser onto the stage that Tony Trischka and his band (above) probably weren’t going … Continue reading
By John Lehndorff (1:49 p.m. July 30, 2016: Lyons CO/ 88 degrees, cloudy, chance of twang) – The gates of Rockygrass swung open at Planet Bluegrass for the second day of the 44th annual gathering. The first one I attended was at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds and Hot Rize was there. Today’s array started with … Continue reading
By JOHN LEHNDORFF – (Boulder Weekly) This time of year I love sweet ripe tomatoes, freshly dressed lettuce and buttered roasted corn as much as any person can, but there really is more to life than a bowl of Colorado cherries. I watch folks ignoring the summer smorgasbord to focus on the mild, sweet favorites. … Continue reading
By JOHN LEHNDORFF During summer’s peak travel season I get variations on the same question from friends and sometimes strangers that go something like this: “We’re driving south on I-25 to New Mexico. Is there any place to eat down there that’s worth getting off the interstate?” I don’t blame them. I made the same … Continue reading
By JOHN LEHNDORFF (From Produce Business magazine) – Produce sales tie-ins are not exactly a new idea. Historians report that merchants in marketplaces sold fruit right next to nuts, bread and other favorites to grab the ancient equivalent of a double-ring from customers. The question isn’t whether tie-ins help sell more fresh fruit – they … Continue reading
(From Boulder Weekly, 6/30/16) – The Blueberry Man always showed up at the back door of my childhood home on hot summer Saturday mornings. I never knew the name of the stooped older man in worn overalls who walked the neighborhood offering freshly picked wild blueberries by the cup from a full tin pail. I … Continue reading
People look at you kind of funny when you’re standing in the produce department with a watermelon on each arm. I was weighing the options and getting some upper body exercise. One melon was very small but convenient, which makes some sense for one person. The other was a monster, a watermelon from the old … Continue reading
By JOHN LEHNDORFF (Boulder Weekly, 6/2/16) Buttermilk Candy. Orange-Pineapple Congealed Salad. Potato Chip Cookies. Unpretentious recipes for everyday and special occasion dishes like these fill the pages of one of my favorite Boulder community collections, Chautauqua Porches: A Centennial Cookbook published at Chautauqua Park’s 100th anniversary in 1998. You can see Boulder’s food culture slowly evolve among … Continue reading
BY JOHN LEHNDORFF (This feature appears in the current issue of Colorado AAA Encompass magazine – plus additional information) It’s not a native tongue, but the bluegrass ballads, waltzes and breakdowns full of stories about mournful death, deep valleys, lonesome train whistles, heartbreak, outlaws and wide creeks resonate in the Rockies as clearly as they … Continue reading
By John Lehndorff Boulder Weekly Feb. 25, 2016 – Ras Kassa’s was the coolest culinary anomaly I’d ever encountered in my food writing life. It was an Ethiopian roadhouse set in a Twilight Zone location, the tumbleweed junction at the mouth of Eldorado Canyon at US-93 in the 1980s. Sour injera bread and yebeg alicha … Continue reading
(This Nibbles column originally appeared in the Boulder Weekly: http://www.boulderweekly.com/article-15452-from-menudo-to-beet-sugar-rum.html) By John Lehndorff John Lehndorff Bone broth was big in 2015 in Boulder — so popular it is even available on tap in multiple flavors. Personally, I’ll take my bone broth — animal bones boiled in water — in the traditional form of Jewish chicken … Continue reading
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