The reimagined Grandview Tavern opened at the beginning of April.
Courtesy photo
When Arvada resident Jeremy Wolgamott left his post as head chef at acclaimed Denver restaurant Bistro Vendôme in 2024, he did so hoping his next move would be opening a restaurant. Just over a year later, Wolgamott realized his goal, taking ownership of the Grandview Tavern on April 1.
A Colorado native originally from Denver’s Wash Park neighborhood, Wolgamott moved to Louisiana and began working in kitchens when he was 16 years old. After spending some time at a neighborhood kitchen in Baton Rouge, Wolgamott moved to Los Angeles for a spell before settling in New Orleans, where he really honed his skills.
“I was there for almost 14 years,” Wolgamott said. “I was the head chef, at three different restaurants in New Orleans,”
Wolgamott worked at the High Hat Cafe, owned a restaurant called Stokehold, and Coquette, an award-winning fine dining French restaurant.
“I left Coquette specifically to move back to the Denver area and specifically to open a restaurant here,” Wolgamott said.
Eventually, Wolgamott and his family — which includes his wife and son — settled in Arvada, a few blocks away from Olde Town. Still looking for a restaurant to call his own, Wolgamott acted promptly when he heard that the former owners of the Grandview Tavern — who had owned the restaurant since 2004 — were retiring.
“I was actively looking for a very long time,” Wolgamott said. “I spent every day driving around. I was getting online. I was reading the papers. I was checking out different spaces. I looked everywhere between Littleton and Boulder.
“I wanted it to be kind of a neighborhood restaurant,” Wolgamott continued. “I like neighborhood restaurants, and I just kind of lucked into it being in Olde Town, because it just worked out once again, like ‘I’ve lived here the whole time, this is my neighborhood.’”
While the food at the Grandview has changed with Wolgamott at the helm, a lot of the foundational aspects of the restaurant that have made it a neighborhood favorite remain. Wolgamott said the restaurant’s tin ceiling reminds him of New Orleans; a few staff members have stayed on through the transition and many of the previous owner’s events are still on the calendar, including live music and trivia.
“I just think it’s a really gorgeous physical space,” Wolgamott said. “I like that. It just feels like a casual neighborhood space. It doesn’t feel like it’s trying to do too much. That’s why we didn’t really do any real redecorating or changing anything. We just kind of let the bones shine, because they’re gorgeous.”
Since the soft opening day in early April, Wolgamott said business has been going well, with many regular customers from the previous era complimenting some of the changes.
The most notable changes are on the menu, where Wolgamott has brought his southern flair and balanced it with his Colorado roots.
Head Chef Jeremy Wolgamott.
Courtesy photo
“I love Southern food,” Wolgamott said. “Southern food, for me, is kind of what American food is. America is such a big country that it’s hard to really have a specific food identity, like a smaller country, such as France or Spain, would just because it’s so big; it’s so spread out, everywhere is so different.
“But for me, the food of the South is the real American food,” Wolgamott continued. “I wanted to do a casual neighborhood restaurant, and just have it be just traditional Southern food, especially with the menu right now. It’s not my take on anything. It’s old stuff out of old cookbooks that I had on menus at other restaurants in the south. And it is exactly what Southern food is supposed to be.”
Some of the standouts on the menu are the gumbo, which has been on Wolgamott’s menus dating back to his High Hat Cafe days, and the cornbread, which will be baked fresh to order. Although the menu is heavily inspired by Louisiana cuisine, he is going to be sourcing what is readily available to him in Colorado.
“I’m not going to try and ship in a bunch of stuff,” Wolgamott said. “For the most part, I want to use what’s here locally. It’s kind of the natural way of cooking for me. In the Gulf South, I only used Gulf seafood. It’s right there … So same thing here.
“I’m doing a fried fish, but I’m not doing catfish, because there’s no catfish in Colorado,” Wolgamott said. “What we do have is trout. So, I’m just frying trout. It’s kind of the same thing I would do in New Orleans, except with a different fish.”
Some exceptions to that philosophy will be made from time to time, such as at Grandview’s grand re-opening party on April 18, which saw Wolgamott bring in hundreds of pounds of crawfish for a boil.
The Grandview Tavern is open 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday. They are closed on Sundays. The Grandview Tavern is located at 7427 Grandview Avenue.
Dining and Cooking