{"id":14313,"date":"2026-11-13T14:12:09","date_gmt":"2026-11-13T14:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/14313\/"},"modified":"2026-11-13T14:12:09","modified_gmt":"2026-11-13T14:12:09","slug":"denver-chef-teams-with-wine-pro-on-new-west-highland-restaurant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/14313\/","title":{"rendered":"Denver chef teams with wine pro on new West Highland restaurant\u00a0\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\"Hannah
\n\t\t\t\t\t\tHannah Cunningham is the owner\/operator of the Bon Vin wine shop.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Provided by Jeff Fierberg<\/p>\n

What happens when a chef needing a front-of-house manager and a front-of-house manager needing a chef both search for a space to open the same type of restaurant?\u00a0<\/p>\n

The smart play, of course, is to join forces. That\u2019s exactly what chef David Arnold (Freehand Provisions, The Counter at Odell\u2019s) and wine store owner Hannah Cunningham (Bon Vin) are doing to launch their new joint project \u2014 Amateur.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think Hannah and I both separately wanted to open a very neighborhood bistro with really great food and reasonably priced, but amazing, wine,\u201d says Arnold. However\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cDavid didn\u2019t yet have an operations front-of-house person, and I still needed to go find the right chef,\u201d adds Cunningham, \u201cso it was kind of serendipitous.\u201d<\/p>\n

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THANK YOU!<\/p>\n

You’re all set.<\/p>\n

CLOSE\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

That serendipity has the pair working together now to find both a space and investors to bring their vision to the West Highland neighborhood, near where they both work today.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Cunningham is the owner\/operator of the Bon Vin wine shop, which opened about a year ago in nearby Sloan\u2019s Lake. While she also has chef experience \u2014 including a stint at Margot while it was still a pop-up at Noisette, and her micro-bakery called Mother Sauce \u2014 her focus has turned to wine pairing and education.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She\u2019s made a name for herself in the neighborhood hosting wine-tasting events and educational classes, as well as a series of food pop-up events outside the store featuring such chefs as Monarch\u2019s Justin Freeman, Geoff Cox from Cimera (formerly Hop Alley), and Ben Whelan at Farang Thai Kitchen, among others.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But a restaurant \u2014 and the ability to serve alcohol that comes with it \u2014 was always the goal, since Denver has restrictions on serving alcohol in retail settings.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe plan was to open the bottle shop, and then find a great space where I can serve on premises and do what my full passion is, which is food and wine together,\u201d says Cunningham.<\/p>\n

\"DavidDavid Arnold at one of his Freehand Provisions farm dinners. <\/p>\n

Provided by Freehand Provisions<\/p>\n

Arnold, meanwhile, was the executive sous chef at Uchi for many years, and helped open the Japanese kaiseki experience at the Odell\u2019s Bagels chef counter. Some may also recognize him from his Freehand Provisions project, which started out as a line hot sauces and other products designed to reduce waste by using excess farm produce that food banks didn\u2019t want.\u00a0Over time, that morphed into a popular series of family-style farm dinners and private dining experiences highlighting local produce, culminating in a one-month residency at this year\u2019s Up NXT cohort, held on Sundays at RiNo\u2019s BearLeek.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201c(A restaurant) has been in the back of my head for two years,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s just hard to find a good restaurant space, especially for your first concept. There\u2019s just not a lot of great restaurant spaces or second-generation spaces, and the good ones tend to get taken off the market before they even really have a chance to be advertised.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s particularly true for the neighborhood they\u2019re focused on \u2014\u00a0West Highland.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a serious gap in the market in the West Highland, Sloans Lake area,\u201d says Cunningham. \u201cWe hear it constantly. Once a week since we opened (Bon Vin), I\u2019ve had customers say how much the neighborhood needs a good chef-driven restaurant.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

They hope to find a smaller space no bigger than 50 seats in a relaxed, walkable neighborhood to serve their shared vision of bistro-like fare with seasonal, chef-driven plates designed around produce, and of course, wine.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"DavidAn example of chef Arnold\u2019s work. <\/p>\n

Provided by Jeff Fierberg<\/p>\n

\u201cDavid specifically focuses on whole-ingredient use and working with local farms,\u201d says Cunningham. \u201cI focus on independent winemakers who use sustainable practices. So there\u2019s a lot of overlap there.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a lot in common between the two, but it doesn\u2019t stop there. They initially met through the Up NXT pop-up series, which both participated in, Cunningham the first year, and Arnold the next. What\u2019s more, both left careers in software to chase their culinary dreams, hence the name Amateur.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe literal Latin translation of amateur is someone who does something for the love or passion of it,\u201d Arnold says. \u201cI thought that was a funny reframe. You don\u2019t really get into food because you plan to make a lot of money. You do it because you love the thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the effort to open the restaurant remains in the very early stages, the two are hosting a five-course preview dinner for the concept Tuesday, Dec. 8 at Odell\u2019s Bagels. Cost is $95 with an optional wine pairing for an additional $45.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hannah Cunningham is the owner\/operator of the Bon Vin wine shop. Provided by Jeff Fierberg What happens when a chef needing a front-of-house manager and a front-of-house manager needing a chef both search for a space to open the same type of restaurant?\u00a0 The smart play, of course, is to join forces. That\u2019s exactly what<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14314,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[5,1472,3960,13033],"class_list":["post-14313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-chefs","tag-chef","tag-exclusive","tag-openings-closings","tag-recommended"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/vive.im\/@dnc\/117609545307893773","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/chefs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}