Minturn Country Club: Minturn, Colo.
By James Coope Contributing Editor
The Minturn Country Club … don’t let the name fool you. This isn’t a fancy golf and social club. It’s a steak restaurant for the people, located in the center of town in an historic old building, famous for their butcher case and their “cook-your-own-food” concept. Yes, you read that correctly – you cook your own food!
Minturn, Colo., is a town that has worn a lot of different hats over the course of its long history. Located in the Central Colorado Ranges, Minturn caught the attention of miners in the late 1880s and became one of the region’s transportation hubs when the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad arrived in 1887. Agriculture and ranching moved into the area in the 1920s, and Minturn became known as the “Lettuce Capital of the United States.” Camp Hale was established in 1942 where more than 15,000 soldiers trained before heading to World War II. A few returned years later to pioneer the American ski industry, in particular, at a couple of nearby mountains called Aspen and Vail.
TJ Ricci is the bartender at the Minturn Country Club. He’s also the son of the original owners and has managed the restaurant for the past 25 years. TJ’s family opened the Country Club in 1982 with a few partners, and didn’t have much to work with – basically just a grill. The cook-your-own-food concept came from Australia and, while not common in the United States, it was the perfect business model for the Minturn Country Club. Self-serving just a few cuts of meat and a few sides helped the restaurant run lean in its early years, an important survival factor for any restaurant competing just 5 miles away from nearby Vail, which is home to some of the fanciest and most famous restaurants in Colorado.
I walked into the Minturn Country Club on a Saturday evening during spring break season. I didn’t have a reservation (highly recommended), but they found a spot for me at the bar. That’s where I met TJ. He’s got a lot of responsibilities, including explaining the Minturn Country Club process to me.
It’s pretty simple – fix myself a salad at the salad bar, then head over to one of the two butcher stations and pick out my cut of Colorado beef to cook. I had a tough choice – bacon-wrapped filet mignon, Prime ribeye and Prime New York, to name a few. I chose the Prime New York cut, and the butcher gave me a quick education on the right way to cook my steak. “Eight minutes per side, on the middle of the grill, not the outside part. It’s much hotter in the middle.”
The restaurant has two lava rock grills, each about 2 feet by 6 feet. I walked over to one of them where I met a family from Frisco, Texas. They have been coming to the Minturn Country Club every year for more than 25 years during their ski vacations in Vail. On this night they had a table of 10, representing three generations, and they gave me some pointers. At one point, we had at least a dozen fellow diners around the grill, talking about their day on the slopes and how many times they had been to the Country Club. I wasn’t on my own anymore – I had met up with a whole new group of friends, and eight minutes per side went by quickly.
I headed back to my seat at the bar to enjoy my steak. It was the best steak I’ve had in a long time. I suppose I could take some credit for that since I spent the last 20 minutes cooking it, but steak doesn’t have to be that complicated when you have great cuts of meat, a hot lava rock grill and a team of Minturn Country Club veterans showing you the ropes.
I was able to spend some time talking to my new friend, TJ. He was a star athlete growing up in the Vail Valley and played wide receiver at the University of Colorado in the mid-‘90s. I noticed literally hundreds of playing cards on the ceiling, and I asked him what that was all about.
“I’ll show you” he said, and he called a family with two kids over to the bar. Not only is TJ an athlete and successful restauranter, but he’s also Minturn’s Master Magician. He played card tricks with the two kids for several minutes, had them sign their names on one of the cards, and at the end of his act, their signed card magically appeared on the ceiling.
The Minturn Country Club is one of the most unique dining events you are going to love. The food, the people and the fun and surprises keep people coming back year after year. Make your reservation, roll up your sleeves and get ready for one of the best food experiences you will ever enjoy!
