Avalanche Pub

I TRIED
- Side Salad (7/10)
- 7one5 Burger (6/10)
- Onion Rings (8/10)

Because this is a Marriott level hotel (i.e. not a Courtyard or Residence Inn) I have to pay for parking, and by the time I got in, valeted the car, put my stuff in my room, I realized that I'd have to get the valet to bring the car back, pay him a tip, and then do it all over again if I wanted to go out. Luckily, this hotel has a Bar & Grill type of place inside. Plus Monday Night Football was on, so a burger and a beer was fine with me!

This is a simple pub inside of the Vail Marriott Resort. They've got about 2 or 3 TVs around the place, and another 2 behind the bar. The place is pretty spacious, they could handle a decent sized lunch crowd, and the bar has seating for about 10-12 people. They've got a couple local brews on tap, and about a handful of other common beers.

SIDE SALAD
Why do I mention a side salad? Because this was the most sophisticated side salad I've ever seen. No, it's not like it's a cobb salad or an Asian chicken salad, but it's just that they had good fresh ingredients and it wasn't like it just came out of a bag! They had like a leafy spring mix going, but again, fresh and not from a bag, some shredded carrots, cherry tomatoes, blue cheese crumbles, and even some kalamata olives! That and my blue cheese dressing on the side, and it was a very good salad!

7ONE5 BURGER
I read this thing on the menu several times before I figured out it's the "Seven One Five Burger." I kept reading it as "Zone 5" for some reason. Anyway, it's a simple bacon cheddar burger on a Brioche (pronounced BREE-o-sh). Hey you learned something!

The beef was pretty good, had a nice grill taste to it, and was tender and meaty. The bacon, I didn't even realize was there. The cheddar made a quick cameo here 'n' there, but barely noticeable. It also came with this "bourbon ketchup," which thankfully didn't taste like bourbon (and if it did, I made sure I had a dozen other flavors to drown it out). The ketchup simply added the little extra seasoning that the burger needed, since the bacon and cheddar were pretty much no shows. But the thing I loved most about this burger was the Brioche. It's a light and airy/puffy bun, which means that it doesn't suck up flavors as much as a dense bun would, like a typical hamburger bun you buy at the store. Better, because it's so light, it disappears with hardly a trace, so you get to focus more on the meat. Good stuff, this Brioche thing might be something I want to pursue on other burgers (Kuma's Corner - I'm calling your name)!

ONION RINGS
Again, why the mention of a side dish? Because either I was super hungry, or these were very good onion rings. They're sorta thin looking, not like those ginormous ones you get at Red Robin. They're practically the size of and shape of White Castle onion rings; however, these are very crunchy! Yes, crunchy, not like a beer batter's weak crisp, but a very decent crunch you'd expect from a, yes, Red Robin onion ring. Dipped in that "bourbon ketchup" it was pretty darn good!

VANILLA SNOW
I dunno, I can't come up with a creative conclusion title. This was the title of one of the spoofs of that Chocolate Rain song by Tay Zonday. Snow...Avalanche, get it? Whatever. ANYWAYS...it's a solid place, and if I wasn't the curious type, I could almost see myself having all my dinners here for the week. Check out the menu, it's not just burgers and beer (actually, burgers are a minority). They've got steaks, ribs, pasta, as well as your bar food types. But now that my stuff is all loaded in my hotel room, I'll be sure to not valet so early and start hittin' the other eateries.