Chef Carrie Baird is back where one of the most notable chapters of her Denver restaurant career began. The “Top Chef” finalist has returned to Bar Dough, the LoHi Italian restaurant where she was an early member of the team and earned a James Beard Award semifinalist nomination for her work in 2019. Now, Baird is once again guiding the restaurant’s creative direction, bringing a renewed focus on Colorado-grown ingredients, seasonal cooking and fresh ideas to the decade-old neighborhood favorite.
Baird never strayed far from The Culinary Creative Group, Bar Dough’s parent company. She remains culinary director of the group’s Tap & Burger restaurants and is a partner and chef at Fox and the Hen, the Highland breakfast spot she opened with Michael Fox in 2023.
Outside Denver, she’s perhaps best known for finishing in the top four on Season 15 of Bravo’s “Top Chef,” which was filmed in Colorado, and later winning an episode of Food Network’s “Beat Bobby Flay.” Her return to Bar Dough, though, is something of a homecoming—and diners will notice her influence throughout the menu.
“It’s an honor to be back in the kitchen here at Bar Dough and a creative challenge to revamp the menu with fresh Colorado flavors while staying true to our neighborhood vision,” Baird said in a statement.
DiningOut got an early taste of that direction during a recent media preview, where the table quickly filled with dishes showcasing the bounty of a Colorado summer. Rocky Ford melon is paired with creamy stracciatella, pistachios and a pepperoncini vinaigrette, while a panzanella combines heirloom tomatoes with “Carrie’s cucumbers,” torn housemade sourdough, stracciatella and sherry vinaigrette.
Some ingredients are even coming from Bar Dough itself. General manager Jaime Flanagan maintains an on-site garden, giving Baird a hyper-local source of produce that will change with the seasons.
“Italian cooking is deeply rooted in using the best-available local ingredients, and it doesn’t get more local than what we’re growing at our Bar Dough garden,” Baird said.
That seasonal approach is particularly evident in the pastas. Fettuccine gets a late-summer Colorado treatment with Olathe sweet corn, Jimmy Nardello peppers, pancetta, Parmigiano, white wine, shallot and basil. Orecchiette, the “little ears” pasta, takes a simpler route with walnut, lemon and ricotta, while bucatini combines heirloom tomato with fennel sausage, pancetta, Parmigiano and parsley for a deeply savory bite.
Baird is also reviving one of her signatures: Fancy Toast. The current iteration layers Centennial beef tartare, caper aioli, cured egg yolk and chives over sourdough made in-house daily. The bread has some pedigree of its own: It’s made with Bar Dough’s 13-year-old sourdough starter, while the toppings will evolve with the seasons.
That same starter also plays a role in Bar Dough’s pizzas. The dough undergoes a 72-hour fermentation before hitting the restaurant’s wood-fired oven. Among the current lineup is the Diavolo Bianco, a particularly loaded white pie with chili garlic oil, Fontina, mozzarella, fennel sausage, Calabrese, speck and pepperoncini. The more traditional Margherita pairs red sauce with mozzarella di bufala, olive oil and basil, while the Salsiccia brings Calabrian red sauce, mozzarella di bufala, provolone, hot Italian sausage, red onion and basil.
And soon, pizza will become a particularly compelling reason to arrive early. Bar Dough plans to roll out an $8 personal pan pizza during happy hour beginning next week, with house ranch, chili garlic oil and chili honey on hand for dipping every last bit of crust.
Baird isn’t completely rewriting Bar Dough in her image. Longtime favorites remain part of the equation, including the pollo al limone, a Joyce Farms half chicken with lemon-caper pan jus, Parmigiano, arugula and parsley.
Other dishes show how broadly the kitchen is applying its Colorado-meets-Italian approach. Seremoni black cod is served in acqua pazza with heirloom tomato, scallion and Olathe corn, while Jimmy Nardello peppers from Spin Farms are paired with roasted garlic-herb aioli and smoked ricotta salata. The meal can end with warm zeppole served over lemon curd and finished with crushed pistachio.
For a restaurant entering its second decade, Baird’s return offers Bar Dough something more interesting than a wholesale reinvention. The familiar bones are still there: handmade pasta, sourdough pizza, Italian flavors and the lively neighborhood atmosphere that has defined the restaurant for years. But Baird is using Colorado’s seasons—and, in some cases, ingredients growing just outside the kitchen—to give those familiar elements new life.
Because the menu is designed to change as new produce becomes available, what diners see now isn’t necessarily what they’ll find a few months from now.
For Baird, that may be the point. Her second act at Bar Dough isn’t about recreating the restaurant she left behind. It’s about figuring out what Bar Dough can be next.
Bar Dough, 2227 W. 32nd Ave., Denver, bardoughdenver.com
