When the Michelin Guide first launched in Colorado in 2023, its authors specified it only covered restaurants in a few select cities: Denver, Boulder, Aspen, Vail, Beaver Creek and Snowmass Village.
The reason had to do with which municipalities chose to give money to the state in order to promote the restaurants that are mentioned in the guide. But the exclusion of the rest of the state angered some restaurant owners like Caroline Glover, who owns Annette and Traveling Mercies in Aurora. “I don’t think it’s a great representation of the state since Aurora is one of the most diverse food communities we have, and it’s a big loss for the city and restaurateurs here,” she told The Denver Post at the time.
Three years later, the French tire company is expanding its efforts, and the travel guide’s infamously anonymous dining inspectors will now cover all of the state, the guide’s director said Wednesday.
“Last year, we awarded the first two Michelin-starred restaurant in Colorado, and we look forward to continuing to discover and promote dining establishments across the state, going beyond the main urban areas,” Gwendal Poullennec, International Director of the Michelin Guide, said in a statement.
Governor Jared Polis and the heads of state economic development and tourism offices celebrated the move to judge and potentially award restaurants in other bigger Colorado cities, suburbs and lesser-known pockets of Colorado.
“This is great for our culinary scene and our small businesses,” Polis said in a statement. The “Michelin Guide’s expansion to cover the entire state will shine a spotlight on more communities and strengthen the entire restaurant industry.”
Michelin’s growth in Colorado is mirrored elsewhere. Inspectors in Florida, who first focused on Miami, Orlando and Tampa, will also be covering the entire state in 2026, according to the company. It will also launch its first guide to the southwest United States, encompassing Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah.
The chief executive officer of Visit Denver, the nonprofit trade association that promotes the Michelin Guide in Denver, said he welcomed the eligibility of new cities in the state.
“Like any good dinner party, the more, the merrier,” Visit Denver CEO Richard Scharf said in a statement. “We look forward to celebrating with the rest of the state later this year.”
In September, the state Guide gave its first two-star rating to The Wolf’s Tailor, a fine-dining restaurant in Denver. Other Colorado restaurants with Michelin stars include Bruto, Frasca Food & Wine, Kizaki, Alma Fonda Fina and Bosque. More than 40 others have been recommended by the guide.