Fort Collins restaurants: 4 spots open in December, 8 will have closed by month's end

While 2023 is winding down, the Fort Collins food and drink scene ramped up in recent weeks, with four openings, eight closures and three forthcoming additions announced in December.

The month was marked by a beloved farmers market fixture going brick and mortar, the opening of a French deli and the addition of a cookie shop in south Fort Collins and an ice cream spot in Windsor.

Plenty of establishments said their goodbyes as the year closed out, too — including two breweries, three restaurants, one beer bar, one cheese shop and one seasonal pop-up bar.

Here are all the comings and goings on the Fort Collins and Windsor food scenes this December.

What opened

Sunny Sky Pies put down roots in Fort Collins with the Dec. 13 opening of its first physical pie shop at 446 S. Link Lane. The pie business, which owner and baker Erin Margenau started out of her Fort Collins home in 2021, has been a fixture at local farmers markets since the following summer. Earlier this year, Margenau and her husband, Mike, debuted Sunny Sky Pies' mobile pie shop out of a refurbished produce and bakery delivery van. Sunny Sky Pies has a small dining area in its Link Lane space where customers can pick up orders, order whole or by-the-slice pies and pick from quiche, cinnamon rolls, coffee drinks and more.

La Boutique, 216 Pine St., said bonjour to Fort Collins Dec. 17. The family-owned French deli and market took over the former Welsh Rabbit Cheese Bistro, which moved from its longtime home on Pine Street to nearby Walnut Street earlier this year. La Boutique offers a little slice of home for owner and French expats Omar-Pierre and Melanie Soubra, who also co-own Boulder's European provision and cheese store Le Frigo. La Boutique specifically focuses on French items, from French meats, sausages and pates to French baguettes, cookies and candies. It is open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday.

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Baskin-Robbins is back in Windsor. Local franchisee Andrea Jensen opened a new Baskin-Robbins ice cream shop at 455 E. Main St. Unit 1 on Dec. 11. Windsor formerly had a small Baskin-Robbins shop connected to a Dunkin' doughnut shop at 1530 Main St. The doughnut and ice cream shop closed in early 2020 after five years in operation.

Dirty Dough Cookies softly opened Dec. 20, bringing its signature stuffed cookies to Fort Collins' Harmony Commons, according to a spokesperson for the cookie chain. The new shop, 3581 E. Harmony Road, is the latest location for the Arizona-born cookie company, which now has locations in more than 20 states, according to the Dirty Dough website.

What closed (or is closing)

Black Bottle Brewery, 1611 S. College Ave., closed Dec. 2 after 11 years in Fort Collins. The brewery's closure comes after years of recent financial hardship, including a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing in 2020. Loveland's Verboten Brewing plans to purchase Black Bottle's Midtown building and turn it into the brewery's second location, Verboten co-owner Angie Grenz told the Coloradoan earlier this year. While the building's sale had not been finalized as of Dec. 11, Verboten hopes to open the new location in early 2024, Grenz added.

Fieldhouse at the Fort, 221 E. Mountain Ave., closed Dec. 1, according to owner Andrew Campbell. The sports bar and eatery was the first restaurant tenant to announce its arrival the East Mountain Avenue building — a mixed-use office, condo and retail building anchored by Elevations Credit Union — last fall. It opened in January, bringing classic pub food, burgers and Rhode Island-style pizzas. The restaurant ultimately closed due to oversaturation, financial challenges, rising interest rates and increased raw material costs, Campbell told the Coloradoan.

Blind Pig Pub, 214 Linden St., will shut down at the end of the year, citing a recent increase in its rent, manager Jackson Stuber confirmed to the Coloradoan earlier this month. The building's owner, Steve Ackerman, confirmed that Blind Pig Pub's rent was set to increase based off of a professional survey conducted on the building two years ago. The increase comes after Ackerman said he agreed to keep renting the space to the bar below market rates in the years since the survey. "After two years, they have decided to close. I'm sorry to see them go," Ackerman said. "... They've been a great tenant and fixture on Linden Street for over 10 years."

RamaMama closed its doors at 120 W. Laurel St. on Dec. 23, according to owner John Lawyer. "We have a lot of businesses and my wife and I are really tired," Lawyer told the Coloradoan, explaining that he and his wife, SJ Lawyer, also run the Corndoggies food truck, Lickskillet catering and — until recently — the Lil Smoke food truck, which they also recently closed.

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Avuncular Bob's Beerhouse, 830 S. College Ave., will be closing its doors at the end of the month. The neighborhood beer bar will shutter over rent, labor and increasing food costs, as well as the recent loss of co-owner K Campbell, co-owner Daniel Wilkerson told the Coloradoan earlier this month. Avuncular Bob's Beerhouse opened in Fort Collins in 2018. A year later, they purchased Wellington fixture the T-Bar Inn, renaming it Avuncular Bob's T-Bar Inn. The Wellington location will remain open and unchanged, according to Wilkerson.

The Fox and the Crow, 2601 S. Lemay Ave., will shutter Dec. 30, marking the end of its near decade in Fort Collins. The cost of labor, coupled with the amount of staff the Scotch Pines Village shop needs to operate, made the business financially unfeasible, owner Kerry Krekich told the Coloradoan in November.

Crooked Stave Artisan Beer Project will shutter its Fort Collins taproom, 216 N. College Ave., Dec. 30, according to an announcement on its Facebook page. Chad Yakobson started Crooked Stave in Fort Collins in 2010 after graduating from Colorado State University and working at Odell Brewing, according to previous Coloradoan reporting. In 2012, the brewery relocated to Denver and later returned to Fort Collins to open a taproom in Old Town's The Exchange, 216 N. College Ave., in 2019. "The choice to close at this time stems from the need to reimagine and reassess the space to better align with the evolving consumer landscape," the brewery's announcement read, noting that Crooked Stave owners Yetta Vorobik and Yakobson hope to either reimagine the space in the coming months or find a new business to take it over.

Miracle is getting ready to say goodbye to Fort Collins. The pop-up Christmas-themed bar, which opened Nov. 20, plans to shut down after the holidays Dec. 31.

What's coming

DGT is on the move. The taco shop — a decade-old fixture under Alley Cat Café at the corner of Fort Collins' Dalzell and Wattles alleys — plans to take its operations around the corner to 120 W. Laurel St. The new space, formerly occupied by RamaMama, will give the taco shop more indoor and outdoor seating and room for a full bar, according to owner Mike Falco. DGT shuttered its existing location Dec. 22, with plans to reopen on Laurel Street around Feb. 1.

Arboretum Coffee plans to open at 221 W. Prospect Road on Jan. 22, bringing its coffee and, more importantly, an apprenticeship program for Fort Collins' refugee and immigrant youth to the area. The nonprofit coffee shop plans to offer a 12-month program for refugees and immigrants ages 18 to 24 where they will learn barista and customer service skills through on-the-job training and receive one-on-one mentoring and classes in financial literacy and career preparation, according to Arboretum Coffee Executive Director Hannah Norris. Norris, who previously worked as a caseworker at the Matthews House in Fort Collins, said she wanted to start Arboretum Coffee after seeing an influx in refugees and immigrants coming to Fort Collins in recent years. "A lot of refugees and immigrants have to start in unsafe and undignified working environments when they get to the U.S. in order to pay the bills," Norris said. To combat this and build community for these groups, Arboretum Coffee said she hopes to open Arboretum Coffee with two cohorts of five participants in early and mid-2024. To learn more or volunteer for Arboretum Coffee, visit arboretumcoffee.org.

The Cakery is plotting its next moves. The Wellington cupcake bakery, which started as a cupcake truck in May 2017 and opened a brick-and-mortar shop in downtown Wellington a few months later, closed Dec. 23 with plans to reopen in Fort Collins in mid-January. After six years in Wellington, The Cakery's building at 3706 Cleveland Ave. went on the market earlier this year, prompting owner Jackie Isvanca to look at potential new homes for her shop. She ultimately setting on 2842 Council Tree Ave., Unit 141, which was previously home to Poeme Macarons. "It's sad to leave our small-town community, but we are excited," Isvanca said. "The bakery is a passion of ours, and I think we owe it to ourselves to see where it can go."

This article originally appeared on Fort Collins Coloradoan: Fort Collins restaurant news: Openings, closings and more in December