Five Month Old Pop's Place Shutters in Ballpark

Pop's Place was born out of a collaboration between Summit County chef Stephen Kleinman (also dad to the Inventing Room's wizard Ian Kleinman) and Denver's resident sausage master Jim Pittenger of Biker Jim's. The duo took over the 2020 Lawrence Street space early in the year and opened the new restaurant in April with a quirky, eclectic menu that covered everything from pancakes to Szechuan chicken tacos and blue grits with grilled shrimp. Labor Day was the last day in business for the Ballpark spot.

"This place was a real passion project for me and Stephen, but we just couldn't get enough butts in the seats," Jim Pittenger said. "It was getting better and better every week but not enough to be where we had to be by now," he added.

The last month brought a big number of shutters to Denver. A broad range of restaurants, old, new, running the gamut of cuisines and neighborhoods said good bye to their customers. Among them are the iconic 95 year old Italian spot Patsy's, LoHi's French darling Z Cuisine, the 13 month old Cherry Creek outpost of Osaka Ramen, Old South Pearl's eleven year old Black Pearl, and twelve year old breakfast joint Mona's.