Belly AND Butter Up to the Bar

I’m not much of a drinker. In fact, I’m a complete lightweight. One drink and I’m gone. Still, I have always considered bars like New York’s 21 Club the height of elegance and sophistication. Now, happily, in my middle-age, I’ve found a bar scene that fits me to a “T” — a butter bar!

You heard me right. A butter bar!

Travel to Lyons, Colorado and you’ll find Bella La Crema, the world’s first butter bar. Belly up to the bar, grab a baguette, and order from a choice of more than 20 compound butters, savory and sweet, all made of organic cream from grass-fed cows.

Butter Bar Delights

On the savory side, you’ll find “Ode to Neruda” made with paprika, garlic, onions, and lime and “French Countryside” with rosemary, garlic, thyme, and herbs de Provence.

For those of us with a sweet tooth, there’s “Holliday’s Bourbon” with bourbon, orange juice, bacon, molasses, maple, cloves, cinnamon, and vanilla and “Monet’s Garden” with rose, vanilla, lavender, and nutmeg.

Be still my chubby hips and thighs!

Butter Bar and More

If a baguette-and-butter binge doesn’t appeal to you, Bella La Crema Bar and Bistro’s owner, Shauna Lee Strecker, also serves breakfast, lunch or dinner. But don’t expect the usual bar fare of jalapeño poppers and chicken wings. Strecker’s menu features more elevated delights like rosemary-sage grilled cheese, tomato bisque, and a cassoulet of the day.

Calories aside, this definitely sounds like my kind of bar.

Butter is Better

For decades I stuck to olive oil and avoided butter because of worries about my figure and my health, but Bella La Crema’s owner is on a mission to remind us all how terrific good butter tastes and also, how good it is for us.

According to Strecker, quality butter “complete with omega-3 fatty acids, healthy bacteria, Conjugated Linoleic Acid, fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, K, E) and antioxidants. (are) … fight things like inflammation, gut problems, heart disease, insulin issues, and more.”

Butter Bar Delights

Healthy living AND at a bar no less! Why I’m ready to pack my bags and head to Colorado.

Really! It’s a dream come true! Just ask Handsome Hubby. I truly am the original cheap date. One drink and I’m down for the count. All my life I’ve followed a sad set drinking pattern: three sips of a Margarita or a glass of wine, and I giggle, loudly, non-stop, for five minutes; next, I cry for two-three minutes over nothing in particular; finally, I nod off. I am nobody’s idea of a good-time party girl!

And while I can’t really speak to the health benefits of butter, this I know. For unsophisticated me who still yearns to sit in a bar looking chic, martini glass in hand, Bella La Crema may be the closest I get.

Just give me a stick of butter, and man, oh, man, I’m ready to belly up to the bar with the big boys ALL NIGHT LONG!