Editor’s note: This is part of The Know’s series, Staff Favorites. Each week, we offer our opinions on the best that Colorado has to offer for dining, shopping, entertainment, outdoor activities and more. (We’ll also let you in on some hidden gems).
I have favorite ski areas, backcountry ski tours, hikes and bike rides, and it’s always hard for me to decide which ones I like best. But when it comes to ski town restaurants, one stands far above the others: Pepi’s Restaurant and Bar in Vail.
Located only 500 feet from Gondola One in the Vail Village base area, Pepi’s has been serving authentic Austrian cuisine since the early days of Vail in 1964. It was founded by Pepi Gramshammer, an Austrian ski racing star of the 1950s, along with his wife Sheika. Together they built Pepi’s and an adjoining hotel called Gasthof Gramshammer into one of Vail’s most iconic destinations. Pepi died in 2019 at 87, but Sheika is still around.
German food is part of my heritage, so for me, no trip to Vail is complete without lunch or dinner at Pepi’s. The food is fantastic, and the ambiance vividly reminds me of ski trips to Kitzbuehel and St. Anton in Austria, Grindelwald and Lenzerheide in Switzerland.
Pepi was one of Vail’s most colorful and beloved characters for more than 50 years. The bar has a glass display case crammed with trophies and medals he won while racing on Austrian teams that included the legendary Toni Sailer and Anderl Molterer. During world championships held at Vail/Beaver Creek in 1989, 1999 and 2015, Gasthof Gramshammer was officially designated “Austria House” by the Austrian ski federation, so you could count on Arnold Schwarzenegger and Franz Klammer paying a visit. Gramshammer was instrumental in Vail’s bidding for those events with the International Ski Federation, which boosted Vail’s stature in international skiing circles.
I got to spend a wonderful day skiing with Pepi in St. Anton, considered the birthplace of alpine skiing, when we both were there for the 2001 world championships. Everywhere we went on that mountain, people called out his name and shouted heartfelt greetings.
“It’s beautiful skiing, but you know what? I’m glad I’m in Vail,” Pepi said that day. “In Vail, you can ski every day. And we have the best snow. The grooming and everything else is fantastic. You can’t beat it.”
Among the many historic photos on the walls at Pepi’s is one of him and Sheika at the White House with former President Gerald Ford, for whom Vail was a favorite vacation destination. There’s another of Pepi skiing with Jean-Claude Killy, the French star of the 1968 Olympics whose fame transcended skiing.
The menu at Pepi’s includes wiener schnitzel, jaeger schnitzel and Hungarian veal goulash. There are three kinds of bratwurst — veal, pork and buffalo — and imported German beers are served. When I was there two weeks ago for a birthday lunch, I had the veal bratwurst with mashed potatoes, gravy, sauerkraut and red cabbage. I was reminded once again that nobody west of Mader’s German restaurant in downtown Milwaukee makes sauerkraut and red cabbage as heavenly as Pepi’s.
Pepi’s Bar is a great place for après-ski fun. One wall is covered with dozens of photos of celebrities who have partied there, including star athletes and Hollywood personalities. The bar menu in the afternoon includes dried meat, cheese and rye bread, Goulash or soup of the day with fresh rolls and butter, smoked salmon, and large, warm German pretzels with mustard and warm cheese sauce for dipping. I highly recommend the pretzels even if you just stop and grab one at the end of your ski day for the walk from the gondola to the parking structure that goes right by Pepi’s.
Some folks like to ridicule Vail Village for its supposedly pretentious ersatz alpine architecture. For me, having been to a few ski towns in the Alps, the food and the setting at Pepi’s offers a taste of Europe that I adore.
