Colorado might not have anyone to root for in this year’s Super Bowl, but there is a local player worth cheering on your big screen next month.
Chef Manny Barella is one of 15 chefs competing on Bravo’s “Top Chef” Season 21, set in Wisconsin and airing weekly on March 20. He will go head-to-head in front of celebrity chef judges like Tom Colicchio and Gail Simmons in Midwestern challenges honoring state traditions, including a Wisconsin cheese festival, a sausage-making competition or homegrown cranberries.
Barella, a 2022 James Beard semifinalist in the Emerging Chef category, previously worked at Michelin-starred Frasca Food & Wine in Boulder, as well as a sous chef for Uchi and executive chef and partner at the now-closed Bellota in Denver.
Barella is now the culinary director of Camp Pickle and Jaguar Bolera. Both are “eatertainment” concepts from Punch Bowl Social founder Robert Thompson, who also owns downtown Denver restaurant Three Saints Revival. Camp Pickle, a restaurant with indoor and outdoor pickleball courts, plans to open locations in Denver and Tulsa, Okla., in 2025. Jaguar Bolera has a similar concept to Punch Bowl Social, which Thompson is no longer affiliated with. The restaurant and gaming center, which is also slated to open in Raleigh, N.C., and Atlanta, Ga., will feature duckpin bowling, foosball and karaoke rooms. Both concepts will serve Barella’s wood-fired dishes inspired by Mexican and southern cuisines.
Until Camp Pickle opens, Barella will be hosting “Mientras, a Manny Barella Pop Up” weekly at Cantina Loca in LoHi, every Monday and Tuesday evening starting Feb. 26. He’ll be cooking a four-course dinner ($110 per person; $160 with cocktail pairings), giving Denver a taste of dishes like steak tartar with salsa macha; lobster-stuffed tetelas (triangle-shaped corn masa bites) smoked and served with Oaxaca cheese; and pastel de elote con nieve (sweet corn pie). Limited tickets for this four-course dinner experience are now available for pre-purchase online. But he’s not allowed to share any secret scoops from the “Top Chef” season yet.
Barella is joining the unofficial Colorado “Top Chef” hall of fame, which boasts Fox & The Hen co-owner Carrie Baird, who competed on Season 15 in Denver and often appears as a judge or host now; as well as Season 5 winner Hosea Rosenberg, owner of Boulder’s Santo and Blackbelly; James Beard Award-winner Jennifer Jasinski, (Rioja, Ultreia, Bistro Vendome and Stoic & Genuine) who was a finalist in “Top Chef Masters” in 2013; and Byron Gomez, the new executive chef of Michelin-starred Brutø in Denver, who competed on Season 18.
