Denver grows more cosmopolitan by the year, but what the Broncos have cooking up isn’t likely to earn any attention from the fancy folk at Michelin.

On the menu these days at Casa Sean Payton: Meat. Potatoes. And a fresh-baked pile of turnovers every weekend.

Slowly but surely, Payton and the Broncos offense have learned to eat their vegetables.

Vance Joseph’s defense will stick to your ribs or, more often than not, plow right through them.

The whole refrigerator of ingredients nearly spoiled in the September heat. They’re not exactly the most stocked pantry in the NFL. And it took a long time for the kitchen to find its rhythm. But at the tail end of Thanksgiving weekend, this team put together its most satisfying meal yet: A big, bad, rugged 29-12 victory over Cleveland.

The ingredient list:

The Broncos out-gained the Browns on the ground, 169-107.

They held the Cleveland offense to 2 of 13 on third down and converted 6 of 14 themselves.

They took the ball away three more times — that’s 15 in the past four games now — and finished plus-2 in the turnover department.

They staved off a second-half push from the Browns and a rash of penalties and authored put-away series on both sides of the ball.

They bullied a team that made a habit of doing the bullying for the first 11 weeks of the season.

Yes, the Broncos have finally fine-tuned their recipe.

It ain’t pretty, but the cooks couldn’t care less. This is the way.

“There were a lot of things we did today that I was pleased with,” Payton, the Broncos’ head coach, said. “We felt like we beat a good football team.”

Payton’s not one to lavish praise, but after the Broncos put away a fifth straight win, moved to 6-5 on the season — the first time the club’s been above .500 since Week 3 last year — and put themselves squarely in playoff contention, he hit on a point that clearly came with pride.

“You could hear that game,” Payton said of the physicality. “That was something, (from the sideline). You could hear that game.”

His team made the majority of the noise from the start.

Over two pulverizing, 80-yard touchdown drives early in the game, they ran the ball 16 times in 22 plays.

On the day, they churned out 169 rushing yards on 39 attempts — a 4.3 per-carry average suppressed by late-game clock-milking — and finally found the kind of creativity and variety to keep a talented Browns defense off balance.

Javonte Williams ground out 65 on 18 attempts. Samaje Perine ripped his way to 55 on just seven attempts. Russell Wilson sprinkled in zone-read work beautifully, at one point baiting in all-world defensive end Myles Garrett and darting 19 yards around him to set up his own touchdown run.

“It was one of the areas on tape that you saw some other teams have success with,” Payton said. “Not necessarily always RPOs — they may have been runs that you’re reading the end, weak reads, zone reads. That was something we thought would be effective, and we were able to have some big plays coming out of it.”

Wilson scored with his legs for the first time this season. He finished with just 134 passing yards, the seventh time in 11 outings this fall he’s failed to top 200.

The Broncos haven’t gone for more than 339 offensive yards over their winning streak and they’ve averaged 293.6.

That’s not exactly cooking, but it works.

“We knew coming into this game that it was going to be what we call a ‘bad game.’ A more physical game,” tight end Chris Manhertz said. “That was a point of emphasis and I’m glad everybody came out and executed on that.”

Even still, when the offense came out with a by-now predictable stinker of a possession to start the third quarter, the Browns took the ball and went 79 yards over 13 plays to score a touchdown and get within 14-12. At that point, they had mounted consecutive scoring drives of 57, 67 and 79 yards.

Then Vance Joseph’s group grabbed the fire extinguisher.

Over the Browns’ final five possessions, they moved the ball 48 yards total in 22 plays — 20 coming via penalty. Two plays after rookie quarterback Dorian Thompson-Robinson was knocked out of the game by a vicious Baron Browning hit, D.J. Jones recovered a fumble on a botched trick play.

“In a day and age where you see a lot of passing, this cute screen game and stuff like that, to play a team that plays like that, it’s definitely a team you’re excited to play against,” defensive lineman Zach Allen said. “Give them credit, they’ve got some really good players, great offensive line, physical. Luckily we got the win today.”

There wasn’t really much luck about it. Cleveland’s final four drives finished like this: Punt, fumble, turnover on downs, safety. From a tight game to a convincing final margin, on the strength of the Broncos’ fully revived defense.

“Once you get one, they come in bunches, that’s kind of the way football works,” said Allen, who sacked P.J. Walker for the safety at the end. “From sacks, picks, turnovers, wins, touchdowns. The whole thing. They come in bunches. We’re on a hot streak now and we’re learning to win games. We’re finishing games. We’re in a good spot.”

Indeed, Broncos are 6-5. They’re tied with Indianapolis and next week’s opponent, Houston, for the final playoff spot in the AFC and trailing the Colts on tiebreakers. Playing beyond Week 18 is no longer a pie way out there in the sky. It’s baking in the oven. It has that undeniable scent.

But in order to enjoy that part of the menu, they’ve got to start a set of three straight on the road by winning at least one of the next two against the Texans and Los Angeles Chargers. Maybe both.

“We’ve got games to win now,” Singleton said. “It’s not just our room believing in us anymore. It’s time to go.”

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