SPECIAL SKI ISSUE: Western Ski Resorts : Food With an Altitude : Resort restaurants give skiers new reason to head for the hills

If you’re looking for a first-rate meal during your ski holiday this winter, start by looking up--up to the mountaintops of some of the West’s favorite ski resorts. High-altitude restaurants have raised the standards of ski-cuisine and competition is fierce to wow guests with stand-out meals in spiffy log-and-glass lodges.

Take Two Elk, for example, one of Vail, Colorado’s, 13 on-mountain eateries. Like 99% of America’s ski restaurants, it’s a cafeteria serving stews, chilies and pizzas, where seats are at a premium and the noise level is high.

But there’s a difference--the food court is enormous, with lots of granite in the sprawling seating area, the chairs and tables are hand-fashioned pine, and the views are stellar. The chili is buffalo, not beef. Pizza might be topped with native venison and goat cheese. Even the sausage sandwich takes a twist with smoked elk and roasted red peppers.

In other words, lunch at Two Elk is likely to be as memorable as the skiing.

Unobtrusive sit-down restaurants have been in place for over a decade on such slopes as Vail, Snowmass and Steamboat Springs in Colorado and Squaw Valley in California, but not until recently did the resorts begin building massive, multimillion-dollar mountain-top log lodges.

The move toward classy dining on the slopes is part of the ever-widening ski experience. “Skiers no longer judge their day by how many runs they made,” says Gwyn Gordon, owner of Gwyn’s High Alpine in Snowmass. “With high-speed lifts, they can have l0 runs in before noon, so now the focus is on the total experience, which includes a delicious, relaxing lunch.”

The aging of the baby boomers, and consequently of the ski market, is another factor in the recent emphasis on stylish dining. It’s a trend that’s open to everyone. Except for Two Elk in Vail; Bonnie’s on Aspen Mountain, Colorado, and Gwyn’s, the mountain restaurants mentioned below are accessible to non-skiers either during the day or by sleigh in the evening.

The food is upscale, but the dress is sportif . Loosened ski boots are the footwear of choice, except at Alpenglow Stube in Keystone, Colo., where guests can exchange clunky boots for warm slippers. At night, it’s apres-ski wear, which takes in everything from jeans and turtlenecks to long suede skirts and beaded sweaters.

The American pioneer in ski cuisine was Deer Valley, Utah. “From day one, fifteen years ago, we’ve never thought of ourselves as running a ski area,” explains food and beverage director Julie Wilson. “Instead, we operate as if we were a hotel and restaurant.”

The restaurants at Deer Valley’s mid-mountain Silver Lake Lodge have built a reputation that rests on a wide array of choices: marinated New York stripsteak, roast leg of lamb, or roast turkey breast; burgers from beef, turkey, or vegetables; and a salad bar with homemade breads, eight salad medleys, fresh artichokes with saffron aioli, relishes and homemade dressings such as sherry pecan vinaigrette.

Deer Valley’s turkey chile and plate-sized cookies are so popular they are sold as take-home mixes.

Alexander’s, in Squaw Valley, has been offering sit-down service for the past 14 years. Since the completion in 1994 of the High Camp Bath and Tennis Club, Alexander’s is just one component of a top-of-the-tram complex that includes a pool with 25-meter lap lanes, an Olympic-sized ice rink, bungee jumping, a hot tub larger than most hotel rooms, and surface-heated tennis courts.

“We bring everything up by cable car,” says Jean Hagan, owner of Alexander’s and the two other High Camp restaurants. Under the supervision of executive chef Jerome Bruawski, breads and desserts are baked on-site and beef is ground daily for Alexander’s burgers. The gourmet salad bar at the Poolside Cafe runs $11.95, including homemade soup or chile.

Across Lake Tahoe at Heavenly, gourmet picnicking that began experimentally last season is now a full-fledged option. Skiers can pick their own favorite site or leave the choice up to Mountain Caterers, who are likely to lead the lunch group to secret spots off the main trails. This fully-catered picnic ($25 a person) comes with the works, including wine, tablecloths and drop-dead views of Lake Tahoe.

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Colorado is the leader in offering both dramatic architecture and great food, both at dizzying heights. Within the last four years, Keystone opened Alpenglow Stube on the North Peak summit, Vail built Two Elk atop China Bowl and Winter Park opened the Lodge at Sunspot. Other favorite dining spots were already in place, including Ragnar’s and Hazie’s in Steamboat Springs, Beano’s in Beaver Creek, Gwyn’s in Snowmass, and Bonnie’s in Aspen.

For gourmet alpine in warm-pine ambience, catch a couple of gondola rides to the Alpenglow Stube. Clinging to the cliffs at 11,444 feet above sea level, it’s the king of haute cuisine. At lunchtime, guests ski in for a grandiose buffet ($13.50) or a la carte fare. At night, they bundle under blankets to ride not one, but two enclosed gondolas to the warmth of the 84-seat Stube.

It’s a showcase of Western elegance, with pewter candlesticks, fresh flowers, massive Douglas fir beams, elkhorn chandeliers and views over the rippling peaks of the Continental Divide. Except that the guests wear bulky ski outfits, it would be hard to distinguish Alpenglow Stube from a stylish, Western-themed city restaurant.

As for cooking at America’s highest mountaintop gourmet restaurant, executive chef Christopher Rybak calls it the greatest challenge of his life. The Stube is part of Keystone’s $6-million Outpost, where there’s also a cafeteria that serves up to 2,000 lunches a day.

All the ingredients for both restaurants have to be brought up the mountain while outside temperatures often plummet far below zero. The second challenge has been adjusting the recipes, since water boils at only 172 degrees and, because of the lower air pressure, breads and cakes react far differently than at sea level.

“We bake all our breads and desserts,” he says. “I experimented with brioche for six months to get the recipe right.”

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Aspen skiers have a surfeit of choices for lunch. The town’s new favorite, Ajax Tavern, is steps from the Silver Queen gondola. It’s hard to pass on Chef Nick Morfogen’s standout bistro fare, but the deck at mid-mountain Bonnie’s remains the see-and-be-seen locale.

“When the king and queen of Spain were here skiing with the king and queen of Greece, they lunched at Bonnie’s two out of three days,” says co-owner Peter Greene. With parkas loosened and sunglasses in place, diners sometimes work on their tans for an hour or so after their meal tray has been cleared.

At Bonnie’s, everything is homemade, including the pizza dough and the filo pastry for the strudel. Says Denver skier Sheri Johnson, “I’m always tempted by the vegetarian pizza, but keep going back to their Caesar salad and white bean chili. At home, a $9 lunch like this would be on the high side, but in Aspen it seems like a bargain.”

Down the road 12 miles at Gwyn’s in Snowmass, the flowers on the tables are flown in from Maui, as is most of the fish. Specialties include daily soups, pastas and Norwegian salmon with blackberry herb creme. Gwyn’s opens at 9 a.m. for breakfast (about $10), with omelets, a daily fresh-fruit pancake and rainbow trout with poached eggs.

Family-oriented, cost-conscious Winter Park, Colo., seemed an unlikely candidate for a sit-down restaurant, but now has the snazzy, two-mile-high Lodge at Sunspot.

Lunch specialties are rotisserie chicken with three sauces ($9), pasta and roasted corn soup; at dinner, buffalo chili and buffalo prime rib are favorites.

For years, Steamboat Springs skiers have enjoyed two mountain-side restaurants: Hazie’s, at the top of the gondola, and Ragnar’s, reached at lunch by skiing and in evenings by a sleigh ride from the gondola.

Ragnar’s has a Scandinavian flair, with salmon cured on-site, fiskesuppe (chowder with fresh fish and vegetables) and grilled venison with juniper berries.

Hazie’s has views of the wide Yampa Valley, and dishes up Cajun catfish filets with a black bean salsa and remoulade sauce, char-broiled salmon on mixed greens, and lemon-pepper linguine. At the four-course dinner, there’s an equally varied menu, but the hands-down favorite is Chateaubriand Bernaise. “People want to eat healthy, but when they ski, they want red meat,” says executive chef Morten Hoj.

Finally, in Beaver Creek, Beano’s--a refined log cabin with a towering river-rock fireplace--is open to the public only in the evening, when a sleigh hauls guests up for dining and live entertainment.

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GUIDEBOOK: Downhill Dining

If you go: Two Elk, Vail, Colo. Open daily for lunch; no reservations. Price range: $7-$15; tel. (970) 476-9090.

Silver Lake Lodge, Deer Valley, Utah. Several restaurants, cafes; open daily for lunch and dinner; reservations for dinner. Price range: from snacks to $36-entrees at the upscale Mariposa; tel. (801) 649-1000.

Alexander’s, Squaw Valley, Calif. Open daily 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.; evening guests holding a day or night ski ticket ride the tram free; otherwise the ride is $5; reservations, dinner only. Entrees start at $11; tel. (916) 583-1742.

Picnics with Mountain Caterers, Heavenly, Calif. $25 per person; reservations; tel. (702) 586-7000, Ext. 6228.

Alpenglow Stube, Keystone, Colo. Open daily; lunch reservations taken only for 11 a.m.-12:30 p.m.; dinner reservations required. Price range: prix-fixe dinner, $72; seven-course degustation, $85. Tel. (800) 222-0188, Ext. 4.

Ajax Tavern, Aspen, Colo. Open daily; reservations suggested for lunch and dinner. Price range: $10-$17 lunch, $13-$20 dinner; tel. (970) 920-9333.

Bonnie’s, mid-mountain in Aspen, Colo. Open for lunch daily; no reservations. Price range: $3-$10; tel. (970) 925-5841.

Gwyn’s, mid-mountain in Snowmass, Colo. Open for breakfast and lunch daily; breakfast reservations taken for 9 a.m. seating, lunch reservations taken for 11:30 a.m. seating. Dinner prices: $15-$20; tel. (970) 923-5188.

The Lodge at Sunspot, Winter Park, Colo. Open for lunch daily; dinner, Thursday-Saturday; dinner reservations. Dinner prices: $39-$59; tel. (970) 726-1446.

Hazie’s and Ragnar’s at Steamboat Springs, Colo. Both open for lunch daily; Ragnar’s dinner, Thursday-Saturday, prix fixe, $61; Hazie’s dinner, Tuesday-Saturday, prix fixe, $49; reservations suggested for lunch; required for dinner; tel. (970) 879-6111, Ext. 464.

Beano’s in Beaver Creek, Colo. Open for dinner only, $75 ($46 for kids under 12); reservations, includes sleigh ride. Tel. (970) 949-9090.

--S.K.