Executive Chef
Rioja

From the edge of Amish country to Houston, Austin, New York City and Portland, Oregon and now Denver, Ben Love’s culinary journey has involved kitchens as varied as country clubs, sushi palaces, modern steakhouses, hotel Italian and an art museum. Along the way Love had worked in 3, 2 and 1 Michelin star restaurants and cooked alongside untold James Beard nominees and winners such as Daniel Boulud and the late David Bouley.

As opening Chef de Cuisine of The Ponti in the extensive renovation of the Denver Art Museum, Love was introduced to Rioja co-owner Jennifer Jasinski who was brought in as consulting chef on the project. Love moved on to Kelly Whitaker’s Wolf’s Tailor in North Denver as executive sous chef but Jasinski kept in touch and they connected when the top job at Rioja opened up.

Motivated to cook in restaurants, Love always appreciated being first hired by a chef who served three tours in Vietnam after he exaggerated his experience on his application. A graduate of The Art Institute of Houston School for Culinary Arts, Love made the move to Denver to open Departure at The Halcyon Hotel with Gregory Gourdet.

His culinary inspirations revolve around “real foods that grandmothers learned from grandmothers” and include Eastern European dishes, laminated doughs, and Wa Shoku, Chinese-style meat smoking (at least for this week). He’s a fan of the famed Blue Ribbon Sushi on Sullivan Street in New York City and the surrounding neighborhood where he lived during 9/11.

Love lives in an 1890 apartment building in Denver’s Capitol Hill neighborhood.