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Justin Cucci is the Executive Chef and owner of Denver, Colorado’s acclaimed Edible Beats restaurant collective. With over 25 years at the helm of restaurants, He is known for creating craveable, vegetable-forward cuisine, innovative sustainability practices, and deeply creative, avant-garde spaces. He is the editor and publisher of The Edible Beat, an annually-produced zine.

A native New Yorker, Cucci’s family owned and ran the iconic Waverly Inn in New York City, where he grew up in the dining room. Cucci began his education in the hospitality industry at 12, working both front and back of the house positions until he was 27. Following the Waverly Inn, Cucci took on apprenticeships at Denver restaurants The Beehive and Aix, in addition to opening two restaurants in Key West, Florida. In 2008, he opened his first Denver restaurant—Root Down—a concept that put a neighborhood on the map and quickly gained a loyal following with praise from local and national food critics for its inspired, seasonal cuisine.

Following Root Down, Cucci went on to open five more restaurants within an ambitious five-year time period, including Linger, Root Down, Root Down DIA (in Denver International Airport’s C-Terminal), Ophelia’s Electric Soapbox, Vital Root, and El Five.

Today, with six restaurants strong, Cucci has received local and national recognition across all concepts in publications including The Denver Post, 5280 Magazine, Westword, 303 Magazine, The New York Times, Bon Appetit (Root Down was named one of the 50 Best new Restaurants in 2009), Travel + Leisure, The Cooking Channel(Unique Eats), The Travel Channel(Food Paradise), USA Today, Reader’s Digest and Hospitality Design.

He’s married to Denielle Cucci and has two daughters.

Approach to cuisine

With Edible Beats, Cucci focuses on global flavors and craveable, healthful dishes: Cucci and his team work with more than 55 local farmers and growers and advocate the reduced consumption of animal- based protein and the increase of plant-based ingredients to offset the environmental impact of carnivorous lifestyles. One example of this is working with the Rocky Mountain Micro Ranch to incorporate insects into menus in a way that’s delicious, approachable, and non-polarizing.

Spaces

Each Edible Beats restaurant thrives on inspired, upcycled design from their original buildings’ past lives: be it an adult video library turned boudoir-style gastrobrothel, a 1950s gas station turned mid-century neighborhood staple, or a mortuary turned eclectic LoHi gem. Cucci has two storage spaces of found objects for future use; he's part notorious hoarder, part discerning collector. Items include: 270 vintage meter sticks; 410 golf club handles, a crate of transistor radios; a pallet of cafeteria lunch trays; 1960's Italian wallpaper bought in bulk on Ebay; vintage color tiles; old, flashing gasoline signs; five rows of movie theatre seating; and retro velvet paintings. Cucci’s approach is to buy things he loves, then find the right place for them in his concepts.

Sustainability Practices

Cucci’s restaurants are entirely wind-powered, and Edible Beats has a 6,000-square-foot garden in the middle of the city to supply 20 percent of its restaurants’ veggies. Other sustainability practices include: sourcing more than 50 percent of food within the state; vegetable “scrap” reuse, giving new life in sauces, pestos, vinaigrettes, or garnishes; recycling fryer oil for sustainable biofuel projects; and partnership in Clean Energy business and EPA Green Power Partner, helping to reduce America's dependence on dirty fossil fuels.