Ep 13 · Denver · 4 Feb 2026 · 20:51
Caroline wanted the wines dry so the chili would stay. They did.
We filmed at Hey Kiddo this week, the Denver bar where Caroline Clark is the beverage director (for It Est, the group behind it). Caroline picked three wines to pair with the bar's smacked cucumber salad. Her one-line manifesto for Hey Kiddo: "Good and fun wine. Delicious, sustainable, and here for the party." Hard to argue.
Sam was feeling competitive again. Justin said the line he always says: "I want to beat Sam this time."
Wine one was light and clear — minerality forward, lemon zest, a brick-rain-on-pavement quality. Sam went Chablis 2023 from France. Justin held. Reveal: Chablis. Sam nailed it.
Wine two smelled fizzier than it looked — peachy, blossomy, exotic spice, what Caroline called a slight VA edge. Bigger than wine one, but still wine that wanted food. Justin guessed Riesling. Sam went Sauvignon Blanc. Reveal: Riesling. The conversation about how dry Rieslings can sneak past you is the kind of conversation this show keeps having on purpose.
Wine three was the pivot — a Grüner Veltliner with enough body and pepper to hold against the spicy cucumber-and-chili dressing. Both contestants took their time. Reveal: Grüner.
Grüner with the dish, by consensus. "All three of the wines, because they're dry, permit the spice to stay," Caroline said. "If you picked any off-dry or sweet wines, it would really dampen the heat. If you like that chili spice, the best pairing is going to be the Grüner. If you want it to be more neutral, my favorite is the Riesling."
Justin agreed. Sam agreed. The Grüner won the round on points. The Riesling was the runner-up everyone kept thinking about.
Hey Kiddo is a real institution in Denver. Caroline mentioned that twelve times during filming, by Sam's count.
If you're in town, drink at Hey Kiddo. Try the smacked cucumber salad. Order whichever wine sounds right.
Play along · Hey Kiddo · 4 Feb 2026
Caroline Clark picked three for smacked cucumber salad — chili, yuzu, mint, cilantro, pepitas. Watching the episode? Check wine 1 when they do, then wine 2, then wine 3. Each one has its own reveal, and you can cover it back up.
Names come off the episode captions. Where a caption garbles a producer, no name gets printed.
Guess if you want. The button works either way.
The answer
A litre bottle from a growers’ collective. Organic fruit, a few families, bottled the way the region used to do it. It is not vintage-dated, and that is the trap.
Called at the table
Guess if you want. The button works either way.
The answer
Ben’s wine out of Palisade, off a vineyard on the slopes of Sleeping Ute Mountain. Putting a Colorado Riesling in a blind flight in Denver is a mean thing to do to two people who live there.
Called at the table
Guess if you want. The button works either way.
The answer
A married-couple project on the central coast, off a cold vineyard where the valley runs east–west and funnels fog inland. That is where the acid comes from.
Called at the table
Pairing winner that night: Wine one, the Grüner. Not unanimously — somebody at that table held out for the Riesling all the way to the end.
“The scoring, how it works, is it's two points for varietal, one point for vintage, and one point for the country of the wine.” (called on camera at Hey Kiddo). How we score.
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