"Best of Utah" Ogden Winners

Salt Lake City Weekly has announced its “Best of Utah 2018” list, and the Ogden area racked up a quite a few impressive titles. The list, compiled by City Weeky staff and readers, is obviously very SLC-centric, but it’s nice to see our neighbors to the south venturing out of their bubble and experiencing our “Notoriously Independent” lifestyle from time to time.

SOCIAL AXE

Declaring Social Axe Throwing as the “Best Place to Lunge Your Stress Away” could have been the result of the Ogden hang-out expanding into Salt Lake City and Orem, but we know that all Social Axe locations spring from Ogden DNA and its location at 2581 Lincoln Ave.

BREWVIES OGDEN

An expansion that worked the other way was cited as the “Best News for Brews and Views.” Of course they’re talking about the SLC theater’s new Brewvies Ogden location. In their words, “Brewvies has become an institution, providing a place to watch new and classic films while enjoying a frosty adult beverage and hearty meal—even fighting for your First Amendment rights to do so.” Brewvies Ogden is located at 2293 Grant Ave.

OGDEN FIRST

The state’s “Best Public/Private Public Art” was awarded to Ogden First for their collaboration with businesses in Ogden’s downtown core “in an effort to transform vertical surfaces with murals.” The project launched in September with a 2,000-square-foot work dedicated to the life cycle of the monarch butterfly, located appropriately enough on the Monarch building at 455 25th St. And this is just the start of a project to make art part of the vitality of downtown Ogden every day.

OGDEN TWILIGHT

City Weekly tipped its hat in acknowledgement that Ogden Twilight out-shined Salt Lake’s Twilight Concert Series. Their write-up: “Ogden Twilight was packing them in with a stellar lineup that included The Flaming Lips, Cold War Kids, Thievery Corporation and Chromeo. With a storyline worthy of a samurai film, it swiftly became clear the pupil had outdone the master. Nice going, grasshopper.”

PIG & A JELLY JAR

A few Ogden-area restaurants captured unique titles such as “Best Place for #thursdaythoughts” going to Pig and a Jelly Jar…we’re going to assume they were including the 25th Street location along with its SLC counterpart. And The Burger Bar was declared as “Best Edible Safari” for their monthly exotic meat burgers including camel, ostrich, shark and alligator.

TALISMAN BREWING CO.

“Best Lucky Charm” went to Talisman Brewing Co. for their ability to “cast spells on your tongue” and for creating “a cozy space for thirsty northern folk” and raising the craft-beer game in Weber County, “creating locally made beer styles our denizens at the top of the compass could previously only get in Salt Lake City.”

PINEVIEW & OGDEN MARATHON

Ogden didn’t just rack up novelty titles. In straight-up competition, the Ogden area earned “Best Reservoir” with Pineview, and the “Best Running Event” with the Ogden Marathon. Did we mention that registration is now open?

OGDEN'S OWN DISTILLERY

Ogden’s Own Five Wives Vodka won “Best Spirit” for the entire state, and we’re confident that New World Distillery’s product offerings will begin to appear atop future lists as City Weekly readers venture into Ogden Valley for a tasting.

TONA & ALLEGED

In a show of expanding their readers’ view of the Wasatch Front, City Weekly had a couple of Ogden-specific categories with Tona edging out Slackwater and Roosters for “Best Ogden Restaurant” and Alleged earning the title of “Best Ogden Bar” just ahead of Funk n’ Dive and Brewskis.

You can read City Weekly’s full “Best of Utah” write-up here. Or pick up a copy at various restaurants and coffee houses around town.