Admit it, most of us are afraid of the Broadmoor. We feel intimidated. Maybe we will use the wrong fork or be so gauche as to slip an adjective instead of an adverb into amusing repartee with the sommelier.

But we are also just plain scared of being forced into indentured servitude when an astronomical bill arrives at the end of the meal.

And so most of us stay away, never enjoying one of the true gems of our region.

Now we have no excuse, because the Broadmoor’s West Lobby Bar, which was reinvented in 2010, is easygoing and affordable while still offering the deluxe, five-star details you’d expect from the hotel. And summer, when the bar patio overlooking the lake is lush and inviting, is the best time to go.

Comfortable couches and chairs by the bar spill out onto a spacious terrace with an open fireplace and lawns (patrolled by freeloading Canada geese) wandering down to the water’s edge.  

It is nothing short of enchanting.

The bar serves only bar snacks, but these bar snacks are more than just bar snacks. We’re not talking rings and wings. We’re talking pâté and confit and gastrique. Call them tapas or small plates, the important thing is that they are whipped up by the masterful kitchen of Charles Court, where chef Greg Barnhill has concocted tempting bites with influences from around the globe.

Prices for these small plates — here it comes — range from $4 to $8, which means that although you may not be able to gorge on the good life, at least you can sample it. And be happy you did.

This short menu is absolutely worth sampling. It wends from nibbles like a spread of bleu cheese and dried fruit ($8) to hearty buffalo sliders ($8) with a rich, assertive cambozola cheese that is essentially a mix of brie and bleu.

Bar food in this town often means something from mega-distributer Sysco that has been frozen and then fried, but not at the Broadmoor.

Here, the crab in the crab fondue ($6) is not krab, or even just any old crab. It is real lump Maryland crab from an exclusive provider. It is sweet and rich and addictive. Big chunks of it simmer in a bubbly bliss made by caramelizing shallots with sherry, cream and sharp mustard, then adding in more of that brie/bleu cambozola. It is not just delicious — for what you get, it is a steal.

The pork quesadillas ($4) are an even bigger steal. Four browned tortilla wedges come stuffed with fresh, tangy salsa and local pork, raised in Peyton and butchered in the kitchen.

On top, a cool, cilantro-laced crema fresca dances with a fiery, smoky, ruby-red ancho chili jelly the chef makes from scratch. It was so tasty I was gushing about it for days.

“You couldn’t do this … where you didn’t have the ingredients and experience of a kitchen like Charles Court,” said Charles Court chef Greg Barnhill. “That was our intent, to do bar food, but make it like you can’t get it anywhere else.”

You have only to sample the menu to see his point proved again and again. The “herb-lacquered bacon” in the BLT ($6) is cured in-house from local piggies. The greens and veggies are all as local as possible.

The Kobe beef short rib ($8) comes slathered with a beguilingly complex sauce that starts with rice wine and ginger. The flavors build with fish sauce and Korean red chili paste. A hint of French decadence is added with splashes of demiglace. French colonialism comes with sprigs of lemongrass. It finishes with a Japanese malt vinegar spiked with zesty persimmons. I get teary-eyed just thinking about it.

Of course, what would you expect from Barnhill, who, in 2009 changed Charles Court from the hotel’s perennial second fiddle into what is, for my money, the place to go in town for fine dining?

This is not to say there are not flubs, and bad ones.

What the menu calls “Indian Spiced ‘Nachos’” ($4) arrived as a greasy pile of homemade flour tortilla chips with hints of “tamarind chutney and cilantro emulsion” smeared on top, and a scattering of chick peas tossed into the mix. It was not only unpleasantly bland and oily, but eating chickpeas with a chip is frustrating and just plain unnecessary. It’s one of those dishes a flesh-eating chef was forced to make for vegetarians, and it needs to go. If the kitchen wants to keep a chick pea vegan dish on the roster, they might consider a creative take on hummus with fresh, local vegetables.

A cute dish of calamari ($5) served in a novelty fry basket with a very good red chili remoulade arrived perfectly cooked but painfully over-salted. This was likely a one-time slip — a new prep cook mixing the spices, perhaps — but one that left the otherwise lovely squid almost inedible.

By serving such fine little dishes for such reasonable prices the hotel clearly hopes to make back its nut on drinks, and that is easy to do. The signature cocktails and wines by the glass often run more than $10 each, though, to be sure, other bars charge as much for less. The cocktails here are very good and the wine list, because of the hotel’s buying power, offers a number of unusual treats.

The real beverage shortfall is the beer list. Though the kitchen focuses on local, the list doesn’t get anymore local than Fat Tire from Fort Collins. Too bad.

Bristol Brewing Co. is less than two miles from the hotel and makes a full court of phenomenal beers that more than deserve to be highlighted by the Broadmoor.

None of these shortfalls, though, come close to swinging the balance at the West Lobby Bar away from wonderful. If you want a special night in a gorgeous setting but don’t want to risk cardiac arrest when the bill arrives, pull up a chair, this is your kind of place.

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