Nob Hill Bar & Grill – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

There’s talk on the street,
it’s there to remind you,
it doesn’t really matter which side you’re on
You’re walking away and they’re talking behind you
They will never forget you ’til somebody new comes along
– New Kid In Town: The Eagles

As an independent observer of the New Mexico culinary experience, it’s always intrigued me just how fleeting and short-lived the popularity of new restaurants can be. Perhaps indicative of our human need for constant new sources of stimulation and gratification, diners (and restaurant critics) flock to new restaurants like moths to a flame. In our minds, new seems to translate to fresh and exciting. We seem drawn to the spit, polish and promise of new restaurants in our constant quest for new and different.

The phenomenon of newness isn’t solely applicable to restaurants. On the liner notes of “The Very Best of the Eagles,” Don Henley explained the meaning behind their number one song “New Kid in Town:” We’re basically saying, ‘Look, we know we’re red hot right now but we also know that somebody’s going to come along and replace us–both in music and in love.’ The fleeting, fickle nature of our fascination with newness is so strong that some restaurants actually peak in popularity within a few months after opening, particularly after their first glowing reviews.

In the National Football League (NFL), general managers and coaches recognize that the effectiveness of a draft (the signing of new players coming out of college) isn’t realized for three years. New restaurants generally don’t have three years to prove themselves. Many of them don’t make it past their first year. Successful restaurants aren’t just another pretty face in the crowd. They’re generally restaurants with substance, not just flash and panache–eateries which provide reasonable portions of good food in a pleasant ambiance served by an attentive staff. Many of them are constantly reinventing themselves with new and exciting seasonal menu offerings.

In April, 2008, one of the pretty new faces gracing the Duke City dining scene was the Nob Hill Bar & Grill on Central Avenue. The mere fact that it’s survived six years (as of this writing) is indicative that it’s doing things right. The fact that there doesn’t appear to be any surcease in its popularity despite the onslaught of newer and arguably prettier competition says the Nob Hill Bar & Grill formula is working very well indeed.

Perhaps one of the reasons the restaurant continues to thrive is the combination of staying true to its original vision while constantly introducing elements of newness the Albuquerque dining public craves. The Nob Hill Bar & Grill’s vision is to be a place in which everyone feels welcome to come as they are, but with the expectations that they’ll find top-notch food, service and interesting twists on the standards they might find at a neighborhood bar, pub or steakhouse. Think time-honored bar and comfort foods with an upscale gourmet interpretation. Think gastropub done very well!

Situated in an east-facing adobe-hued stucco exterior and a beckoning red brick frontage facing Central Avenue, the Nob Hill Bar & Grill is a beacon for patrons in pursuit of delicious victuals and creative cocktails. The east-facing wall opens up to an exterior patio which nearly doubles the restaurant’s seating capacity. The patio provides an excellent people-watching venue (and great place to bring your dog) even though the faux wicker chairs must have been designed by the Marquis de Sade. The restaurant’s interior is decidedly contemporary and masculine with its exposed brick walls, high-backed booths with black leather seating, dark wood floors and an exposed ceiling. An exhibition kitchen is the restaurant’s cynosure, a hectic, but not harried hub of activity. The menu, however, has more than enough variety to please both masculine and feminine palates.

The Nob Hill Bar & Grill’s innovative menu changes with the seasons. To the greatest extent possible, the restaurant sources its beef and produce locally. Hamburgers are crafted from premium-cut steak raised in Roswell (no UFO jokes, please). This is no ordinary beef. It’s a full carcass blend made from premium cuts–New York, tenderloin, ribeye– not scrap meat. You’ll be able to taste the difference.

Appetizers

19 August 2011: As down-to-earth as celebrity foodie Ryan Scott is, he is admittedly a barbecue snob. Years of trial and some error have made him a true smoke master and undoubtedly imbued him with the patience all barbecue purists must have. Dine with him and you’re practically assured your meal will include smoked chicken wings if they’re on the menu. The Nob Hill Bar & Grill’s wings are smoked in applewood, a “light” wood which imparts a fragrant smokiness without overwhelming the meats. You can have the wings tossed in your choice of buffalo sauce or mango-habanero and served with your choice of blue cheese or ranch. The mango-habanero is slightly tangy and only mildly piquant, allowing the applewood smoke to shine. Shine it does. These wings are so good Ryan eschewed dessert and opted for a second order of wings.

15 March 2014: In responding to my “Best of the Best for 2013” feature, my friends Hannah and Edward compiled their own list of the most memorable dishes they had in 2013. Their list included a number of intriguing dishes I hadn’t tried. Among the most compelling, a dish on which they both agreed, was the steamed clams at the Nob Hill Bar & Grill. Since in my mind Hannah and Edward can do no wrong, the clams were the first item on which my eyes trained during a subsequent visit. Be forewarned, that the steamed clams aren’t always on the menu. Thankfully the menu does change seasonally and the restaurant even has a “suggestion box” in which you can request your favorite dishes be brought back onto the menu.

These steamed clams are indeed well worthy of adulation. At seven to ten clams per pound, little neck clams are the smallest of American cold water quahogs, but they’re among the most delicious–especially when served in a white wine butter sauce topped with gremolata (chopped herb condiment usually made of lemon zest, garlic, and parsley), roasted fennel, Roma tomatoes and pork lardons. It’s as good a sauce as we’ve found for clams, a sauce which would make an award-winning soup and for which you would want a half dozen slices of lightly toasted bread to dredge up every drop.

15 March 2014: From its onset, the Nob Hill Bar & Grill has been one of the city’s very best eateries in showcasing the versatility and deliciousness of duck. One of the more inventive ways in which it’s offered is in the form of Jicama Duck Tacos. You’re probably thinking “what’s so inventive about julienne jicama on a taco” and you’d be right. What makes this taco so innovative is that the fresh tortillas are made not from corn or flour, but from jicama, a versatile sweet root vegetable. Four tacos per order are engorged with shredded duck confit with an orange-cranberry salsa and queso fresco. These are some of the most moist and delicious tacos in town. The shredded duck is rich, moist and infused with flavors complemented by a tangy-sweet salsa and a mild queso.

In its annual Food and Wine issue for 2013, Albuquerque The Magazine‘s staff sampled “every dish of nachos in the city” and selected the Nob Hill Bar & Grill’s nachos as the sixth best in the city. The magazine described these nachos as “Albuquerque meets Texas with this plate of nachos, which is filled with chili–you know, the Texas kind.”

Brunch

Sunday brunch is a special event at several Nob Hill restaurants. It’s the thing to do on lazy Sunday mornings and restaurants such as Zinc are the place to be. Look for the Nob Hill Bar & Grill to attract even more people to the cultural heart of the city. When the Nob Hill Bar & Grill first opened, it offered a bountiful brunch buffet. Bidding bonjour to that brunch buffet is a blow softened by a memorable, weekly changing brunch menu. Sure, you won’t engorge yourself with multiple trips to the buffet, but you’ll be treated to prepared to order entrees that don’t suffer the ignominious fate of sitting under a heat lamp (which will diminish the flavor of even the best entrees).

14 December 2008: Huevos Rancheros are just a little bit different, maybe just a bit better than huevos rancheros at most New Mexican restaurants. Instead of piling ingredients atop a corn tortilla, these beauties start with two rolled duck meat enchiladas topped with both green chile stew and red chile sauce and a fried egg. The green chile stew is fantastic–piquant and flavorful, albeit parsimoniously portioned. The red chile has a beautiful purity with no discernible thickening agents. It is earthy and delicious, but alas, there’s just not enough of it. Not everybody wants a veritable lagoon of fluorescent red chile (a description shared with me by long-time friend of this blog Bruce Balto), but when it’s this good, you want more than to be teased. The huevos are accompanied by old-fashioned refried beans which, honestly, would have benefited from some of that fabulous green chile stew.

Until a few years ago, you couldn’t find an imaginative pancake in all of Albuquerque. Sure you could find pancakes topped with every conceivable fruit you can find, but in terms of griddle greatness, buttermilk was about as good as it got. It took chefs like Dennis Apodaca at Sophia’s Place and the Nob Hill Bar & Grill’s Culinary Institute of America former owner-chef Matt Ludeman to elevate pancakes to a new level. Matt and his brother Michael sold the Nob Hill Bar & Grill to Nicole Kapnison in 2014.

14 December 2008: The Nob Hill Bar & Grill’s contribution includes oatmeal Guinness pancakes topped with a Balsamic orange butter and whiskey syrup. Roughly the circumference of a coffee cup, these flavorful orbs are dense and thick instead of light and fluffy, but they’re good enough to eat sans syrup and butter, not that you’d ever want to considering the whiskey syrup is sensational. Accompanying the pancakes are two strips of candied pepper bacon and two eggs sunny-side-up. The candied pepper bacon will compete with the honey-chile glazed bacon at the Gold Street Caffe as the best bacon in town. It’s a flaccid bacon as opposed to the jerky textured bacon some restaurants serve.

14 December 2008: The “brunchies” portion of the menu includes several nice starters such as chips and salsa three ways. Sweet, smoky and tart is one way in the form of smoked mango salsa composed of mangoes, tomatoes, cilantro and green peppers. Another way is with creamy avocado sparsely dotted with corn niblets and replete with flavor. It’s not a conventional guacamole per se, but if you like just the whisper of citrus influenced tartness with the buttery richness of avocado, you’ll love this one. The third way is pico de gallo, a composite of tomato, green pepper, red onion and cilantro. There’s not much pico in this rooster’s bite, but it’s delicious. The red, white and blue corn tortillas are crisp and low in salt.

Lunch

19 August 2011: My friend Ryan Scott, the dynamic host of Albuquerque’s best YouTube channel program Break the Chain, (yeah, I’m a shill) and I shared a “Dirty Burger” which our waitress touted as one of the very best burgers in New Mexico. A better name might be “Messy Burger” in the best tradition of four napkin burgers whose ingredients run down your hands and face. The burger is constructed with your choice of Nob Hill’s ultimate blend steak or Snake River Kobe beef topped with chili (sic) con queso, frizzled onions, bacon fried egg and “beeronnaize” served with sea salt fries and chipotle ketchup. Because the chili con queso is made with the foul demon spice cumin, I deprived Scott of the experience of trying the Kobe crafted chili.

Sans chili, this is a terrific burger! Lightly toasted brioche buns are hardly formidable enough to contain all the juiciness and flavor so you might have to eat this burger with a knife and fork. The beef is most assuredly the star of this four-star burger. It has the flavor of premium steak. Cut into the over-easy fried egg and let its yoke cover the beef for a taste sensation savvy restaurants have caught onto. The beeronnaize (not Bearnaise) has an interesting flavor–a somewhat salty, beer imbued mayo concoction applied generously. Only the frizzled onions are truly extraneous, a wholly unnecessary additive.

15 March 2014: It’s not every mama who serves meatloaf constructed from local New Mexico all-natural beef stuffed with applewood smoked bacon and smoked mozzarella cheese stacked atop a forest mushroom risotto then serves it with fresh vegetables (haricot vert and asparagus). That makes this entree’s name–This Ain’t Yo Mama’s Meatloaf–so appropriate. The pairing of applewood smoked bacon and smoked mozzarella makes smokiness the most prominent in a flavor profile. It’s most definitely an adult meatloaf. The forest mushroom risotto isn’t the usual accompaniment for the meatloaf, but a very accommodating server (Josh) aimed to please. It’s a good risotto though its flavor was somewhat obfuscated by the shallot gravy intended for the meatloaf.

15 March 2014: Not only is the meatloaf not constructed as your mama might make it, the fish and chips aren’t quite what we enjoyed by the netful in England. Instead of flaccid fries which easily absorb the malt vinegar, the Nob Hill Bar & Grill serves sea salt waffle fries which seem to have a deflector shield preventing the absorption of malt vinegar. The fish–two pieces of fresh cod–are delicious: flaky and delicate on the inside with a crispy Marble Brown Ale batter on the outside. A small ramekin of apple slaw completes the entree.

30 April 2017: Surf, turf and sky get equal billing on the menu with several menu item on each category. Among the terrific dishes on the “sky” menu are the Mole Duck Enchiladas (shredded duck enchiladas with queso fresco, red chile mole, calabasitas and cilantro-lime Basmati rice). There’s much to love about the dish though that love would be even more boundless if the enchiladas were more sizeable. There are two stars on the enchiladas–the rich shredded duck and the sweet-savory-piquant mole with red chile notes blending well with the complex multi-ingredient mole. Also a star are the calabasitas–al dente zucchini, corn niblets and green chile which are fresh and delicious with piquant notes from the green chile sneaking out with every bite.

30 April 2017: Celebrity chef Ludo Lefebvre calls steak frites the perfect date food, going so far as to crediting this popular French dish with helping win over his then girlfriend now wife. Steak frites is a pretty good date food, too, even if you’re already married. It’s one of my Kim’s favorite dishes and few do it as well as this restaurant. The two components of this dish are, of course, steak and French fried potatoes. At the Nob Hill Bar, that means a mountain of truffle fries so big we barely put a dent on the pile before giving up. These fries have a twice-fried texture and a nice stiffness. They’re served with two different ketchup types. The steak is grilled and topped with a port wine compound butter that’s in the early melting sages. You’ll want to spread the butter all over the steak. A port wine demi sauce lends a deliciously rich finish.

Desserts

Dessert options have included an Editor’s Pick in Albuquerque The Magazine’s 2008 Best of the City edition. That would be the Cafe Con leche, a coffee lover’s lascivious dream. It’s Thai coffee mousse with a white chocolate, coffee sponge cake and a crumbly trail of decaf coffee crumbles leading to sweetened condensed milk ice cream made in-house. Wow! It’s one of the most unique and intensely flavored desserts in town, a dessert you might not want to share no matter how much you might love your dining companion.

15 March 2014: Anthony Bourdain believes Guinness to be one of the best adult beverages in the world and as if to prove it downs several frothy pints with every meal of which he partakes in Ireland (that is when he’s not sipping on Irish whiskey). It’s unlikely he’s had Irish libations in the manner they’re presented at the Nob Hill Bar & Grill in a dessert called the Guinness Fritter Bomb. Three crispy fritters are served in a large bowl with Guinness ice cream, Bailey’s whipped cream and a Jameson’s caramel sauce. Surprisingly the most memorable of the lot is the Bailey’s whipped cream. The Jameson’s caramel sauce is actually sugar spun into twill patterns.

In 2008, the Nob Hill Bar & Grill was selected by readers as Albuquerque’s best new restaurant in the Alibi’s annual “Best of Burque Restaurants” poll. It earned the same accolade in Albuquerque The Magazine‘s annual “Best of the City” honors. In subsequent years, this restaurant has continued to rack up honors and accolades, surely indicative that this is no flash-in-the pan. The Nob Hill Bar & Grill is here to stay.

Nob Hill Bar & Grill
3128 Central Avenue, S.E.
Albuquerque, NM
1ST VISIT: 27 April 2008
LATEST VISIT: 30 April 2017
# OF VISITS: 5
RATING: 21
COST: $$
BEST BET: Oatmeal Guinness Pancakes, Huevos Rancheros. Chips & Salsa Three Ways, Cafe con Leche, The Dirty Burger, Applewood Smoked Wings, This Ain’t Yo Mama’s Meatloaf, Fish and Chips, Steamed Clams, Jicama Duck Tacos