Cafe Bodega closed in
February, 2005 after its founding owner and chef passed away.
Bodega is not just the
Spanish word for little grocery store. A Bodega is typically a
Hispanic-owned and operated neighborhood grocery and convenience store,
but it's more than a place to pick up produce indigenous to or
reminiscent of the customers' native lands. In New York City,
bodegas are where transplanted Hispanics drop by to pick up ethnic
newspapers, converse in their native tongue and gossip about their
neighborhoods, old and new.
Bodegas line the
neighborhoods of the Bronx and Spanish Harlem, the two areas of New York
City with which I'm most familiar. Knowing what bodegas
really are, I found it quite interesting that an Albuquerque fine dining
establishment would choose that appellation, but after our second visit,
it became apparent why. Café Bodega is the type of restaurant in
which you would dine with a close friend or family--a relaxing ambience,
impeccable server and captivating tastes will do that for you.
Amazingly the edifice
in which Café Bodega is housed was once an IHOP restaurant while the
owner previously operated the classy Café Las Placitas. Café
Bodega features a wood burning oven used for roasting marinated lean
cuts of meat. The breads, pastas, sauces and desserts are made from
scratch. For two years in a row the extensive wine list has received Wine
Spectator's Award of Excellence. The menu changes seasonally
allowing the variety of dishes to highlight the freshest ingredients
available.
The lunch menu includes
salads, pastas and sandwiches and entrees other restaurants might
reserve for dinner--such as a flatiron grilled eight-ounce sirloin with
a gorgonzola demi-glace and butternut squash. The sirloin is as
tender a piece of meat as you'll find anywhere in Albuquerque while the
taste contrasts of a sharp cheese and sweet vegetable are redolent with
flavor. A great sandwich alternative is the black angus Philly
cheese steak with roasted peppers, onion, and Gruyere on toasted
sourdough served with fries. The fries are even bigger than Texas
cut and much better tasting while the sandwich is a superstar with
razor-thin shards of perfectly seasoned steak. Accompanying your
meals is a basket of warm, yeasty baked bread served with a small dish
of virgin olive infused with Romano cheese and spices. It was one
of the few things in Café Bodega we found boring.
Fortunately, we love
the café's fresh steamed mussels in a spicy saffron tomato broth that's
ideal for being sopped up by bread. The mussels are as meaty
(oxymoronic adjective, but you get my point) as you'll find in
land-locked Albuquerque. During a dinner visit in 2001 (our
inaugural visit), spicy beef dumplings (ginger and cabbage in a black
bean sauce with satay) heightened our expectations that the main entrees
would be equal or superior to what was an outstanding appetizer.
When prepared well, lamb chops are one of those delineating
entrees that define a restaurant as being either outstanding or
run-of-the-mill. Alas, I found Café Bodega's fire roasted lamb
chops just okay, nothing more. Also falling off the mark were the
wood roasted red chile pork chops.
Future visits are
definitely in order because our dinner visit may just have been an
anomaly. This is an Albuquerque
Original that belongs in the top-tier.
