Blades' Bistro in Placitas, New Mexico

“Ask three Placitans what they like best about living in Placitas and…
one will say it is being so far from everything, another, being so close to everything–and both will be right.”
- The Placitas Chamber of Commerce

Chamber of Commerce not withstanding, the distance from Placitas to fabulous gourmet restaurants has spanned both great  mileage and the healing passage of time for residents. When hungry, the mileage between Placitas and either Santa Fe or Albuquerque has seemed interminable.  When fondly recalling a glorious meal within its doors, time has been the sole comforter for residents still missing their beloved Cafe De Las Placitas, a magnificent shooting star which faded away much too quickly but left an indelible afterglow. Most residents will agree the distance to fine restaurant dining is a small price to pay when you live in an idyllic haven back-dropped by the reddish Sandias and surrounded by panoramic views of hills dotted with dessert flora, weather-worn mesas and verdured mountains.  Compared to its bustling, burgeoning, boisterous neighbors, Placitas is a serene harbor of refuge and respite.

Blades’ Bistro, which opened on March 19th, 2009, has greatly narrowed the distance to fine-dining for Placitas residents while rekindling fond memories of fabulous gourmet experiences at the long defunct Cafe De Las Placitas. For diners who frequent the former, comparisons to the latter will be inevitable–and they will be favorable. In fact, Blades’ Bistro might soon be a standard by which restaurant greatness will be measured–not just in Placitas, but throughout northern New Mexico. It’s that good!

Chef Kevin Bladergroen

The village of Placitas (in Spanish, literally “small places”) was formed by the San Antonio de las Huertas (Saint Anthony of the Gardens) Spanish land grant in 1745.  While many descendants of the original land-grant families still reside in Placitas, it has in recent years blossomed as an affluent bedroom community for residents employed in Albuquerque and Santa Fe.  Fewer than a dozen non-realty businesses call Placitas home, most of them ensconced in the Homestead Village shopping center, home of Blades’ Bistro.

Within a week after Blades’ opened, an excited Bruce Schor, a long-time friend of this blog, shared the news of its launch with me. “My first impression was I’m not in Placitas any more,” he related. “It has a sophisticated ambiance, very big city feel and the food is terrific.” Bruce’s glowing descriptions of what he ate were the inspired impetus for our first visit.  Ive since had the great fortune to have met Bruce and his aptly named better half Grace at Blades.  It remains one of their very favorite restaurants.

Baked Mushrooms (escargot style) / white wine, garlic herb butter, fresh parmesan

Had it not been for Bruce, we might have thought the name “Blades” had to do with Rio Rancho’s multiplex arena by that name expanding into Placitas and into the restaurant business.  Apparently several people have made that mistaken assumption.  Blades’ Bistro is actually named for brothers Michael and Kevin Bladergroen.  Their name is Dutch, while their restaurant is a veritable melting pot of European and American culinary influences.

An exhibition kitchen is the domain in which Kevin Bladergroen plies his chef trade as he has now for three and a half decades. After years of opening, working in and managing the kitchens of several restaurants in Europe and America, he has set down roots in Placitas. No stranger to New Mexico, he started his professional career in 1975 at Casa Vieja, a Corrales institution. He has also worked at the Prairie Star and before partnering with his brother and wife Anja to launch Blades’ Bistro, was executive chef at the innovative Standard Diner. Anja runs the front of the house.  She is as charming and gracious a hostess as there is in New Mexico.

Roasted Fresh Beets

Chef Bladergroen is classically trained, having attended the prestigious “La Varenne” cooking school in Paris.   His curriculum vitae also includes a unique professional odyssey by motor home.  To broaden his culinary edification, he and Anja traveled across the country to work in several restaurants with chefs he admired.  The journey included stops at a small coastal resort town in Maine; Aspen, Colorado, the glitzy playground for the rich and famous; and Pebble Beach, California, home of the national pro-am, one of golf’s most important events.

Chef Bladergroen’s menu is a culmination of his vast culinary training and experience. His cooking philosophy centers around using high quality ingredients to create a “melting pot of taste” with an innovative yet surprisingly unpretentious and simple menu influenced by the European and American culinary cultures from which he learned.  Some facets–moderately priced culinary fare and pleasant service–of Blades’ are true to the Parisian bistro concept, however, it could be debated that the setting is not exactly casual. It’s very well appointed and stylish, certainly more upscale than your typical bistro (albeit without being overweening). It’s a restaurant in which you’ll feel right at home and have fun while being inspired to be on your best behavior.

Shrimp Melanaise

Although the bistro doesn’t have a formal “chef’s table” per se, you can still feel like like a VIP by sitting in an area directly adjacent to the exhibition kitchen. Only a plexiglass sneeze guard and an extended countertop separate you from the kitchen. You’ll be close enough to converse with the chef, an amicable gentleman with a quick wit. Chef Bladergroen is very well organized and purposeful in every motion. He is a treat to watch.

As enlightening and inspiring as sitting in close proximity to the kitchen might be, even better are the intoxicating aromas emanating from the panoply of pots and pans perpetually sitting atop high flames. Watching every appetizer and entree in every phase of its preparation, unfortunately doesn’t make it any easier to decide what you want to eat. Everything looks and smells absolutely fabulous. My advice–let the chef pick something for you. Don’t even let him tell you what it is so you can be surprised when it arrives at your table. That’s what I’m happy to have done.

Con Frutti de Mar -- (The Fruit of the sea) Shrimp-Scallops-Lobster with white wine garlic cream sauce over linguini

Blades’ array of appetizers is impressive, but not because of sheer numbers. Including daily specials there are only about a half dozen appetizers available, but if our inaugural choices are any indication, they are of four-star quality. Fans of fleshy and fabulous fungi will fawn over baked mushrooms served escargot style. Blanketed by a light, flaky puff pastry, rich, mellow mushrooms are baked in a light white wine broth with garlic herb butter and parmesan. Mushrooms, it turns out, are the ideal vehicle for soaking up all the buttery goodness (which even Gourmet magazine believes is the best best part of escargot).

It’s not easy to sop up any remaining broth with the hard-crusted crostini which accompanies the mushroom dish, but the crostini is lightly toasted and provides a nice counterpoint to the starring attraction’s richness.  As do several of the best fine dining restaurants in the Duke City area, Blades’ Bistro acquires its staff of life offerings from Albuquerque’s Fano Bakery which specializes in artisan-style rustic and specialty breads.  Characteristics of baguettes from Fano, a hard-crust complements a soft, airy texture on other breads served during meals at Blades’.

Borscht, one of several soups on the winter soup rotation

Beauteous, blood-red beets roasted so they retain a soft inside and a firm exterior are the center point of a second appetizer, roasted red beets with toasted goat cheese and a Balsamic glaze drizzle on a bed of Arugula and Radicchio. The fresh red beets are moist and tangy, a flavor complement to the smooth, creamy texture and mild flavor of the goat cheese and both are a perfect counterbalance to the savory salt and pepper flavors of the Arugula and Radicchio salad. Red Beets are unique for their high levels of anti-carcinogens and their very high carotenoid content. It’s also heartening that they’re so delicious especially at the hands of a skilled chef. 

The only sane reason for which you should forgo an appetizer is if you’re going to luxuriate in one of the chef’s wondrous soups.  The borscht (described below in the brunch section of this review) is one of several soups on the winter soup rotation, an elixir both the elegant Anja and I wish was offered with more regularity.  The French onion soup is among the most aesthetically appealing and delicious of its genre in New Mexico.  Served in a traditional two-tone soup crock, it arrives at your table steaming hot with the cheese brown and bubbling over the top of the crock.  The aroma of onions is intoxicating and the broth is thicker than most French onion soups.  The onions are cut larger, too, imparting the wonderful sweet flavor of perfectly prepared onions.  You’ll risk the molten cheese and sacrifice the roof of your mouth to dig into this soup right away.

Clam Chowder

Ask any New England transplant to New Mexico what soup they miss most and invariably the answer will be clam chowder (chowdah to Bob of the Village People), the thick, hearty, soul-warming favorite of folks from Maine to Connecticut.  Expats will also lament the absence of good clam chowder in the Land of Enchantment.  Blades’ rendition is the best we’ve had since vacationing in Massachusetts in 2009.  It’s creamy and thick, but not overly so.  The potatoes are perfectly prepared and the clams are plentiful –a nice ratio of potatoes to clams.  Best, they were neither tough nor chewy.  It would have been interesting to see Chef Bladergroen attempt oyster crackers.

The entree chef Bladergroen prepared for me during our inaugural visit is a dish he started preparing while serving as chef in a Fort Pierce, Florida restaurant overlooking an Atlantic waterfront. It’s Shrimp Milanaise, an entree named for the Italian city of Milan. For the most part I’ve equated breaded shrimp with disdained restaurant chains that tend to serve them in all-you-can-choke-down quantities. I had also assumed initially that the breading would be similar to the breading used on steak Milanesa, a Mexican favorite. Blades’ Bistro has forever changed those conceptions.

French Onion Soup

The breading is light and very well seasoned, adhering like a second skin to the perfectly prepared, sweet and succulent shrimp without dominating their native sea born flavors. Appropriately–being this entree is prepared by a chef of Dutch heritage–the shrimp are served with dollops of smooth and creamy Hollandaise sauce which imparts a rich, buttery flavor with a mild tang. Also served with the dish are rice and carrots, green beans and fennel served al dente. There are only two things wrong with the entree: it doesn’t come with a dozen or more of the crusty crustaceans and it’s not on the daily menu.

Seafood lovers in land-locked New Mexico have rarely had the quality of succulent shellfish and mollusks available in one dish–Blades’ Bistro’s Con Frutti de Mar, literally fruit of the sea.  This entree features shrimp, scallops and lobster with a white wine garlic sauce over linguini.  It’s an inspired entree in which the richness of the sauce is a concordant marriage for the sweetness of the seafood.  It will not only sate your lust for protein and carbs, it may leaving you swooning in appreciation.  In its annual food and wine issue for 2011, Albuquerque The Magazine awarded the Frutti de Mar entree a “Hot Plate Award” as the hot entree Albuquerque diners can’t do without.

Veal Sweetbreads: pan-seared with apples and finished with Calvados Brandy Sauce

There are entrees a plenty for landlubbers, too, including some not attempted by other restaurants in the Duke City area.  The seasonal menu for winter 2012 includes two such rarities, veal sweetbreads and rabbit (if Anja has her way, these two stick around longer, especially the rabbit, her absolute favorite).  Sweetbreads are one of those words which demonstrate English is a crazy language.  They’re neither sweet nor bread.  They’re in the offal (animal entrails and internal organs) family, though many would spell it “awful.”  They’re also an acquired taste and one of the most misunderstood entrees–being mistaken for everything from bull’s testicles to liver–on any restaurant’s menu.  Sweetbreads come from two organs–the thymus (sometimes called the throat sweetbread) and the pancreas (sometimes called the stomach sweetbread).  Of all offal meat, sweetbreads are the most prized thanks to their mild flavor and color and their velvety, rich texture.  Veal sweetbreads are the most popular. 

My friend Larry McGoldrick, the professor with the perspicacious palate, is a sweetbread savant, enjoying them so much he once had them every other week for six straight months at Chicago’s La Grenouille.   When he compared Blades’ version to the one he enjoyed so much in the Windy City, I knew I had to try them, gout be damned (purine rich sweetbreads top the list of things gout sufferers should avoid).  What’s a little joint pain and threat of kidney stones compared to the decadent deliciousness of great sweetbreads.  Blades’ sweetbreads are outstanding–pan-seared, fork-tender veal sweetbreads in a rich, creamy Calvados brandy sauce perfumed ever so slightly with sweet, delicate apples.  Texturally they’re absolutely perfect and flavor-wise, they’re incomparable.  The sweetbreads are served with mashed potatoes and a salad of julienned carrots and red cabbage, a good counterpoint to the richness of the sweetbreads.

Rib Eye Steak with Cremini Mushroom Demiglace

Another entree any carnivorous landlubber will lust after is a ten- to twelve-ounce rib eye steak which can be prepared with either a green chile or a crimini mushroom demiglace.  The steak is prepared to your exacting specifications and arrives at your table surrounded by a rich, glossy pool of pure deliciousness.  Unadorned it’s an excellent steak.  The crimini mushroom demiglace with its discernible red wine influence elevates it to another level.  Served with asparagus spears and one grilled tomato, it’s a terrific entree.

Brunch

In 2010, Blades’ Bistro began serving lunch on Friday and Saturday from 10AM to 2PM and brunch on Sundays during those same hours.  Brunch is the best of two worlds–not quite breakfast and not quite lunch, but the very best of both.  It’s a leisurely weekend repast which makes you feel you’re getting away with something, almost as if you’re defying your mom’s mandate not to have dessert before your main entree.  Brunch in Placitas has the additional feel of going out-of-town, away from the maddening traffic and crowds to a more sedate and tranquil paced haven.

Fettuccini alla Carbonara: pasta tossed with cream, eggs, bacon & parmesan cheese

While the menu has an enticing array of appetizers, soups (French onion soup topped with Gruyere cheese and a soup-of-the-day) and salads with which to begin your brunch experience, if the soup du jour gracing the menu is Borscht, contemplate the rest no further (unless it’s to have Borscht and another starter).  The Borscht, one of several soups on the chef’s winter soup rotation, is excellent. Deep reddish-purple in color courtesy of beetroot, it is redolent with tomato, potatoes, beef, sour cream, garlic and dill.  Borscht, a veritable culinary treasure in Eastern and Central Europe, is one of those dishes for which there is no one universal recipe.  Cultural differences (Russian, Jewish, Ukrainian, etc.) account for variations in ingredients and preparation.  There are also seasonal variations that include serving it as a cold soup or a hot soup.  Blades’ version is served steaming hot and it’s terrific!

Perhaps the most sinfully rich brunch entree (on a menu which includes a Croque Monsieur made with Gruyere cheese topped with a cheese bechamel sauce) is the Fettuccini alla Carbonara, pasta tossed with cream, eggs, bacon and Parmesan.  This version is more cheesy than it is creamy and it’s thicker (though not clumpy and sticky) than some Carbonara dishes.  Carbonara, an Italian pasta dish with its genesis in Rome, is best made with al dente pasta and while Blades’ rendition is certainly not al dente, it’s so good and so rich you won’t–you can’t–stop eating it.  Besides that, every spoonful includes bacon and you can’t go wrong with that.  This dish is so rich, it should be served with a side of angioplasty.

Mongolian Ribs with Sweet Potato Fries and Coleslaw

During our inaugural brunch visit, we lucked upon a special-of-the-day offering called Mongolian Ribs, a veritable tower of meaty ribs glazed with a ginger-sesame sauce.  The plating of the ribs is tower-like, indeed.  At least six ribs are stacked atop one another, buttressed by a mound of coleslaw and a phalanx of sweet potato fries.  The ginger-sesame sauce is practically shellacked onto the ribs, but if that description leaves you dubious based on similarly described Chinese rib dishes, fear not.  Unlike some Chinese ribs, these are not candied meat lollipops.  The ginger-sesame sauce complements the beef ribs; it does not overwhelm them.  Did I mention these ribs are meaty?  Though they’re not quite Flintstonian in size, they will appease any a carnivore.  The accompanying coleslaw is tangy and delicious, made with Fuji apples and julienne carrots on a bed of greens.

Desserts

What many will love most is dessert and Blades’ Bistro doesn’t disappoint here either. An outstanding option sure to please one and all is the tiramisu.  Blades’ rendition is served in a large goblet but the cake’s component parts are certainly present: ladyfinger biscuits dipped in espresso layered in a whipped mixture of mascarpone, sugar, egg yolks topped with cocoa.  The distinct addition of a liqueur is also discernible.  It is a phenomenal dessert and that’s selling it short.  Along with the incomparable offering at Torinos @ Home, this rendition is at the top of my list of my very favorite tiramisu desserts in New Mexico, a Tuscan treat so good I’d eschew my other favorite (if it was on the menu) dessert–bread pudding.

Tiramisu

In the June, 2010 edition of New Mexico Magazine celebrating “New Mexico’s Best Eats,” a three person panel of culinary experts of which I was a part, selected as the Land of Enchantment’s best uptown dessert, the red chile soup at La Casa Sena.  Studded with Chimayo chile that enlivens the chocolate, it is one of my favorite desserts.  In the Chocolate Chili Pot, Blades’ Bistro may have one-upped La Casa Sena.  The chocolate chili (sic) pot is a ramekin brimming with dark chocolate pots du creme with toasted Chimayo chili.  Its consistency is reminiscent of a very thick frosting served cold, but it certainly doesn’t taste like the topping for a cake.  The adult chocolate is made even more flavorful with the infusion of Chimayo chile (better, by the way, than Hatch chile).  It’s topped with whipped cream studded with blueberries.

Chocolate Chili Pot: Dark chocolate Pots du Creme with toasted Chimayo chili

Even in winter, savvy restaurateurs will serve cold dishes, perhaps figuring that frozen desserts are good any time of year.  That’s certainly the case with Blades’ trio of sorbets, a refreshing, teeth-chattering bowl of flavor explosions.  This housemade triumvirate is as good a chilly dessert as there is in the Land of Enchantment.  As with all excellent sorbets, each truly captures the essence of the flavors they represent.  The pear sorbet tastes like fresh-picked pears (only served ice cold).  The pineapple-mint sorbet blends two distinctive flavors into a composite of what’s good about both.  The blackberry-cantaloupe sorbet is similarly fruity and delicious.

A trio of Sorbet: Pineapple-Mint, Blackberry-Cantaloupe and Pear

Besides sweetbreads, another addiction my friend Larry McGoldrick and I share is for bread pudding.  It’s our catnip and kryptonite–practically bringing us to our knees in gratitude to the bread pudding gods when it’s made right.  Blades’ bread pudding made Larry’s Bread Pudding Hall of Fame, an indication of its rarefied greatness.  It’s at or near the top of my list, too.  Unlike the soggy, custard-like bread pudding that relies on cloying sauces for flavor, this is a firm yet spongy bread pudding with a texture that’s absolutely spot-on.  In terms of taste, it’s an eye-opener with the pronounced flavor of banana and rum, the latter cutting the sweetness of the former.  It’s a winning combination.

Banana Rum Bread Pudding

In under two years, Placitas has become a dining destination frequented not only by local loyalists, but by diners from throughout the state and beyond.  In 2011, Blades’ Bistro was selected by readers of Local IQ as the Duke City area’s best romantic restaurant, best fine-dining restaurant and for having the area’s best bartender.  The operative term here is “best,” a term that has become synonymous with this stand-out restaurant.

Blades´ Bistro
221 Highway 165 Suite L
Placitas, New Mexico
505) 771-0695
Web Site
LATEST VISIT: 23 February 2012
1st VISIT:  31 March 2009
# OF VISITS: 3
RATING: 24
COST: $$$ – $$$$
BEST BET: Baked Mushrooms (escargot style), Roasted Fresh Beets with toasted Goat Cheese @ Balsamic Glace Drizzle, Con Frutti de Mar, Shrimp Melanaise, Tiramisu, Trio of Sorbets, Chocolate Chili Pot, Mongolian Ribs, Borscht, Fettuccinni alla Carbonara, Banana Rum Bread Pudding, Veal Sweetbreads, Rib Eye with Mushroom Demiglace