Category: American

BarbecueNew Mexico

Red Chimney BBQ – Carlsbad, New Mexico

Gil Garduno5:54 PM

Depending on your lifestyle choices and temperament, some of the slogans emblazoned on bumper stickers or tee-shirts seen over the years at Rio Rancho’s annual Pork & Brew will either make you laugh or rankle your ire. “Meat is murder – tasty, tasty murder.” “Animal rights – Animals have the right to be tasty.” “Gardening: Cultivating a piece of land in order to barbecue.” “If you can’t stand the heat, go get me a beer!” Obviously no similarly themed bumper stickers or tee-shirt slogans will ever be seen at vegan or vegetarian festivals. They are, however, part and parcel of my former colleague Matt Mauler’s casual (and for that matter, formal) attire. You might remember Matt from my review of…

BarbecueNew MexicoRated 24

Danny’s Place – Carlsbad, New Mexico

Gil Garduno11:59 PM

For some reason, national print and online publications and even the Food Network can’t seem to fathom that the Land of Enchantment has outstanding cuisine outside the shining pinnacles of Santa Fe and Albuquerque. To some extent the media may be justified in perceiving the City Different and Duke City as offering the quintessence of what makes New Mexico a culinary Mecca. Obviously, Santa Fe and Albuquerque enthrall hungry visitors armed with voracious appetites (especially for our incendiary red and green chile), but to discount the cuisine at other cities throughout our diverse state is just plain lazy. Santa Fe and Albuquerque do not have exclusivity when it comes to extraordinary restaurants and cuisine. Phenomenal eateries and cuisine can be…

AmericanBurgersNew MexicoRated 23

Big D’s Downtown Dive – Roswell, New Mexico

Gil Garduno12:01 AM

During a March, 2012 trip to Roswell, New Mexico President Barack Obama made the following opening remarks to his speech. “We had landed in Roswell. I announced to people when I landed that I had come in peace. (Laughter) Let me tell you – there are more nine and ten year old boys around the country when I meet them – they ask me, “Have you been to Roswell and is it true what they say? And I tell them, ‘If I told you I would have to kill you.’ So their eyes get all big…so…we’re going to keep our secrets here.” To many, his comment was just an innocent joke, but to passionate conspiracy theorists, Obama’s remarks were further…

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Groundstone – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno11:59 PM

Kids say the darnedest things. That was the premise of popular radio and television shows hosted by Art Linkletter from the mid 1940s through 1969. Linkletter would engage children (usually aged three to eight) in casual conversation. Humor–often laced with double entendre–would often ensue out of the children’s naive and silly responses. Once, for example, he asked a little girl to spell Art, his name. She proceeded to spell the host’s name R-A-T. Most parents can relate to the unpredictable nature of what their children say. More often than not, it resonates with child-like innocence, but every once in a while an utterly unintentional and unfiltered zinger sneaks out that will make parents want to slink away and hide. When…

BarbecueClosed in 2019Gone But Not ForgottenNew MexicoRated 23Rio Rancho

Stack House BBQ – Rio Rancho, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno12:56 PM

One of my Psychology professors cautioned students about the danger of “amateur diagnosis,” the practice of assigning specific psychoses and neuroses to people we meet solely on the basis of our cursory familiarity with the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. He explained that it often takes an experienced practicing psychiatrist several sessions to arrive at a diagnosis and many more sessions before treatment proves effective. His point–a little knowledge can be dangerous–applies in virtually every arena of knowledge in practicum. Reflecting back on all the times my rudimentary conclusions were ultimately proven incorrect, it’s a point well driven. When my friends Larry “the professor with the perspicacious palate” McGoldrick, Dazzling Deanell and Beauteous Barb decided to pursue Kansas…

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Cafe Laurel – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno8:46 PM

“To anyone else,” my Kim joked “the name Café Laurel is just a cute name probably chosen because the owners like laurel leaves. To you the name has to mean something.” She reminded me of the hours I spent dissecting former President Bill Clinton’s statement “It depends upon what the meaning of the word “is” is.” “You’re too literal. You don’t just want to know what words mean. You need to know why they’re used.” “But,” I retorted “laurel leaves aren’t just a leafy plant. Julius Caesar and Napoleon Bonaparte fashioned “crowns” out of laurel leaves, probably,” I surmised “because laurel leaves were more comfortable than the heavy, bejeweled metallic crowns that may have been the reason for the adage…

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Seared – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno12:01 AM

While you might not be able to judge a book by its cover, sometimes a book title will resonate deeply and you know you’re going to enjoy reading it very much. That’s especially true when a book title warmly reminds you of nostalgic memories long buried in your past. Such was the case when I espied Where There’s Smoke, There’s Dinner: Stories of a Seared Childhood by award-winning raconteur Regi Carpenter. That title aptly described daily life for the long suffering Peraltas, our childhood neighbors in Peñasco. Mama Peralta, one of the nicest people you could ever hope to meet, was such a scatterbrained cook that she used the smoke alarm as a timer. She didn’t sear meat, she cremated…

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Devon’s Pop Smoke Wood Fired Grill – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno8:53 PM

The book of Genesis in the Old Testament explains that after the great flood, God commanded humankind to “increase in number and fill the Earth” (be fruitful and multiply, if you prefer). Instead, humanity decided to do the exact opposite–to build a city with a tower reaching to the heavens where all the population could live so as not to be scattered over the face of the Earth. In response, God “confused” the languages of humanity so they could no longer communicate with each other. As a result, people who spoke the same languages departed and settled other parts of the world…just as God wanted. You might assume that those of us who served in the armed forces would all…

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Spencer’s Restaurant – Palm Springs, California

Gil Garduno12:01 AM

  Dean Beck: What do you have against preachers? Clay Spencer: It’s what they preach against I’m against. Dean Beck: I’m afraid I don’t understand? Clay Spencer: They’re against everything I’m for. They don’t allow drinkin’ or smokin’, card playin’, pool shootin’, dancin’, cussin’ – or huggin’, kissin’ and lovin’. And mister, I’m for all of them things. ~Spencer’s Mountain In the family-centric 1963 movie Spencer’s Mountain, hard-drinkin’, hard-lovin’ Clay Spencer (brilliantly portrayed by Henry Fonda) dreamed of building his wife Olivia (the stunning Maureen O’Hara) a beautiful home on a piece of land he inherited on Spencer’s Mountain. My dream was a bit less ambitious. My dream was to take my Kim to Spencer’s Restaurant at the Mountain, “one…

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Cheeky’s – Palm Springs, California

Gil Garduno9:55 AM

Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw is widely credited with the aphorism “England and the United States are two nations divided by a common language.” My Kim and I had no idea just how different the Queen’s English is from the English spoken by the colonists until we were assigned to Royal Air Force Fairford. As part of the newcomers orientation, we were required to attend a course in which those vast differences were explained. Many of those differences were rather comedic, but we were warned, “if Yanks aren’t careful, we could perpetuate the dreaded “ugly American” stereotype widely held in some parts of Europe.” We learned, for example, that if an American serviceman walks up to an English lady and…

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Butters Pancakes & Cafe – Scottsdale, Arizona

Gil Garduno8:32 PM

“Spread your tiny wings and fly away And take the snow back with you Where it came from on that day So, little snowbird take me with you when you go To the land of gentle breezes where the peaceful waters flow.” ~ Anne Murray Every autumn, gaggles of geese, flocks of ducks, kettles of hawks and constructions of cranes begin their long, arduous migration from the continent’s northern regions to warmer climes in the South. They fly in formation to more idyllic and much warmer locales such as the Bosque del Apache in New Mexico. Similarly, large numbers of pasty-skinned human migrants from Canada and the northern tier of the fruited plains leave behind the rigors of snow shoveling,…