Category: Rating: Outstanding

Outstanding–A stand-out; delivers a memorable dining experience through a harmonious blend of exceptional food, attentive service, and consistent quality

AlbuquerqueClosed in 2021Dog FriendlyGone But Not ForgottenItalianNew MexicoPizzaRating: Outstanding

Poppy’s Pizzeria & Italian Eatery – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno12:01 AM

Chef-owner Mario D’Elia knew what he’d be in for when he named his new restaurant Poppy’s Pizzeria & Italian Eatery.  Legions of Seinfeld fans would undoubtedly joke  “Poppy’s a little sloppy,” a reference to Poppie, a restaurateur on the comedy Seinfeld who didn’t wash his hands after using the bathroom.  Sure enough,the jokes came…until the jokesters tasted the seriously outstanding authentic New York style pizza.  Poppy’s pizza is no joking matter.  So why would Mario subject himself to a spate of predictable and hackneyed jokes? Poppy, as you might know, is an affectionate nickname given to a father, grandfather or a male authority figure standing in a similar position.  Mario speaks with reverence and love about his poppy, the nurturing grandfather who encouraged and challenged him to always do his best.  Mario’s Poppy would be very proud of the man his grandson has become.  The precocious child who once giggled as he bounced on his grandfather’s knee has become not just quite a chef, not just quite a dad, but quite a good dude. Born and raised in the same Bronx neighborhood Joe Guzzardi of Joe’s Pasta House also called home, Mario started cooking at age 12.  Because culinary school…

Dog FriendlyNew MexicanNew MexicoRating: OutstandingSanta Fe

La Choza Restaurant – Santa Fe, New Mexico

Gil Garduno12:02 PM

“I have tried to express the terrible passions of humanity by means of red and green.” ~ Vincent Van Gogh Using bold and furious brushstrokes and striking colors (mostly red and green), Van Gogh once created a painting intended to depict humanity at its lowest point. Calling it “Night Cafe” he described it as “…one of the ugliest I have ever done, a collection of clashing colors in the dreariest atmosphere.” To New Mexicans, the notion of red and green being ugly, dreary and clashing in any way is a heretical concept. For denizens of the Land of Enchantment, red and green are absolutely stunning especially when plated together over blue corn enchiladas stuffed with carne adovada. Red and green chile are why New Mexicans celebrate “Christmas” every day of the year. Unlike the dreary and ugly cafe of Van Gogh’s painting, New Mexico’s restaurants tend to be spectacular, especially when their ambiance is perfumed by the wondrous wafting of chile simmering over a stove. This rapturous redolence is the essence of enchantment, a veritable aphrodisiac to chile lovers everywhere. Very few restaurants prepare red and green chile as well as Santa Fe’s La Choza, an inviting domicile of deliciousness…

AlbuquerqueAmericanBreakfastDog FriendlyNew MexicoRating: OutstandingSandwich

The Shop Breakfast & Lunch – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno7:14 PM

In the 60s and early 70s, movies and television programs would have you believe all spies were hard-drinking, fast-driving, woman-chasing playboys as good with their fists as they were with a gun. They were worldly, sophisticated and charming, but could just as easily use guile and deception to get the job done. Bob Ayers, who worked in intelligence for 30 years in the U.S. Army and Defense Intelligence Agency counters those stereotypes: “All of that stuff about James Bond, that’s Hollywood. You don’t want anyone standing out in the intelligence business. You want someone nondescript. The ideal spy is 5-foot-6 and kind of dumpy.” That ideal—nondescript and dumpy—just wouldn’t work in the restaurant business…or would it? Restaurants, especially those which are generously bankrolled by corporate megaliths, tend to have a lot of cash, flash and panache to create the illusion of glamor and allure which brings in customers (and most of us are easily entertained). In addition to all the pristine veneer and effusive, over-the-top flamboyance money can buy, these restaurants tend to have catchy, memorable names which help in the establishment and proliferation of brand identity. They’re capacious, swanky, memorable and largely successful. Anyone who thinks this formulaic approach…

AlbuquerqueFine DiningRating: Outstanding

Seasons Rotisserie & Grill – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno3:21 AM

To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted. – Ecclesiastes 3:1-2 Despite America’s oft vascillating economic situation, new restaurants continue to sprout faster than New Mexico’s unofficial state flower (no, not the ubiquitous orange traffic cone; the almost as omnipresent tumbleweed). Rarely does a week go by without some sparkly and shiny new restaurant opening up somewhere in the Duke City. Though most start off with much promise and potential, many restaurants are destined to suffer a fate similar to the dreaded and accursed tumbleweed. The average lifespan of most independent restaurant concepts is less than five years. In 1995, Seasons Rotisserie & Grill was one of the shiny new restaurants with lots of promise and potential. A quarter of a century later, it continues to thrive against the onslaught of rigorous competition from newer, shinier and prettier new restaurants, outlasting many restaurants anointed the “next best thing” by the cognoscenti. Year after year, Seasons continues to be mentioned as one of the city’s very best restaurants and not…

AlbuquerqueClosed in 2019Dog FriendlyGone But Not ForgottenMexicanNew MexicanNew MexicoRating: Outstanding

Sophia’s – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno10:01 AM

Exterior signage for Dennis Apodaca’s new restaurant venture sports the name of the previous tenant, a short-lived eatery named MIXX. In a February blurb announcing Dennis’s return, the Albuquerque Journal called his new venture “REMIXX.” A handwritten note scrawled on the front door, however, informs you that you’ve arrived at “Sophia’s – that you knew & loved on 4th St. NW.” Not taking any chances, Yelp lists entries for both “REMIXX by Sophia’s Place” and “Sophia’s.” So which is it? Ask Dennis and he’ll tell you that despite what the sign says, his restaurant is a relaunch of Sophia’s, the celebrated restaurant that made him one of Albuquerque’s most talked-about and respected chefs. “I’d rather spend money on serving great food than replacing a sign” he laughs. Dennis points out that the exterior signage for Trois Mec, one of the most revered fine-dining restaurants in Los Angeles, still bears the name of its predecessor, Raffalo’s Pizza. That’s entirely by design, the point being that despite a constantly changing five-course tasting menu approaching a C-note price point, the restaurant is unpretentious, its focus being on the food not peripherals such as signage. The term “unpretentious” probably fits Dennis more than it…

AlbuquerqueChickenDog FriendlyPeruvianRating: Outstanding

Pollito Con Papas – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno9:29 PM

I think a rotisserie is like a really morbid ferris wheel for chickens. It’s a strange piece of machinery. We will take the chicken, kill it, impale it and then rotate it. And I’ll be damned if I’m not hungry because spinning chicken carcasses make my mouth water. I like dizzy chicken. – Mitch Hedberg Comedian Mitch Hedberg may have meant it in a funny vein, but it’s no joke that Americans are finding rotisserie chickens not only sexy and sumptuous, but convenient, flavorful and oh, so easy to prepare. The latter three were reasons most cited by consumers for liking rotisserie chicken. In 2015, the National Chicken Council survey estimated that 900 million rotisserie chickens are sold each year in the United States, a number that’s expected to exceed one billion by 2018. According to Lohud, a trade publication, nearly 700 million of those birds will be sold in supermarkets. At $5 a pop, that’s $3.5 billion in sales. Since 1980, the per capita consumption of poultry–and not just rotisserie chicken–in America has increased significantly. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Chicken Council, Americans are eating more chicken than ever. The per capita consumption of…

AmericanCaliforniaDog FriendlyRating: OutstandingUnited States

LULU CALIFORNIA BISTRO – Palm Springs, California

Gil Garduno2:12 PM

How many times have you heard a transplant to the Land of Enchantment say it just doesn’t feel like Christmas without snow? Some of you expats dream of a white Christmas, just like the ones you used to know back when you lived in Siberia, the North Pole, Greenland and other similarly snowed-in states that aren’t as beautifully balmy in winter as is New Mexico. It’s not enough for you that winter temperatures across the Land of Enchantment occasionally drop into the forties and you sometimes have to wear long pants outdoors. You hardy, masochistic northerners are accustomed to mountains of snow being one of the defining elements of the Christmas season. You want to wash your hands, your face and hair with snow, snow, snow… In the immortal words of Thor, the Norse god of thunder, “I say thee nay!” Any more than the one- or two-inches it takes for the city of Albuquerque to declare a “snow day” is too much snow. Who needs it! My dear friend Becky Mercuri who lives just south of Buffalo in the lake-effect-snow-belt traumatizes me with reports of storms dumping two- to three-feet of snow at a time. The Buffalo area averages…

AmericanBrunchCaliforniaDog FriendlyRating: OutstandingUnited States

JAKE’S – Palm Springs, California

Gil Garduno7:54 PM

“Now i lay me down to sleep And pray the Lord my soul to keep If i die before i wake, feed Jake He’s been a good dog My best friend right through it all If i die before i wake, feed Jake.” ~Pirates of the Mississippi “On one hand,” my Kim tells me, “you’d make a great politician.” “You maintain a perfect deadpan expression while telling the biggest whoppers.” She had just watched me convince a gullible millennial (okay, she was your stereotypical California blonde valley girl) that the Jeff Bridges character in the movie The Big Lebowski was named for our debonair dachshund The Dude. Never mind that our Dude was born sixteen years after the 1998 comedy hit. “On the other hand,” she corrected herself, “you’re much too honest to ever run for office.” Only a few people, my Kim being one of them, can recognize when I’m using my “gift” of mirthful mendacity. It’s a gift I employ only to lighten the mood, not to exploit gullibility. We were standing in line in front of Jake’s, one of the most famous and popular restaurants in Palm Springs, when the opportunity for my duplicitous act presented itself.…

AlbuquerqueClosed in 2019Dog FriendlyGone But Not ForgottenItalianNew MexicoRating: Outstanding

M’TUCCI’S MARKET & PIZZERIA – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno9:35 AM

Greek mythology recounts the story of Tantalus, progeny of a divine parent (Zeus himself) and a mortal one. Uniquely favored among mortals by being invited to share the food of the gods, Tantalus abused that privilege by slaying his own son and feeding him to the gods as a test of their omniscience. The gods immediately figured out what Tantalus had done and in their rage condemned him to the deepest portion of the underworld where he would be forever “tantalized” with hunger and thirst. Though immersed up to his neck in water, when Tantalus bent to drink, it all drained away. When he reached for the luscious fruit hanging on trees above him, winds blew the branches beyond his reach. For years, Duke City diners have been tantalized by the promise of signage beckoning us to visit “delis” only to realize, much like the gods of Olympus, that all is not as it appears. A sign does not a deli make nor do products from peripatetic distributors. As with Tantalus, we’re left to pine for the authenticity of a true deli, the type of which Albuquerque has not seen since the bygone days of Deli Mart. Savvy diners may…

AmericanChickenRating: OutstandingTexasUnited States

GUS’S WORLD-FAMOUS FRIED CHICKEN – Austin, Texas

Gil Garduno11:18 PM

When I told my friend Carlos my Kim and I would be enjoying Gus’s World Famous Fried Chicken during our trip to Austin, he quipped “when did Los Pollos Hermanos open a restaurant in Texas?”.  Wrong Gus.  Obviously Carlos was joking about Gus Fring, the stoic Argentinian entrepreneur on the Albuquerque-based Breaking Bad television series.  Gus Fring, as you might recall, used his fried chicken franchise Los Pollos Hermanos as a front for methamphetamine distribution throughout the American Southwest.  The Colonel may have had eleven herbs and spices, but Gus had blue-hued crystal meth. The Gus’s World Famous Fried Chicken of which I spoke is a burgeoning franchise which got its start in Memphis, Tennessee.  While Nashville’s incendiary, cayenne-heavy, finger-dying hot chicken may be all the rage, Music City’s piquant poultry seems to be about testing your mettle and demonstrating pain is a flavor.  Gus’s fried chicken, on the other hand, is all about flavors that titillate your taste buds and linger on your lips.  Sure, it’s got heat, but just enough to give you a buzz, not to scald your mouth…and it doesn’t leave your fingers oily and orange.  Moreover, it’s absolutely delicious, easily the best spicy fried chicken…

AlbuquerqueAsianBrunchClosed in 2019Dog FriendlyGone But Not ForgottenHawaiianLatin AmericanNew MexicoRating: Outstanding

POKI POBLANO FUSION LOUNGE – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno1:09 PM

Starting with a raucous concert in 1954, the idiom “Elvis has left the building” was uttered at the conclusion of many of Elvis Presley’s concerts to encourage rabid fans to accept that no further encores were forthcoming and that they should go home. Today, those five simple words are an oft used catchphrase and punchline used in a humorous or sarcastic vein to refer to virtually anyone who has made an exit or vacated a premises, especially in dramatic fashion. The phrase was later co-opted in the Kelsey Grammar sitcom “Frasier” which ended with a play on the line—“Frasier has left the building.” For many Duke City diners, the term “Elvis has left the building” recalls June 1, 2017, the sad day when wunderkind Chef Elvis Boncomo shuttered the doors at Pasion Latin Fusion one final time. Pasion was unlike any restaurant in Albuquerque, showcasing a menu demonstrating uncommon creativity, imagination and willingness to experiment with ingredient and flavor combinations. It was quite simply one of the very best restaurants in Albuquerque with Elvis widely acknowledged as one of the city’s most innovative and talented chefs. The menu was an eye-opening melange of Latin fusion with elements of Cuban, Haitian,…