Category: Rating: Excellent

Excellent – High quality dining experience; very good to excellent food, attentive service, and a well-maintained atmosphere; worth a detour.

AlbuquerqueNew MexicoRating: ExcellentSandwich

Philly Steaks – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno8:02 PM

“I love the dignity in the name Philadelphia, but at heart, we’re Philly.” ~Lisa Scottoline New York Times Best-Selling Author “There are a couple of things you should know about Philadelphia,” my friend Vladimir “Speedy” Gonzalez told me before my first visit to the City of Brotherly Love. “First, Philadelphians are not rude. We may be blunt and direct, but that’s just passion.” Passion? I always thought he was a grouch. “Second,” he added, “you’ve got to know the process for ordering a Philly cheesesteak when you visit Pat’s King of Steaks. If you don’t, you’ll be sent to the…

AlbuquerqueNew MexicanNew MexicoRating: Excellent

New Mexico Beef Jerky Company – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno1:28 AM

The internet is replete with compilations abounding in truth and humor entitled “You Know You’re From New Mexico When…” Perhaps most resonating in factuality are the items which depict just how much New Mexicans value their culinary traditions. For example, you know you’re from New Mexico when: your favorite breakfast meat is sliced fried bologna; you buy green chile by the bushel and red chile by the gallon; most restaurants you go to begin with ‘El’ or ‘Los’; you have an extra freezer just for green chile; you think Sadie’s was better when it was in a bowling alley; and…

AlbuquerqueJapaneseNew MexicoRamenRating: Excellent

O Ramen – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno7:30 PM

“Food, like a loving touch or a glimpse of divine power, has that ability to comfort.” ~Norman Kolpas According to most online definitions, the term “soul food” defines the cuisine associated with African-American culture in the southern United States. In wide use since the 1960s, the term originated and came into heavy use with the rise of the civil rights and black nationalism movements. Though still most widely associated with the African-American culture, over the years “soul food” has become synonymous with basic, down-home cooking, especially of comfort foods…and as Cracked magazine puts it, soul food is “the real reason…

BreakfastDog FriendlyFood Network Eats New MexicoNew MexicoRating: ExcellentSanta FeSouthwestern

Tesuque Village Market – Tesuque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno4:34 PM

The most successful Indian revolt in North American history occurred on August 10th, 1680. On that day, more than 8,000 warriors from the various Native American pueblos in New Mexico put aside deep historical differences and banded together to drive the Spaniards from their ancestral lands. This event is celebrated each year in Tesuque Pueblo. Tesuque Pueblo played an integral role in the rebellion. Two Tesuque runners were dispatched by pueblo leaders to enlist support for the revolt. The runners carried knotted deer hide cords to the various pueblos, each knot signifying a day. On each successive day, one knot…

AfricanAlbuquerqueBurgersClosed in 2021Dog FriendlyGone But Not ForgottenIndianNew MexicoRating: Excellent

The Safari Grill – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno2:29 PM

“The wild dogs cry out in the night As they grow restless longing for some solitary company I know that I must do what’s right Sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus above the Serengeti I seek to cure what’s deep inside, frightened of this thing that I’ve become.” ~ Africa by Toto Shrouded in mist and steeped in myth and mystery, Mount Kilimanjaro attracts visitors from all over the world. Often called “the roof of Africa,” the towering, snow-capped, conically-shaped mountain is the crown jewel of the United Republic of Tanzania. At 19,340 feet, the magnificent freestanding peak commands the…

AlbuquerqueAsianNew MexicoRating: ExcellentVietnamese

Viet’s Pho – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno12:59 PM

“”Vietnam. It grabs you and doesn’t let you go. Once you love it, you love it forever.” ~ Anthony Bourdain Most of us have never been to Vietnam. It’s possible, maybe likely, that most of us will never make it to Vietnam…at least not in a corporeal state. That’s an important distinction because for years, we’ve already been visiting Vietnam. We’ve been magically transported to Vietnam every time Anthony Bourdain visited. Bourdain had the rare ability to develop intimate connections with the cultures and people he encountered in his travels then translate those connections into expressive and relatable narratives. He…

AlbuquerqueClosed in 2021Dog FriendlyFrenchGone But Not ForgottenRating: Excellent

P’Tit Louis Bistro – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno1:07 PM

“If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.” –Ernest Hemingway I’ve often wondered if Ernest Hemingway would have felt at home in Taos during the “roaring twenties,” a period of dynamic artistic, societal and lifestyle upheaval. Instead of communing with the Taos Society of Artists and other inspired Bohemian minds, Hemingway spent much of the decade in Paris, a city whose own liberal attitudes attracted poets, painters and writers from throughout the world. Paris…

2022 James Beard Foundation - "Best Chef - Southwest" SemifinalistAlbuquerqueAmericanClosed in 2022Diners Drive-Ins and DivesFood Network Eats New MexicoGone But Not ForgottenJames Beard Foundation (JBF) Award Nominees & WinnersRating: ExcellentSandwich

Bocadillos Slow Roasted: A Sandwich Shop – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno12:19 AM

The Food Network’s television cameras just love Chef Marie Yniguez who’s been showcased on not one, not two, not even three, but four of its prime-time programs. Aficionados of her cooking will tell you that in three of those programs she even upstaged Guy Fieri, the spiky-coiffed chef-glitterati.  Marie is a larger-than-life personality whose irreverent sense of humor, Burque pride and charisma can’t be contained within the small screen.  It’s inevitable that some network executive will someday make a movie of her life.  The question is who would play her.  Lady Gaga?  Nah, not enough personality.  Meryl Streep?  Ditto and…

AmericanBrunchCorralesDog FriendlyNew MexicoRating: Excellent

Indigo Crow Cafe – Corrales, New Mexico

Gil Garduno11:55 PM

Now I lay myself down to sleep I pray oh lord my soul to keep Cause if I should die before I wake I hope up in Heaven they’ve got lobster and steak It’s a sin if Heaven ain’t got an Indigo Crow Best food down here up there they’ve gotta know. A Sin if Heaven ain’t got an Indigo Crow But if they don’t then why the hell should I go. Now I’ve tried every joint around here I’ve had green chile stew, I’ve had had my root beer But when I want to treat my taste buds right…

AlbuquerqueBreakfastClosed in 2024Diners Drive-Ins and DivesFood Network Eats New MexicoGone But Not ForgottenNew MexicanRating: ExcellentTravel Channel Eats New Mexico

Cecilia’s Cafe – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno8:12 PM

FROM INSTAGRAM (December, 2024):  After 25 years on the corner of 6th & Silver, Cecilia’s Café has closed its doors. This New Mexican breakfast and lunch restaurant was once featured on the Food Network and was a beloved space for locals.  Owner Cecilia Baca cited persistent challenges with homeless people, issues finding employees, and the remote/hybrid work phenomenon as key reasons for closing. Since the pandemic, “customers aren’t working a full week,” she said. “Just a lot of little things that made me realize that Downtown will not come back to life the way it was before COVID.” Pasqual Baylon’s…

AlbuquerqueDog FriendlyNew MexicoRating: ExcellentSalvadoran

Gobble This – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno6:06 PM

“Is there a sound on Earth as joyous as the pat-pat-pat from a Salvadoran kitchen, the gentle rhythm of a cook slapping together a pupusa that just happens to be yours?” ~Jonathan Gold Pulitzer Prize-Winning Restaurant Critic Los Angeles Times Somewhere amid the bottlenecked tangle of highways, byways, freeways, parkways, roadways and expressways (boy, is that a misnomer) that make up Los Angeles there is well-trod mile many consider sacred. The Los Angeles Times calls it the “pupusa mile.” Housed in this approximately 5,280-foot-long stretch just beyond Koreatown is a congregation of Salvadoran restaurants so revered that “walking the pupusa…