Month: September 2012

AlbuquerqueBreakfastBrunchBuffetClosed in 2014Gone But Not ForgottenLatin American

La Fonda Del Bosque – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno

In the millennium year, after years of planning and lobbying, the dream was finally realized of a haven  dedicated to the preservation, promotion, and advancement of Hispanic culture, arts, and humanities. In 2000, the National Hispanic Cultural Center (NHCC), launched along the Camino Real in the Albuquerque’s historic Barela’s neighborhood.  The Center is an architectural anomaly in a largely adobe-hued area, its unique structures including a renovated hacienda-style school, a stylized Mayan pyramid with interior elements modeled on Romanesque architecture and a torreon (tower) housing a 4,000 square foot concave fresco depicting over 3,000 years of Hispanic history. Ironically the complex chartered to preserve, protect and promote Hispanic culture had to displace several families, thereby disenfranchising some of the very…

AlbuquerqueClosed in 2014Gone But Not ForgottenNew Mexican

ZS&T’s Great Grub – Albuquerque, New Mexico (CLOSED)

Gil Garduno

“Here’s an idea: Quit playing on the Internet and get over to 5017 Menaul, N.E. for lunch. And dinner.” That’s not Gil Garduño admonishing you to take a break from the invaluable research you’re conducting on the Internet. That’s ZS&T’s Web site inviting you to what could very well be one of the best Duke City restaurants you’ve never heard of, a restaurant so confident in its cooking that its Web site boasts, “If you don’t think it’s the best food in Albuquerque, we’ll refer you to a good Ear, Nose and Throat doctor to get your taste buds adjusted.” Audacity, braggadocio or confidence? As Muhammad Ali used to say, “it’s not bragging if you can back it up.” ZS&T’s…

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Pepper Pot – Hatch, New Mexico

Gil Garduno

You might expect that a village renowned as the “chile capital of the world” could also boast of restaurants which showcase chile of such high quality that they would be veritable Meccas to which diners from throughout the state would pilgrimage.  With a population of 1,648 (as of the 2010 census), Hatch has fewer than ten restaurants, many of which do indeed seem to draw nearly as many visitors from outside of Hatch as they do local residents and most of which do indeed showcase red and green chile.  For New Mexican food, the one restaurant which most locals name as their very favorite is the Pepper Pot. Located in a converted residence, the Pepper Pot still resembles a family…

BarbecueMissouriRated 26

Arthur Bryant’s – Kansas City, Missouri

Gil Garduno

Shortly after Arthur Bryant died in 1982, the Kansas City Star published a cartoon showing St. Peter greeting Arthur at the gates of heaven and asking, “Did you bring sauce?” Perhaps not even in Heaven can such a wondrous sauce be concocted. Arthur Bryant’s is probably the most famous barbecue restaurant in the country, if not the world–an institution to which celebrity and political glitterati make pilgrimages. If Schlitz was the “beer that made Milwaukee famous,” then Arthur Bryant’s is the barbecue that made Kansas City one of America’s four pillars of barbecue (along with Memphis, Texas and the Carolinas). In a city where barbecue is exalted, Arthur Bryant’s may no longer be indisputably the one restaurant everyone mentions as…

Fine DiningMissouriRated 24

Savoy Grill – Kansas City, Missouri

Gil Garduno

In a 2012 episode of the Travel Channel’s “No Reservations” television program, host Anthony Bourdain and his Russian pal Zamir Gotta visited Kansas City in search of the city’s best barbecue.  When not licking barbecue sauce off their fingers, the peckish duo detoured to Stroud’s for the best fried chicken in the known universe and to The Savoy Grill for nostalgia and memories.  The Savoy Grill, a Kansas City landmark, has been making memories since 1903 when it was added to the Hotel Savoy.  Today, the Savoy Grill is the oldest restaurant in Kansas City while its home, the Savoy Hotel is the oldest continuously operating hotel in the United States west of the Mississippi River. During its inception, the…

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Danny Edwards Blvd. BBQ – Kansas City, Missouri

Gil Garduno

Kansas City is known as the “city of fountains.”  It’s also known as the “world’s barbecue capital.” If locals had their way, ever the twain would meet and the city’s fountains would be burbling not with water, but with barbecue sauce.  Barbecue sauce runs through the veins of local barbecue aficionados.  It’s an integral part of the city’s heritage.  More than at the other regions–the Carolinas, Texas and Memphis–in which barbecue is a religion, Kansas City pit masters know that sauce is the crowning touch to their low-and-slow handiwork. In combination with dry rub seasonings, the sauce gives smoked meats their personality.  It’s what you taste most along with the smoky flavor.  One of the very best barbecue sauces my…

ChickenKansasRated 25United States

Stroud’s Restaurant & Bar – Fairway, Kansas

Gil Garduno

Kansas City is often referred to as the “world’s barbecue capital.”  With more than 100 barbecue restaurants, its reputation for outstanding barbecue is known far and wide.  It’s not as commonly known that Kansas City can also strut its stuff about its fried chicken.  In fact, Travel Channel television host Adam Richman has joked that KC actually stands for “killer chicken.” The killer chicken tradition started with Stroud’s Restaurant which not surprisingly, began in 1933 as a barbecue shack in Kansas City.  On Independence Day a few years later, founder Helen Stroud added skillet fried chicken.  It sold out immediately and has been on the menu ever since.  Ironically, barbecue is no longer on the menu. Fittingly both of my…

BarbecueKansasRated 23United States

Oklahoma Joe’s Barbecue – Kansas City, Kansas

Gil Garduno

You might expect that a magazine renowned for its staunch advocacy of healthy living and fitness would celebrate only healthful dining and that its food-related content would be penned only by paragons of physical fitness and health. Perhaps because it may want a broader, younger readership demographic, Men’s Health Magazine asked popular but vice-ridden sybarite Anthony Bourdain to author an article entitled “13 Places to Eat Before You Die.” Bourdain, whose seedy past includes heavy drinking, drug use, chain smoking and an addiction to pork wrote a thought-provoking “bucket list” which included restaurants and food–outstanding though they might be–which might actually accelerate your demise. What a way to go! Interspersed within Bourdain’s lucky thirteen restaurants, some of which are among…

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Billy Goat Tavern – Chicago, Illinois

Gil Garduno

The genesis of the idiomatic expression “got your goat” which means “to greatly annoy someone” is in dispute with sources attributing it to both the United States and England.  The American version has it that horse trainers would put a goat in a racing horse’s stall to keep it calm.  When bettors wanted a horse to race badly, they took it away (ergo “got someone’s goat”) and the horse would become agitated and run badly.  No evidence exists to support this legend.  According to the English version, keeping a goat in the barn has a calming effect on cows, thereby motivating them to produce more milk.  When rapscallions wanted to upset competing cattle ranchers, they would abscond with their goat…

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Al’s #1 Beef – Chicago, Illinois

Gil Garduno

Assume the position!  It’s been called the “Chicago Lean,” the “Italian Stance” and simply “The Stance.”   It’s  the time-tested, traditional art and science of eating Italian beef sandwiches, a Chicago specialty.  Trust me, it’s not the same as eating an ordinary sandwich.  If you don’t follow the process, you’re bound to spill shards of beef, bits of giardiniera and drippings of spice-laden beef gravy onto your clothing.  Italian beef sandwiches are as messy as they are delicious.  Some Italian beef sandwich shops don’t even offer seating.  Instead, they provide high, thin counters with or without stools where you’ll park yourself and proceed to assume the position.  I’ll let the professionals take over from here.  Courtesy of Italianbeef.com: (1)  Put…

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David Burke’s Primehouse – Chicago, Illinois

Gil Garduno

By day, my friend James Sorenham was an architect of his business group’s data warehouse and business intelligence strategies.  By night and on weekends, James was a gentleman farmer tending to a small herd at his Broke Again ranch outside Portland, Oregon.  James took immense pride in raising prized beef cattle and kept his colleagues apprised of their progress through his weekly status reports.  Alas, his writing skills weren’t in the same zip code as his data management skills so when he reported that he had “personally inseminated sixteen cows,” he got teased mercilessly about his deviant bestial activities. The fact that David Burke is the first chef to own his own bull means “personal insemination” of beef cattle can…