Break The Chain Visits Paco’s International Smoked Cuisine

When Break The Chain host Ryan Scott learned that a CIA trained chef was operating in the Duke City, he knew he’d have to investigate.  His sleuthing didn’t reveal any clandestine menus or covert cooking, but he did discover a chef with some pretty deft knife-wielding skills.  Throughout Ryan’s interrogation, the chef maintained no cloak of subterfuge or secrecy.  In fact, Chef Paco Aceves was rather forthcoming about his training and his not-so-secret mission here in the Duke City. 

Chef Aceves’s mission is to introduce Albuquerque to a range of international smoked foods including some of the most popular American BBQ specialties. His eponymous restaurant, Paco’s International Smoked Cuisine is not your typical BBQ restaurant in that it he utilizes smoking techniques to prepare a menu of rotating dishes from various countries.  Oh, and Chef Aceves was trained by the CIA, but not that CIA.  He’s a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, the other CIA.  The CIA  Chef Aceves attended is America’s most respected school for culinary arts training.

In the third YouTube channel episode of Break the Chain, Ryan joins Chef Aceves in the kitchen where the chef displays his formidable culinary skills in preparing a delicious pork loin.  Ryan also interviews several guests who rhapsodize eloquently about the food at Paco’s.  This entertaining three-part episode can be viewed on the Break The Chain Channel.  This episode should come with a warning that watching it might lead to involuntary salivation and it certainly will lead to a visit to Paco’s.

BACKGROUND: Over a five year period ending in 2010, there was a five percent increase in the number of chain restaurants across the United States. More than 15,000 chains were added to a restaurant landscape already blighted by chains. During that same period, there was a one-percent decline in the number of independent restaurants. Albuquerque ranks 31st per capita in the number of fast food and chain restaurants among cities with a population of at least 200,000. The Duke City has more than 300 fast-food and chain restaurants–56.7 per 100,000 residents. The chain with the largest presence in Albuquerque is Subway.

If your loyalties lie with local restaurants–those owned and operated by our friends and neighbors, you’ll love “Break the Chain,” an enlightening and entertaining new media program hosted by Ryan Scott. Break The Chain’s celebrates locally owned and operated restaurants here in New Mexico.  Ryan’s guests are among New Mexico’s most noted chefs and culinary experts, all of whom will give you some great ideas on where you can go to break the chain.

Obviously Break The Chain isn’t about breaking or bankrupting heavily bankrolled chain restaurants. It’s about breaking the chain “habit,” the inclination many have to visit the ubiquitous and convenient chains. Break The Chain is a celebration of local mom-and-pop restaurants, aiming to show the many outstanding alternatives to the familiar chains. It’s an interactive show in which you can participate and become a part of the experience. Most of all, it’s a fun and lively show you will love.