Tag: Green Chile Cheeseburger

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My Moms – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno

“God could not be everywhere, and therefore he made mothers.” —Rudyard Kipling Should you have the pleasure of getting to know Chef Marie Yniguez, even a little, you’ll come away with three absolute certainties.  First, Albuquerque’s arguably most famous celebrity chef is unabashedly herself.  The happy, loving, gregarious person you’ve seen on numerous Food Network culinary competitions doesn’t have a pretentious bone in her body.  She is as genuine and sincere as they come.  Though she left the hardscrabble mining town of Hurley, New Mexico a lifetime ago, she remains a country girl at heart. And even though she was as a semi-finalist for the James Beard Foundation’s “Best Chef – Southwest” honor in 2022, she remains as humble as…

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Sugar Nymphs Bistro – Peñasco, New Mexico

Gil Garduno

Peñasco has always been the beautiful stepsister ignored by the dutiful suitors who prefer the company of Taos, its more glamorous sibling. Taos, the mystical art colony to which new age subscribers seem preternaturally drawn is the terminus of the high road, starting and end point of the enchanted circle and one of the most beautiful communities in the country, if not the world. Sugar Nymphs Bistro is helping Peñasco lure some of those suitors away…at least for a spectacular meal or ten.  A 2002 entry into the Taos county restaurant scene, Sugar Nymphs offers a sophisticated menu that belies Peñasco’s rural simplicity while celebrating its agrarian traditions and serving its local home-grown organic produce.  It’s quite simply one of…

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Sparky’s Burgers, Barbecue & Espresso – Hatch, New Mexico

Gil Garduno

New Mexico’s Green Chile Cheeseburger Trail not only celebrates one of the Land of Enchantment’s most iconic foods, it showcases the restaurants, drive-ins, diners, dives, joints, cafes, roadside stands and bowling alleys which prepare our ubiquitous, incomparable green chile cheeseburger.  To New Mexicans, there is nothing as thoroughly soul-satisfying and utterly delicious! What elevates a burger from the ordinary to the extraordinary is taste bud awakening, tongue tingling, olfactory arousing green chile, New Mexico’s official state vegetable (even though it’s technically a fruit).  In the continually evolving mosaic that describes New Mexico’s cultural intermingling, one constant is green chile, an essential ingredient in many of our recipes and THE centerpiece of any outstanding green chile cheeseburger.  Even such corporate megaliths…

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El Roi Cafe – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno

You know you’ve been involved in project management for too long when the only thing that comes to mind when told about a restaurant named “El Roi” is “why would a restaurant be named for a Return on Investment (ROI).”  For those of us who have worked in Information Technology, ROI is a financial ratio used to calculate the benefit an investor will receive in relation to their investment cost.  Restaurants often have a poor return of investment–not just in financial capital, but in human capital.  Restaurants require a significant investment in time by owners as well as kitchen and “front of the house” staffs and the financial return isn’t exactly lucrative.  My Kim theorized that Roi is probably a…

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Red Onion Lounge – Heber, Arizona

Gil Garduno

On 5 November 1975, a seven-man logging crew working in the Sitgreaves National Forest near Heber, Arizona experienced what has become the most documented UFO (UAP or unidentified aerial phenomena, if you prefer) sighting and abduction in history. As the crew was wrapping up for the day, they saw a bright light off to their right. When they approached, they espied a bright saucer-shaped UFO  (UAP) hovering about 20 feet over a clearing.  Travis Walton was the only one who got out of the truck to investigate.  He was quickly knocked to the ground by a bright, blue-green beam of light.  Five days and six hours later, Walton awoke on the outskirts of Heber. Not surprisingly, the veracity of the…

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The Flying Star – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno

In the ancient Chinese art and science of Feng Shui, flying stars are used to assess the quality of the energy flow (qi) in a given place at a given time. The positive and negative auras of a building are charted using precise mathematical formulas to determine the wealth, academic, career, success, relationships and health of a building’s inhabitant. By understanding the course of harmful and beneficial flying stars, appropriate Feng Shui cures can be employed to mitigate the effects of those harmful stars while enhancing the positive effects of the beneficial stars. While owners Jean and Mark Bernstein may not have renamed their successful local restaurant chain for the Feng Shui principles of flying stars, there’s no denying the…

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A & B Drive In – Truth or Consequences, New Mexico

Gil Garduno

For five very memorable seasons, Michael Newman, the charismatic and ebullient host of New Mexico True Television and Melinda Frame, the show’s brilliant producer-director had the very best jobs in the world. Though not expressly stated, their true job titles should have been “Ambassadors for the Great State of New Mexico” because that’s what they really were. Every Sunday (8:30AM on KOB-TV Channel 4), they showcased the Land of Enchantment in all its magnificent splendor and incomparable beauty. With the flair of gifted raconteurs, they knew just when narration was necessary and when it was best to let spectacular backdrops tell the story. New Mexico True’s thematic episodes truly fed the soul and capture the imagination.  Note:  You can still…

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Holy Burger- Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno

During his 40-year career as a radio and television broadcaster for the York Yankees, Phil Rizzuto made “Holy Cow” his trademark exclamation. Similar to Yogi Berra, another legendary Yankee personality, Rizzuto became beloved for his snafus and humor: “Uh-oh, deep to left-center. Nobody’s gonna get that one! Holy cow! Someone got it.” In 1985 when the Yankees retired his uniform number 10, they paraded a live cow with a halo propped on its head onto Yankee Stadium. During the ceremony the “holy cow” knocked Rizzuto to the ground, an encounter he described thusly: “that big thing stepped right on my shoe and pushed me backwards, like a karate move.” The comedic broadcaster’s “Holy Cow” catchphrase became further cemented in pop…

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Big Boss Hot Links at Brew Lab 101 – Rio Rancho, New Mexico

Gil Garduno

The Oxford Dictionary defines an adage as “a proverb or short statement expressing a general truth.”  The adage “the apple does not fall far from the tree,” for example, means a child usually behaves in a similar way to his or her parents.  Sometimes, however, an adage fails to live up to the truism it purports to express.  One such example is the vast chasm that exists between patriarch Martin Crane (John Mahoney) and his sons Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) and Niles (David Hyde Pierce).  Where Martin was portrayed as an everyman with whom many of us can identify, Frasier and Niles were pretentious and condescending snobs.   In one episode the Brothers Crane decide to broaden their father’s horizons by taking…

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The Golden Light Cafe & Cantina – Amarillo, Texas

Gil Garduno

Published in 1938, John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath is widely regarded as one of the greatest American novels ever written. Replete with timeless themes of struggle, destitution, injustice, and the pursuit of a delusive “Promised Land,” the novel centers around the trevails of the Joad family.  Along with thousands of other tenant farmers from Oklahoma who lost their livelihood and property because of the Dust Bowl, the Joads travel the relatively nascent Route 66 toward California and the pursuit of a piece of land to call their own. Every night on their journey, the Joads and their fellow migrants witnessed man’s inclinations toward desperation, violence, and murderous anger as well as generousity and respect.   We couldn’t help but think about…