Tag: Italian Cuisine

AlbuquerqueDog FriendlyItalianNew MexicoPizzaRating: Very Good

Uptown Saggio’s Scratch Italian Kitchen – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno12:01 AM

Can you imagine the outcry if Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham tried to abolish New Mexico’s sacrosanct red and green chile because the Department of Cultural Affairs Secretary convinced her that chile doesn’t bring out the best in New Mexicans?  Such a treasonous and heretical act would probably provoke outrage, if not an outright revolution.  Thankfully our Governor is a tremendous advocate for our home state’s hallowed and official state vegetable.  Regardless of your political affiliation, you can’t help puffing up your chest with pride when she responds to a snarky tweet from Colorado’s governor claiming Colorado’s chile is superior. That dystopian scenario sounds too outlandish to ever happen.  It would be akin to Italy trying to abolish pasta.  Wait, that actually did happen.  In the decade before World War II, an up-and-coming art movement called The Futurists derided anything that wasn’t on the cutting edge of modern. They wanted Italy to be on the front lines of the future and saw one thing holding the entire country back—its love of pasta.  The movement believed pasta was “heavy and anti-virile,” claiming that “no true fighters would ever eat pasta because of its tendency to weigh you down.” They also made it clear…

AlbuquerqueMediterraneanNew MexicoRating: N/R (Not Rated)

Central Bodega – Albuquerque, New Mexico

Gil Garduno12:01 AM

As if living just outside of Boston for two years just out of high school wasn’t thrilling (and filling) enough for this rustic clodhopper, New York City was only four hours (with good traffic) away.  There were more languages (800) spoken in New York City than there were people (500) in my hometown of Peñasco, not to mention a population of some 16-million.  All those languages meant a vast diversity of dining opportunities and I wanted to try them all.  Best of all, so many of them were available all day and all night long.  Large, hand-tossed slices of thin-crusted pizza were available from street vendors.  You could even find warm food at some of the Puerto Rican bodegas (owner-operated convenience stores) in the Bronx, home for my friends Carmen and Vladimir “Speedy” Gonzalez who graciously showed me around Metropolis.   At a neighborhood bodega, they introduced me to one of my favorite beverages, the legendary egg cream. Untapped New York describes a New York City bodega as “where the city’s character, diversity, and history are embodied in a physical space.”  Sadly, however, instead of being treated with reverence for being “lifelines for New York City’s food deserts” bodegas seem…