Local Flavor May 2012

&

Farm Ranch 2012

MAY 2012

Santa Fe | Albuquerque | Taos A Taste of Life in New Mexico

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Home of the Healing Arts The Spa at Encantado offers an innovative selection of spa and wellness services, honoring New Mexico’s indigenous healing traditions while paying tribute to Santa Fe’s established reputation for eclectic approaches to health and well being.

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Farm and Ranch 2012

Photo: Kate Russell

Photos: Gabriella Marks

ON OUR COVER: The Family of Boxcar Farm

The Buzz

by Christie Chisholm | 08

Get in on all the latest news from Santa Fe, Albuquerque and Taos.

Everybody reads the buzz…

Farm & Table

by Gail Snyder | 13

The Farm and Ranch issue kicks off with a story about a restaurant—but not just any restaurant. Cherie and Joseph Austin recently opened one of the most exciting new concepts to ever hit Albuquerque, and we couldn’t wait to tell you about it.

A Farmer’s Life: What It’s Really Like

by Stanley Crawford | 18

Stan Crawford and his wife RoseMary have farmed in the Embudo Valley for over 40 years. This essay is a poignant expression of what those years have meant.

Chocolate Maven

by Barry Fields | 22

Always a favorite for breakfast on the go or a cozy lunch, the Chocolate Maven is now an intimate haven for dinner. Meet Chef Marianne Deery, who made it all happen; she’s as sweet as her name, and you’re going to love her food.

On the Cover: Farm Kids

by Kristen Davenport Katz | 26

In June of 2006, Kristen and Avrum Katz moved their family (and menagerie of “three dogs, three cats, 15 goats, 20-odd rabbits, several dozen chickens and some doomed geese”) and moved to a 100-year-old house with no running water on a 32-acre farm in the mountains of Northern New Mexico. We asked Kristen to share about how the kids were doing.

Making a Difference

by Tori Lee | 32

Chef Roland Richter of Joe’s Dining is one of the most fervent supporters of the Santa Fe Farmers’ Market, and he is truly making a difference.

Poetry of the Land

by Levi Romero | 34

We asked Levi Romero, honored with the title of Centennial Poet of New Mexico, to share three of his poems that celebrate life on the farm.

The Taos Hum

by Tania Casselle | 36

Welcome to a new monthly feature at localflavor, an insider’s look at some of the colorful folks who personify Taos, each in his or her own inimitable way.

In the Vineyard

by James Selby | 38

One of the most talked about trends in the wine world today is the growing number of vineyards that are being farmed biodynamically. We cut to the heart of the matter in this interview with Deborah Madison, author, chef and food activist.

A Taste of España

by Caitlin Richards | 40

Chef James Campbell Caruso’s newest cookbook is hot off the press, and his love of Spanish cooking and lifestyle are more passionate then ever.

Still Hungry?

by Caitlin Richards | 44

Three amazing recipes from España: Exploring the Flavors of Spain are paired with the equally luscious photography of Douglas Merriam.

2012 ~ Publishers Patty & Peter Karlovitz Editor Patty Karlovitz Publisher’s Assistant Caitlin Richards Art Director Jasmine Quinsier Cover photo: Gabriella Marks Advertising: Michelle Moreland 505.699.7369. Mary Brophy 505.231.3181. Leslie Davis 505.933.1345. Chris Romero 505.670.1331.

Prepress: Scott Edwards Ad Design: Alex Hanna Distribution: Southwest Circulation LocalFlavor 223 North Guadalupe #442, Santa Fe, NM 87501 Tel: 505.988.7560 Fax: 988.9663 E-mail: localflavor@earthlink.net Website: www.localflavormagazine.com localflavor welcomes new writers. Send writing samples to localflavor@earthlink.net

MAY

localflavor is published 11 times a year: Feb, March, April, May, June, July, Aug, Sept, Oct, Nov, Dec/Jan. Subscriptions $24 per year. Mail check to above address. © Edible Adventure Co.‘96. All rights reserved. No part of this magazine may be used without the permission of Edible Adventure Co. localflavor accepts advertisements from advertisers believed to be reputable, but can’t guarantee it. All editorial information is gathered from sources understood to be reliable, but printed without responsibility for erroneous, incorrect, or omitted information.

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4th Annual

A Bishop’s Lodge SUMMER EVENT Memorial Day Weekend Sunday, May 27 Father’s Day Weekend Sunday, June 17 4th of July Weekend Sunday, July 1

Grilled Steaks and Chicken, Braised Ribs, Ranch Burgers and All the Fixin’s • Cowboy Hats for Buckaroos • FREE Pony Rides Live Country/Western Music & Dancing

Gourmet BBQ Dinner from 6 pm $39.95 per person • $34.95 seniors $19.95 for buckaroos under 18, under 5 free

Reservations 505.819.4035 bishopslodge.com

Join Wildlife Rescue today!

Your membership supports the food and medical supplies vital to wildlife rehabilitation. Membership also supports programs in local schoolts, providing the next generation with intimate insights into the needs and values of our state’s rich wildlife heritage.

Volunteer...

If you would like to train to be a rehabilitator, join other volunteers answering the phone, filing or giving educational presentations in local schools, please contact us. Your membership and involvement connects you with an expanding group of people and organizations who really care about wildlife.

Wildlife Rescue Inc. of New Mexico

To raise, rehabilitate, release and educate PO Box 70364 Albuquerque, NM 87197

505-344-2500 http://www.wrinm.org 6

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theLetter Welcome to the 2012 Farm and Ranch issue. Each year for this issue, we choose a different theme that focuses on the men and women who have chosen farming and ranching as their livelihood. One of my favorites was the year we covered the stories of young people raised on farms who were at the point of deciding on their career paths. One year we told the stories of farmers who were also songwriters, or artists, or poets. Another time we explored families who uphold a centuries-old tie to the land. And then one year we covered the inverse: the generation of agrarians from urban backgrounds who came to New Mexico to “live their bliss.”

This year’s theme is my new favorite. We asked three farmers to share their stories, in their own words. The writers who bring you the heart of this issue are novelist and essayist Stan Crawford of Bosque Farms, writer Kristen Davenport Katz of Boxcar Farms and poet Levi Romero, native son of the Embudo Valley. They come from different cultures, generations and backgrounds, but each is tied to the land in a deeply personal way—and each has a unique way of sharing this connection with us. And the pieces are all the more special because they are in the writers’ own words.

While the other features this month are what you have come to expect from us in the more urbane world of fine food and wine, these are also inextricably tied to the land. The piece on the justopened restaurant Farm & Table, nestled in Albuquerque’s bucolic North Valley, is one of the most exciting stories that we have done in a very long time. Cherie and Joseph Austin are at the vanguard of a new generation of restaurants—and they are right here in our own backyard. We’ve also got Chef Roland Richter of Santa Fe sharing his thoughts on what it takes to be a chef committed to sustainability and wine writer James Selby exploring the growing emphasis on bio-dynamic practices in vineyards in an interview with “soil sister Deborah Madison—citizen, writer, gardener, cook.”

Creating some real excitement in the world of culinary writing is the debut of Chef James Campbell Caruso’s new cookbook España: Exploring the Flavors of Spain. Writer Caitlin Richards sits down with Caruso for an incisive interview on the book—and on the powerful influence of Spanish cuisine and culture. The interview ends with a surprising announcement by the chef that you won’t want to miss.

There is something quite magical about watching an issue come together—and an undeniable sense of accomplishment when you finally hold it in your hands.

This month has been more magical than most. We hope you enjoy it.

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Featuring:

Pelican’s • Zinc • Seasons • Savoy The Ranchers Club • Farm &Table Scalo • Marcello’s Chophouse Taste of the Wild Catering National Distributing Desserts: Rebel Donut, Caked & more Wine Sampling:

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A Taste of Life in New Mexico

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the ALBUQUERQUE

by Christie Chisholm

Beer, dinner and Zinc—that’s a pretty delicious combination. Zinc Wine Bar and Bistro’s new monthly beer dinner series has us salivating, with four courses of beer paired with dishes like black mussels and chorizo sausage in a nut brown ale and fennel jus, braised pork belly gougeres, and java porter pot de crème.

Each month will feature a different local brewery, and Sunday, May 20, Marble Brewery is on the menu. The cost for the dinner is only $35 per person, but you need a reservation. 3009 Central NE, 505.254.9462, www.zincabq.com.

The wildly successful Corrales Art Studio Tour is back for its 14th year. On Saturday and Sunday, May 5 and 6, more than 60 artists will let you take a peek inside their homes and studios and show you how it all happens. To get a preview of the works shown on the tour, stop by a preview reception at the Rancho De Corrales Event Center (4895 Corrales Road), where a children’s art exhibition will also be on display. The reception takes place on Thursday, May 3, and tickets cost $20. (Proceeds will benefit ARCA and the Corrales Arts Center.) The tour takes place both days from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. To find out more, visit www. corralesartstudiotour.com.

| Corrales Art Studio Tour Speaking of Corrales tours, this one’s not until June, but because it always sells out early, we’re telling you about it now. The Corrales Garden Tour features seven area gardens, which range in location from the Bosque to the Sandhills and in style from xeric to traditional. Get inspiration for your own plot of land from one half-acre that was converted from an old, unmaintained lawn into a garden overflowing with flowers and a native turf area and a privacy screen to provide a buffer from downtown 8

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Corrales. Another garden is planted with keepsakes and “memories” from the owners’ home in Georgia, blending Southern and Southwestern scenery and skills. Master gardeners will also be available at each garden to answer questions. Tickets are only $10, with proceeds being used for a landscaping project along pathways on Corrales Road. It’s all on Sunday, June 10, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. For more information, call 505.350.3955 or visit www.corrales-gardentour.com.

| Corrales Garden Tour In a full solar eclipse, the moon’s shadow overtakes the entire surface of the sun, creating a blazing ring of fire along its circumference. That’s super cool, but what’s even cooler is that it’s happening this month, on Sunday, May 20, and Albuquerque is supposed to be one of the best places on the planet to see it. And here’s another dose of cool to add to the cosmic mix: The Anderson-Abruzzo Albuquerque International Balloon Museum has come up with a great plan to view it. From 4 to 10:30 p.m. on the day of the eclipse, The Albuquerque Astronomical Society will provide telescopes fitted with solar filters, which will project their findings onto a massive LCD screen inside the museum.

Because you can’t look at the sun directly (unless your brilliant plan is to blind yourself ), volunteers will also roam the grounds passing out special solar glasses and materials to make pinhole cameras so you can look right at the eclipse. Backdropping all of this awesomeness will be live music, food, drinks and children’s activities. And for pure nerdy pleasure, the movie Contact, which was filmed at Socorro’s Very Large Array, will be screened at 8:30 p.m. Normal museum admission fees will be in effect, but parking is free. If you’ve got folding chairs and/or picnic blankets, bring ’em, because seating will be limited.

And quickly, here’s one more cosmic event for you: On Tuesday, June 5, you can experience the transit of Venus in a similar capacity. Only twice a century, Venus passes across the face of the sun, but you can’t see it without crazy magnification. The Balloon Museum is setting up another LCD display to provide you with just that, along with more neat events. Get all the details by calling 311 or at www.cabq.gov/balloon. magazine.com

While you’re in Balloon Museum territory checking out the solar eclipse, you may as well stroll over to the 24th annual Celtic Festival, which is right next door at Balloon Fiesta Park on Saturday and Sunday, May 19 and 20. There will be live music (including bagpipe and drumming competitions), dancing (with Irish step and Scottish Highland troupes), cultural activities (such as goat and duck herding), athletic competitions (like rugby tournaments) and traditional food and drink (Scottish whiskey tastings, anyone?).

Kids will also have plenty to do, with pony rides, prizes, castles, quests and knight fighting. The festival runs from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. on Saturday, May 19, and from 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. on Sunday, May 20 (just in time to head over for that eclipse). Admission is $15 for one day or $20 for both, with discounts for seniors, children and active military members and free admittance for kids under six. For more information, visit www.celtfestabq. com.

| Cinco de Mayo Folk Art and Music Festival Celebrate May 5 with Kenny Chavez at his sixth annual Cinco de Mayo Folk Art and Music Festival. With more than 30 artists from around New Mexico (and some passing through from other states),

New! New! New!

music all day long and a contest and raffle, it promises to be a fun time. The much-lauded Farm & Table will provide food and drink. It’s at La Parada (8917 Fourth Street NW) from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.

505.897.8203, www.shoplaparada.com.

There’s a new retreat and wellness center in Bernalillo. La Hacienda de La Luna inhabits a 300-year-old building, which has served as a chapel, winery, bed and breakfast, and stagecoach stop in its various realizations. The center offers spa therapies, health and weight loss management, yoga classes, chair massages, energy work and more. And here’s a perk: New Mexico residents get 20 percent off all wellness spa services. Welcome them and treat yourself at 21 Baros Lane, Bernalillo. 505.771.9312, www. lahaciendadelaluna.com.

Blackout Theatre has been killing it lately with its viral “Shit Burqueños (New Mexicans) Say” video on YouTube and five wins in the Alibi’s 2012 Best of Burque poll, for best Theater Performance, Comedy Troupe, Theater Troupe, Arts Nonprofit and Actor (Blackout member Lauren Poole took that one handily).

And so it’s with great anticipation that it releases its newest original work, F8: A Rock Musical. F8 is a technology company that controls the seemingly mundane details of earthlings’ daily lives. Find out what happens when one woman decides to fight the system. The show runs from May 11 through 20 at the VSA North Fourth Theatre. Tickets are $15 general admission and $10 for students, seniors and Albuquerque Theatre Guild members.

For showtimes, to buy tickets and to find out more, visit www.blackouttheatre.com.

4904 Fourth Street NW, 505.672.8648.

SANTA FE

by Christie Chisholm

We’ve been getting great reviews from readers on the new Babaluu’s Cocina Cubana. The chef, Amaury Torres, suffered through a lot on his path toward opening a restaurant (and fleeing communist Cuba in 1994 with his brother on a homemade raft was just the beginning of the journey).

But the real draw at Babaluu’s is the food, which features Cuban paninis, plantains, fresh clams and shrimp cocktails. The new eatery has a lot of plans, with a gourmet food shop coming this summer and cooking classes starting in the fall. In the meantime, Chef Amaury and his wife Mary are having a grand opening for the Havana Copa Cabana patio on Saturday, May 12, which will include dining and dancing. 3810 Hwy. 14, 505.471.1100, www.babaluuscocina. com. Call early for tickets! The restaurant is | Chef Amaury Torres of Babaluu a short 6 miles south of Santa Fe and there’s plenty of parking for motorcycles, horses, cars and helicopters. (Call ahead for days open and hours as they are not the usual.)

As you’re tilling, mixing and seeding your gardens this spring, consider adding an extra row. This is the simple request from The Food Depot, which has launched a new strategy for feeding the hungry.

With Plant a Row for the Hungry, the organization hopes backyard gardeners will cultivate an additional row in their crop this year and donate its harvest. The Food Depot can’t meet the growing demand for produce, and with fuel prices continuing to swell, the cost of acquiring produce is also rising. You can bring your bounty to 1222 Siler Road, and if you’re outside Santa Fe County, call The Food Depot for the name of a food pantry or soup kitchen in your area where you can drop off your fresh produce. 505.471.1633, www. thefooddepot.org.

J. Edgar Hoover called Emma Goldman the “most dangerous woman in America.”

A Russian immigrant who came to New York City at 16 in the late 19th century, she became a key member of the anarchist movement. Nicknamed “Red Emma,” she’d cross the country speaking out on workers’ rights, capitalism and, of course,

Photo: Kate Russell

Exciting news for La Boca lovers (which, really, is just about everyone): The tapas and wine bar is opening a second restaurant just down the alley. The Taberna La Boca bar and patio will serve many of the same signature dishes from La Boca’s kitchen, so when the main eatery fills up, you’ll still be able to get your fix.

From 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. every day, you can stop by for the likes of house made empanadas, bocadillos, tapas, churros, gazpacho and sangria. Taberna closes at 2 p.m. for private parties and special events, but it opens back up again at 5 p.m. and stays open until 10, offering La Boca’s full tapas menu. Also, keep an eye out for cooking demonstrations and wine tastings, which will be hosted in the new space.

With the onslaught of beautiful weather, it’s the perfect time to spend an evening on the patio with a glass of wine and a sampling of Spanish cheeses. La Boca: 72 West Marcy. Taberna: 145 Lincoln Plaza (in the former Carlos’ Gosp’l Café space).

505.982.3433, www.labocasf.com.

free love. Now composer Jeremy Bleich and librettist Sarah-Jane Moody have taken the words from Goldman’s essays, books, speeches and letters and turned them into Love & Emma Goldman: A Rock Opera, presented by Wise Fool New Mexico and Santa Fe Performing Arts.

Catch the rabble-rousing show—with singing, dancing and a live band—from May 17 through 20 at the Armory for the Arts. Tickets are $15 to $30, available on a sliding scale. Appropriate for children ages 12 and up. To make reservations, email emmagoldmanrocks@yahoo.com. 1050 Old Pecos Trail. To find out more, visit www.wisefoolnewmexico.org.

| Meagan Chandler in Love and Emma Goldman: A Rock Opera Julie Brette Adams has spent 25 years interpreting and creating the movements and forms that make modern dance.

From May 11 through 13, the dancer, choreographer and producer will show off her experience with One Woman Dancing, a solo contemporary dance concert at the Santa Fe Playhouse. Associate Artistic Director (and guest percussionist) Jefferson Voorhees will accompany her on dances such as “The Dreamscape of an Iconic Mexican Artist,” “The Death Poem of a Silent Geisha” and “The Play of Female Form and Steel Geometry.” Tickets are $20 general admission and $15 for students and seniors. 142 East DeVargas, 505.986.1801.

For more information, visit www. onewomandancing.com.

Photo: Bill Heckel

Eric DiStefano (of Geronimo and Coyote Café) and Sara Chapman (also of Coyote Café), along with partners Merit Rieland and Dana Cortez, are joining forces to open Stats Sports Bar & Nightlife. The restaurant’s grand opening is set for Friday, May 11. Here’s what we know about it so far: It’ll have a nightclub open four nights a week with live music the other three. The menu will provide standard sports bar fare but with DiStefano flair. Hours are 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day, with the nightclub open until 2 a.m. Thursdays through Saturdays. There’s no website yet, but you can find info about upcoming events on its Facebook page. 135 W. Palace, 505.982.7265.

Las Cosas Kitchen Shoppe and Cooking School has some awesome cooking classes this month—and here are two of my favorites. The first is just in time for Mother’s Day with Special Brunch for Mom. Learn how to whip up ricotta-berry stuffed toast, sweet crab eggs Benedict, red chile–honey–glazed bacon, ginger-cranberry scones, lemon icebox tartlets and Mexican licuados. It’s on Saturday, May 12, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Next, on Tuesday, May 22, from 6 to 9 p.m., is Exotic Asian Appetizers.

This course covers a greatest-hits menu of Johnny Vee favorites from China, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia. Get your fingers delightfully sticky while making Vietnamese spring rolls, pot stickers, steamed pork buns, Sichuan spiced eggplant, chicken sate, samosas, Thai fish cakes with spiced cucumber sauce, and banana fritters with pineapple ice cream. Each class costs $80.

181 Paseo de Peralta, 877.229.7184, www.lascosascooking.com.

The newest addition to area farmers’ markets will be stationed right outside local wine store Arroyo Vino. Starting on May 31 and running each Thursday from 2 to 6 p.m., the market will feature local and organic produce, plants, meats and more. Although there will be fewer than a dozen vendors to start with, they’re hoping it will grow! (What a great addition for that end of town.) 218 Camino la Tierra, 505.983.2100, www. arroyovino.com.

If you want to hone your bluegrass chops and like the idea of doing it in some of the most stunning canyon country in New Mexico, this is going to get you pretty excited. The 21,000-acre Ghost Ranch in Abiquiú offers its third annual Bluegrass Camp Wednesday, May 19, through Sunday, May 20. Musicians of all levels are welcome at this retreat, which will teach you how to put your guitars, mandolins, fiddles, banjos, clawhammer banjos, basses and voices to better use. Leading the event is singer, songwriter, guitar-picker and teacher Mike Finders, who’ll be joined by Gregg Daigle, Matt Flinner, Aaron and Erin Youngberg, Cahalen Morrison, Brian Wicklund and Eli West. Bluegrass Camp costs $365. 505.685.4333. For more information, directions and to register, visit www.ghostranch.org.

It’s most writers’ dream: traveling around the world and getting paid to write about it. On Saturday, May 19, Lesley King will teach you how to do it in Travel Writing and Blogging for Fun and Profit. The 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Wordharvest Workshop will show you how to blog, to find or refine a subject, build a following and create a book. Class is $150 for

general admission, $130 for Eldorado residents. It’s at The Performance Space at La Tienda 7 Caliente, in Eldorado, 505.471.1565, www.wordharvest.com.

TAOS Taos, stand up and take a bow. The revered Smithsonian Magazine just named Taos the number two “Best Small Town in America.” Their tribute: “… these days tourists, seekers, skiers and other outdoor enthusiasts pack the plaza of the old adobe town, dabble in its many galleries and museums, delve into history at the 1804 Spanish Colonial Martinez Hacienda and attend concerts (the Music from Angel Fire is a world-class chamber music festival).

But Taos (pop. 5,700) still speaks most compellingly to writers, photographers and artists who, like Georgia O’Keeffe and D.H. Lawrence before them, come for the flash of a passing spirit and the quality of the light.”

So what’s the town that beat out Taos for first place? Great Barrington, Mass., which is apparently worth a trip. If you live in Taos, congratulations on choosing well.

If you don’t, maybe it’s time to revisit your favorite B&B. Taos’ El Monte Sagrado celebrates a taste of India this Saturday, May 5. Visit the hotel’s De La Tierra Restaurant for authentic Indian cuisine, with raita, mint chutney, vegetable samosas, vegetable pakoras and a buffet with aloo tikki, chicken tandoori, mixed vegetable curry, aloo choley, roast leg of lamb and more.

Served from 5 to 10 p.m., dinner is $25 per person. Also stop by the Grand Bohemian Gallery from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. to listen to the music of Fardeschi.

Entrance fee is $10. Round out the night by staying in one of El Monte Sagrado’s luxurious 84 guest rooms and casitas. 317 Kit Carson Road. 575.758.3502, www. elmontesagrado.com.

El Meze Restaurant in Taos has an amazing Italian Wine Dinner slated for Thursday, May 17, featuring wines from the Piedmont region. Five courses start with hamachi (yellowtail) with shaved fennel and dried white peach caponata on toast, paired with Bellavista Special Cuvee Brut NV. The delicacies keep coming with lobster mousse ravioli, grilled quail, Brunello-braised beef short ribs and a fresh strawberry tart, all matched with exquisite wines. The fun begins at 6 p.m., and tickets are $95 per person, plus tax and gratuity. 1017 Paseo del Pueblo Norte.

575.751.3337, www.elmeze.com.

| Julie Brette Adams in One Woman Dancing A Taste of Life in New Mexico

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Join us on the Blue Heron patio at Sunrise Springs for dining overlooking the tranquil ponds...

• New Casual Menu • Full Bar Available

Mother’s Day Brunch 11am-4pm

Summer Hours: Wed–Sun 11:30am to 9pm 242 Los Pinos Rd, Santa Fe (only 20 minutes south of the Plaza) www.SunriseSprings.com (505) 428-3600

Northern New Mexico’s Favorite Choice Competitive Prices Largest Selection Friendly Staff We also carry over 20 varieties of keg beer FINE WINE & LIQUOR

Wine tasting every Saturday 4pm - 7pm Temperature Controlled Wine Cellar

NEW LOCATION

Something for every taste

Presently Stocking

1512 Pacheco Street, Suite A-204 Santa Fe, NM 87505 p: 505.982.4536 f: 505.982.0041 barbara@sfdesignconnection.com

Over 3,500 Wines 220 Types of Vodka 910 Beer Choices 222 Tequilas 120 Single Malt Scotches 136 Types of Rum 505-455-2219 | kokoman@cybermesa.com Hwy 84/285 Pojoaque, 12 miles North of Santa Fe

Scan to purchase tickets

Jewelry ~ Accessories ~ Carvings & Beadwork noon to 6 Balloon Fiepm daily sta Park

SponSored by

526 N Guadalupe (in DeVargas Mall) ~ Santa Fe 10

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preSenTed by THe neW MeXICo WIne GroWerS ASSoCIATIon

noon to 6pm daily Balloon Fiesta Park

Explore New Mexico’s Wine Trails VISITORS ARE WELCOME

Call ahead for tasting room hours & tour times.

New Mexico Wineries Antonito

Grants

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Carrizozo

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Ruidoso

13 Cloudcroft 17 Mtn Park 14

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Mesilla

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Del N

Los Ranchos

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Albuquerque

Menaul

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Lomas Central

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Bridge

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Roswell

Artesia

24 Hobbs

Riv er

Carlsbad 23

Las Cruces (see inset)

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448

31

35

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25

20

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21

San Lorenzo

Deming

10

Montano

Centr

Tularosa 18 8 Alamogordo

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Lordsburg

Vaughn

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Truth or Consequences

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San Antonio

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Albuquerque

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Las Vegas

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Santa Fe

Placitas

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San Mateo

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43 44

Los Alamos

Clayton Springer

Angel Fire

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Gallup

46

Española

Taos

49 48 Dixon Velarde

47

Embudo Cuba

50

Capulin

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51

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52

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22. Willmon Vineyards 2801 Sudderth Dr. Ruidoso, NM 88345 (575) 630-WINE Endofthevine.com 23. Balzano Winery Trinity Hotel, 201 S Canal Carlsbad, NM 88220 (575) 234-9891 Thetrinityhotel.com 24. Cottonwood Winery 1 East Cottonwood Rd. Artesia, NM 88210 (575) 365-3141 Cottonwoodwineryllc.com 25. Pecos Flavors 305 N. Main St. Roswell, NM 88201 (575) 627-6265 Pecosflavorswinery.com 26. *Bee’s Brothers Meadery 27. Tierra Encantada Winery 1872 Five Points Rd. SW Albuquerque, NM 87105 (505) 764-9463 Tierra-encantada.com 28. Guadalupe Vineyards 188 San Jose Loop San Fidel, NM 87049 (505) 552-0082 Guadelupevineyards.com 29. St. Clair Bistro 901 Rio Grande NW Albuquerque, NM 87104 (505) 243-9916 Stclairwinery.com 30. Gruet Winery 8400 Pan American Fwy NE Albuquerque, NM 87113 (505) 821-0055 Gruetwinery.com 31. Casa Rondena 733 Chavez Rd. NW Los Ranchos Albuquerque, NM 87107 (505) 344-5911 32. Matheson Wine Co. 103 Rio Rancho Blvd. B3 Rio Rancho, NM 87124 (505) 350-6557 Mathesonwines.com 33. *Pasando El Tiempo 34. Milagro Winery 985 W. Ella Corrales, NM 87048 (505) 898-3998 Milagrowine.com 35. Corrales Winery 6273 Corrales Rd. Corrales, NM 87048 (505) 898-5165 Corraleswinery.com 36. Acequia Vineyards and Winery 240 Reclining Acres Corrales, NM 87048 (505) 264-1656 37. Anasazi Fields Winery 26 Camino de los Pueblitos Placitas, NM 87943 (505) 867-3062 Anasazifieldswinery.com 38. Casa Abril 01 Camino Abril Algodones, NM 87001 (505) 771-0208 Casaabrilvineyards.com 39. Ponderosa Valley 3171 Hwy 290 Ponderosa, NM 87044 (505) 834-7487 Ponderosawinery.com 40. *Jacona Valley 41. *Falcon Meadery 42. Vino del Corazon 235 Don Gaspar Ave., Ste 6 Santa Fe, NM 87501 (505) 216-9469 vinodelcorazon.com 43. Santa Fe Vineyards 106 N. Shining Sun Santa Fe, NM 87506 (505) 455-2826 Estrelladelnortevineyard.com 44. Estrella del Norte Vineyard 106 N. Shining Sun Santa Fe, NM 87506 (505) 455-2826 Estrelladelnortevineyard.com

Valley

1. Sunland Winery 1769 Victory Lane Sunland Park, NM, 88063 (575) 589-1214 2. La Vina Winery 4201 S Hwy 28 La Union, NM 88021 (575) 882-3987 Lavinawinery.com 3. Rio Grande Winery 5321 Hwy 28, Mile Marker 25 Las Cruces, NM 88005 (575) 524-3985 Riograndewinery.com 4. St. Clair Winery 1325 De Baca Rd. Deming, NM 88030 (575) 842-8689 Stclairwinery.com 5. Luna Rossa 3710 W. Pine St. Deming, NM 88030 (575) 544-1160 Lunarossawinery.com 6. Black Range/Vintage Wines 2461 Calle de Principal Mesilla, NM 88046 (575) 523-9463 Blackrangevineyards.com 7. Josefina’s Old Gate Cellars 2261 Calle de Guadelupe Mesilla, NM 88046 (575) 525-2620 Josephinasoldgate.com 8. Heart of the Desert 7288 Hwy 54/70 Alamogordo, NM 88310 (575) 434-0035 Heartofthedesert.com 9. St. Clair Bistro 1800 Avenida de Mesilla Las Cruces, NM 88005 (575) 524-2408 Stclairwinery.com 10. Luna Rossa 1321 Avenida de Mesilla Las Cruces, NM 88005 (575) 526-2484 Lunarossawinery.com 11. Amaro Winery 402 S. Melendres St. Las Cruces, NM 88001 (575) 527-5310 Amarowinerynm.com 12. Fort Seldon Winery 1233 Fort Seldon Rd. Las Cruces, NM 88007 (575) 647-9585 13. Arena Blanca Winery 7320 US Hwy 54/70 North Alamogordo, NM 88301 (575) 437-0602 Pistachiotreeranch.com 14. Arena Blanca Tasting Room 37 Hwy 82 Alamogordo, NM 88301 (575) 437-0602 Pistachiotreeranch.com 15. Heart of the Desert 2355 Calle de Guadelupe Mesilla, NM 88046 (575) 647-2115 Heartofthedesert.com 16. Heart of the Desert 4100 Dripping Springs Rd. Las Cruces, NM 88001 (575) 522-4100 Heartofthedesert.com 17. *Draney Orchard 18. Dos Viejos 69 Pecos Rd. Tularosa, NM 88352 (575) 585-2647 Dosviejoswines.com 19. La Esperanza 100 De La O San Lorenzo, NM 88041 (505) 259-9523 20. Tularosa Vineyards #23 Coyote Canyon Rd. Tularosa, NM 88352 (575) 585-2260 Tularosavineyards.com 21. Noisy Water 2372 Sudderth Dr. Ruidoso, NM 88345 (575) 257-9335 Rellenobros.com

El Paso

Map by Jan Underwood, Information Illustrated, 2011

10

Legend Interstate Highway

International Boundary

State Highway

Wine Trail

Federal Highway

45. Don Quixote Winery State Road 4 Los Alamos, NM 87544 (505) 695-0817 Dqdistillery.com 46. Black Mesa Winery 1502 State Hwy 68 Velarde, NM 87582 (800) 852-6372 Blackmesawinery.com 47. Vivac Winery 2075 State HWY 68 Dixon, NM 87531 (505) 579-4441 Vivacwinery.com 48. La Chiripada Winery Hwy 75 Dixon, NM 87527 (505) 579-4437 Lachiripada.com

State Line

52 Wineries See list on opposite page

0

5

Scale in Miles 10 25 15

50

49. *Ritchie-Slater 50. La Chiripada Tasting Room 103 Bent St. Taos, NM 87571 (575) 751-1311 Lachirpada.com 51. Wines of the San Juan 233 Hwy 551 @Turley Blanco, NM 87412 (505) 632-0879 Winesofthesanjuan.com 52. St. Clair Bistro 5150 E. Main St. Farmington, NM 87491 (505) 325-0711 Stclairwinery.com *Non-Members

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Farm&Table

A

t Farm & Table, one of Albuquerque’s newest and most compelling restaurants to hit the scene, the real story is roots. As Cherie Montoya Austin likes to tell firsttime visitors, “My dad—there’s the founder of our feast!”

The sweet adobe building housing the restaurant and its modest farm abut the property’s nine-acre alfalfa field. Located in the heart of the North Valley, where rich soil is fed by the Rio Grande, this area has traditionally been home to sprawling, bucolic agricultural land with big spreading trees. About ten years ago, as commercial interests began to encroach, Cherie’s father bought what is now the family’s property to preserve it from being developed for housing. “He did it out of his love for this valley,” says Cherie, who, along with her sisters, grew up in the area.

Currently, there are five generations of the family who live within a two-mile radius. People in the Valley, including her grandparents, grew most of what they ate. Cherie herself was raised to appreciate food made from scratch using local ingredients, mostly homegrown. And she remembers that slower, more relaxed time when people knew their neighbors and the community thrived on its resilient web of interconnections.

With a background like that, Cherie is the perfect person to successfully execute a plan for a restaurant like Farm & Table. Along with her husband, Joseph Austin, she opened it a scant few months ago, and so far it’s been slammed every single night. With its focus on sophisticated and simple, elegant dishes crafted with locally-sourced seasonal ingredients (including those from the eatery’s farm out back), a democratically run kitchen in which everyone’s ideas are encouraged, genuine hospitality (“Come find your place at the table!” says their website), and the fervent desire to be a cornerstone of the community, Farm & Table offers diners a culinary concept they have obviously been hungering for. story by GAIL SNYDER p h o t o s b y K AT E R U S S E L L

| Chef Ka’ainoa Ravey, Joseph Austin, Cherie Austin and Ric Murphy

A Taste of Life in New Mexico

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Farm&Table 14

It’s getting dangerously close to the five o’clock hour one chilly spring evening. Most restaurants would never consent to scheduling a group interview with the owners, the executive chef, the pastry chef and the farmer (if they even had one) just before doors open for dinner. But here we are—chairs pulled up around a big corner table, Cherie folding menus as we talk, Joseph supervising wait staff in the background while simultaneously taking phone reservations—and it’s a busy environment, a definitely focused, on-time environment but calm and cheerful, with everything running smoothly.

Ric Murphy, the restaurant’s farmer, is talking about growing crops for Farm & Table as well as for his own small CSA and, starting in May, a farm stand. How can he do all this by himself? “I don’t,” he says, laughing. “We have lots of volunteers: individuals, UNM Sustainable Studies students, people here for tours and class field trips.” And every Monday night is volunteer night, with a potluck afterwards. “That’s a beautiful time of day to work in the field.” CSA members join restaurant staff and anyone else who wants to come help—including pastry chef Rachel Patton’s small son, who loves it.

Chef Ka’ainoa Ravey, originally from Hawaii, has worked in kitchens both there and in New York. He loves how much free rein he’s given at Farm & Table to stretch his creative muscles; Cherie says that Ravey’s constantly asking his team what they’d like to see on the menu, which shifts gears five times a year. “I like to keep thinking and learning constantly,” he says, “not do the same thing, or I get burnt out.”

Clearly gifted, this chef enjoys creating memorable meals that run a unique and impressive gamut. Case in point: a salad of quinoa and roasted root vegetables on a bed of mixed local greens with panko-encrusted goat cheese and a braised local pork belly appetizer with crisp apple slices and butterscotch-miso sauce. Then there’s an entrée he calls Salmon Two Ways, served seared on a bed of mushroom-quinoa pilaf and as a tartare salad over field greens with shaved asparagus—layers built upon complex layers. (“And then, when you take a bite,” he says, “it all combines.”) What it all combines into is divine. And with such elegant presentation! House-made focaccia is delivered on a ceramic tray accompanied by small square dishes of olive oil and fresh, sliced radishes—the whole, in its sleek

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simplicity, strikingly Asian. And, as Joseph observes, “The menu isn’t pages and pages. We’d rather have ten quality plates than 20 mediocre ones.”

Right now, Farm & Table serves dinners Wednesdays through Saturdays and brunch on the weekends.

Pastry chef Patton calls Ravey “definitely, hands down the most even-tempered chef I’ve ever worked with, very friendly, very mellow, no yelling or slamming things.” Whenever he gets tense or angry, she says, he just makes jokes. (“Really bad jokes,” Cherie adds, and everybody nods his way, laughing.)

As the crew waits for some of the early spring fruits, like berries and cherries, to appear, Patton is baking a variety of breads (including the green chile–cornmeal bun for the grass-fed beef burger) and using local eggs, honey and cream to create an enticing selection of desserts: a light but dense red chile–chocolate cake with vanilla bean flan and special tortilla chip, a deservedly exclaimed-over bread pudding.

She’s already brainstorming menu ideas for summer, including fruit tart samplers and homemade jams (for which she’s won awards at the state fair).

Before embarking on life as a restaurateur, Cherie, who used to work in the world of nonprofits, and faithfully followed that industry’s dictum in the process of setting up Farm & Table: “Don’t duplicate services already in place, enhance those services.” So she asked for guidance from chefs she admired and respected (Joseph Wrede, James Campbell Caruso, Phil Beltran, Jonathan Perno of Los Poblanos, among others). “Ninetyfive percent responded, saying things like, ‘I’ll be on your board,’ ‘I’ll do special dinners,’ ‘Count me in as a mentor.’ There’s so much to learn and share. We had no secrets.”

The chef community’s generosity and enthusiasm for Cherie’s idea kept her on course, even through the obstacles that inevitably followed.

“We aren’t trying to compete,” says Patton. “In fact, our goal is to help this idea trickle out—or even explode!”

Cherie gets excited about all the possibilities for bringing people together at Farm & Table. “We’d like to have flamenco and paella on the patio,” she says. “And, out back, in the strip of grass in front of our farm field, I want to collaborate with local filmmakers, serving dinner at tables

A Taste of Life in New Mexico

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Farm&Table

set up out there and showing movies against the fabric wall of the greenhouse on summer nights.

We’ll also definitely have big celebrations for Cinco de Mayo and the Day of the Dead!”

What she and Joseph aim to provide, Cherie adds, is a not a fine dining establishment but a restaurant that accommodates both flip-flops and sport coats, a genuine back-to-basics experience that is expressed through the food and the place.

“This building is all adobe,” she says. “My dad brought all these reclaimed timbers from a fire up north, that we used as the vigas.

Outside, as you enter the restaurant by crossing the wide patio, you’ll notice what Cherie describes as a “water feature.” This, she says, is to honor her father, who feels it imperative to include the story of water and its importance here, in any conversation about New Mexico. “This one flows toward the fields, in one direction, another channels water the other direction, flowing the other way, across the patio. The curving stone pathway running through the patio was designed by my sister. It describes and celebrates the acequia system in the Valley.”

On any given day, Patton adds, everyone on the staff ’s family is here, “including parts of mine,” and it’s true. Tonight, Cherie and Joseph’s ten-year old daughter wanders in and out talking on her cell phone, laughing with her mom.

“My personal goal” says Patton, “is to live Farm & Table.” And having been there myself, I have to admit that’s now my personal goal, as well.

Farm & Table is located at 8917 Fourth Street NW in Albuquerque. They are open for dinner Wednesday through Saturday and serve brunch on Saturday and Sunday. 505.503.7124. www.farmandtablenm.com.

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12

P U E B L O ARTIST WORKSHOP SERIES At the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center TEXTURED PAINTING CLASS (Beginning and Intermediate) with Gregory Analla Isleta & Laguna Pueblos JUNE 2nd & 3rd (10a-3pm) Registration Fee: $95 | Limited Enrollment All Materials Included

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Registration Deadline is one week before 1st class Register online at indianpueblo.org/workshops or call Kay @ 505-212-7052 Indian Pueblo Cultural Center 2401 12th St. NW • Albuquerque, NM .

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Farm and Ranch 2012

A Farmer’s Life:

What It’s Really Like

A

small farmer should live like a traditional peasant: work hard; eat exclusively from your crops and herds and flocks; can, pickle, freeze and dry what you can’t eat fresh; be miserly; save; mend your old clothes; drive an old pickup and eschew the new technologies celebrated by the younger generation.

I say “should,” because for all the Occupy rhetoric, the economic tide is still channeling wealth to the wealthy (as in trickle-up economics), and prices for agricultural products are stuck back in the last century for many of us, while costs appear to be quite unstuck. Lie low, eat from the fruits of your own labor and keep your meager savings under the mattress—this has always been the way of those at the bottom of the economic food chain. It has been said that when the Soviet Union collapsed, there was no widespread famine, because people had long been accustomed to canning and drying food against the inevitable difficult times ahead.

But “should” is rarely entirely the reality in these United States of the year 2012. My wife, RoseMary, and I may not be typical small farmers, but in many respects our lives as such may not be unusual either. We did have our peasant days back in the 1970s when we built our own adobe house, raised goats and chickens and ducks and geese and rabbits, and began selling our produce at farmers’ markets, first in Taos and then in Santa Fe and Los Alamos.

Now we think back fondly on the years when we had no phone and when making water flow in the house consisted of vigorously pumping a cast-iron hand pump on the kitchen counter whose wheezing and clanking still echoes in my ears. We were less fond of the outhouse in the winter.

But children, age, and secret wishes to creep back up into the middle class gradually served to reconnect us, and, in time, the attractiveness of certain conveniences and labor saving devices—running water, flush toilets, tractors, planters, roto-tillers, computers (to say nothing of vehicles that could be counted on not to break down at some perfectly dramatic moment)—led us by insidious degrees into a high-overhead situation. Mortgage! Home equity line of credit! Overdraft protection! Credit cards! At this point, the peasant may look up from his glass of home-brewed beer and ask, “What’s next, drug dealing?” Eventually, to use Thoreau’s wonderful image, the farmer no longer owned the farm; the farm owned the farmer.

This is not to say that we should have remained hippie-peasants. The incorporation of labor-saving mechanical transplanters and other equipment no doubt has spared our joints and generally extended our farming lives well into our seventies. And as I have argued elsewhere, if we were all paying what we really should be paying for nonrenewable fuels—$10 a gallon? $20?—and if the federal government (as in “We, the people”) were no longer subsidizing agribusiness to the tune of $12 billion a year in order to keep commodity prices low, then small producers might be able to outprice the big boys and make a good living while they’re at it.

But this is the stuff of farmers’ market tailgate conversations; it’s not what I think about when out in the field tending my crops, which is where the reality lies. Not long ago, I spent a week with relatives in Southern California not far from where I grew up. From this distance of time and place, I tend to regard that part of the country as too fast, too neat, too grandiose, too ephemeral and with far too many people. Within a few days of returning to our postage-stamp farm in the Embudo Valley, I was out fiddling with the drip system and flushing lines and checking them for flow. At one point, I realized that my hands were dirty. I found this oddly pleasing. Reassuring, even.

Because it is so overwhelmingly so, it is paradoxically easy to overlook the fact that farming is a sensual experience. With my feet and hands, I can feel the condition of the soil, whether damp and spongy or dry and hard. One of the signature experiences of garlic harvest (my allergies have receded by then) is the unique aroma of freshly dug garlic and damp soil, which one knows only during those few days of harvest. Basil, tomato, parsley, onion, and squash plants all signal to us strongly through the nose. In the course of a morning out in the field weeding or planting or harvesting, we become less aware of clock time and more aware of the natural processes of the diurnal: the sun rising, clouds forming and melting away, shifts in breezes and winds, changes in humidity, the movement through the landscape of birds and insects and other creatures, rains of air-born seeds.

As workers in the field, we are embedded within a network—partially of our creating—of incredible complexity, of which only a tiny fraction is observable by our human senses, in a daily experience that challenges the act of description. We “know” what goes on in terms of photosynthesis in leaves and nitrogen fixing and countless other processes within the soil, but we cannot directly observe them with the eye, which can detect only comparatively gross movement. In the field, I sometimes feel I am as close to being an animal as I will ever know; in my own way, I am working the crops just as gophers, squirrels, rabbits, magpies, ravens, robins, butterflies, beetles and thrips do. Of course, I am larger, have a huge brain and possess an ego that can declare: These are my crops. And I try to be patient with the ravens, which like to peck holes in the drip lines.

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s t o r y b y S T A N L E Y C R AW F O R D p h o t o s b y K AT E R U S S E L L

And as in the field, so with the year. Each month— and often each week within the month—has its tone, its tinge, its flavor. Third week in June: garlic harvest.

Third week in August: sniffing the winds in order to make that inner pronouncement that fall is on the way.

October, the do-everything month: harvesting on the one hand, planting on the other. The perpetual guessing game of the date of the first frost and whether it will be just a topping frost, a moderate one or a killing frost.

In the old days, I used to mourn the change, the loss of flowers, the turning to tan and brown, but now I am more celebratory, as in, What a relief. Every farmer carries his or her own personal almanac around in the brain. Each morning the angle of the sun tells you what the day’s task is to be.

But farming is not just about the land and the sun and the wind and the rain. It’s also about the market.

And as market gardeners, we’re like restaurateurs, like musical and theatrical performers. Our weekends do not belong to us; they belong to our customers. Height of the season, we’re up at four a.m., leave the farm at five, arrive at the Santa Fe Farmers’ Market at six, set up by seven for the early-bird customers who come to get our produce while it’s still fresh and to beat the crowds.

At times, the complexity, and even the arc of this experience, becomes exhausting, demoralizing, particularly when expenses seem grossly to exceed income. But at the same time, in a deep sense, by farming you know at all times exactly where you are in time and place, which are your guides and teachers.

The trick may be to remember that in those moments of pain and disappointment, there will still be long hours in which your plantings and fields reward you in countless ways.

In these times of rapid and often disconcerting change and disruption, there comes the thought that though RoseMary and I no longer live like peasants, we could resume doing so without having to learn anything new.

Stanley Crawford has written and farmed in the Embudo Valley for over 40 years. His works of fiction, non-fiction and essay collections can be found at local book stores and online.

A Taste of Life in New Mexico

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chocolate s t o r y b y B A R RY F I E L D S photos by GABRIELLA MARKS

| Chef Marianne Deery

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M

arianne Deery wants you to be happy. As chef of Chocolate Maven since December, she’s developed a dinner menu that expresses her commitment to creative fare. “It took me a while to get grounded,” she muses, “and then I just wanted to expand the flavors and have it be loving and great. I want people to be happy when they taste the food. It’s very simple. When you feed someone, you’re taking care of them.”

Dharm Khalsa, who co-owns the bakery-restaurant along with his wife, extols Deery’s impact on the restaurant. “Women are maternal, nurturing. For Marianne, it’s about the customer having an amazing experience.”

Part of that experience is in the dining room, with its soft classical music, white tablecloths and huge window looking into the bakery, where you can see workers preparing the desserts that originally boosted Chocolate Maven to local prominence. Part of it is in the inventiveness of the menu, with appetizers like grilled Brie in grape leaves, and duck-pistachio paté served with cherry-apple chutney. And then there’s the execution. For both Deery and Khalsa, the joy of eating begins in the kitchen. Marianne swears you can taste the positive energy from the cooks in the final preparations.

Chocolate Maven has had excellent chefs before, but “Marianne’s taking dinner to a new level,” Khalsa declares. “She was a perfect fit, a godsend. As creative as everybody’s food was before, it didn’t have that energy.”

Sitting across the table from me, Marianne Deery has sharp eyes and a way of speaking unabashedly from her heart. A beaded necklace rests on her blue pullover tunic. She’s wearing a rainbow-colored kerchief over her head, a dragonfly pin and earrings depicting fairies.

Her first forays into cooking, at the ripe age of four years old, involved making Irish bread with her grandmother, whose feel for the flour made a lasting impression on her. She remembers dancing to the sound of the pressure cooker with her mother, who taught her to make Portuguese and Italian dishes she had learned from their ethnic neighbors. As a teenager in Rhode Island, Deery would bake scones and head out to the beach before the rest of the family was up.

A move to San Francisco in 1976, at age 18, quickly opened up opportunities. A few days after arriving, she prepared dinner for guests of her sister, one of whom was a personal chef. He liked her cooking so much he gave her a lead, and she landed her first job as chef for an order of nuns. The money she earned paid for her degree in restaurant and hotel operations. Other jobs followed, such as running a summer camp kitchen in northern California.

“I cooked for a hundred kids, and everything was from scratch,” she remembers. Another was at Doro’s, at the time one of San Francisco’s top dining establishments, where she stayed for two years. She cooked at the American corporate headquarters of the clothing company Esprit, took a turn as sous chef at The Rotunda in Neiman Marcus and transformed a bland English teahouse into a boutique Italian restaurant. When asked which job stands out for her, Deery replies, “Everywhere was special. It’s like a dance, you learn the steps. It all went by too fast.”

She came to Santa Fe to work as executive chef for the Palace restaurant, then in its heyday. “When I came here, I fell in love with the place and decided I wanted to live here.” She cooked for the Santa Fe Opera for a few summers and took a job at Mu Du Noodles. She worked at the much-loved (and missed) Natural Café, which she fondly terms “a little magical place,” and also spent two years in the kitchen at Sunrise Springs.

“Then a friend of the governor called me.” Deery spent almost the next seven years as the personal chef of Bill Richardson at the Governor’s Mansion.

Sometimes she’d prepare food for the family, but she was also called upon to execute grand dinners. “It was nice to be able to represent the state. I felt honored,” she says modestly. She recalls one dinner to which Bill Clinton came. “It was after his heart surgery. “That night we also had Martin Sheen—he licked his plate clean and wanted me to come out and see it. President Clinton was warm and gracious. It was a simple dinner with chicken breast with lime-tomatillo sauce. Clinton poured the salsa all over it.” Deery says her one regret was not preparing broccoli, which she knew was a Clinton favorite.

The next time Bill Clinton returned was a Super Bowl Sunday, a day off for Deery. But a snowstorm ended Richardson’s and Clinton’s plans to fly to Red River, and the governor called her, asking if she could put something together. “I ended up feeding 25 people, and I had 45 minutes. I made broccoli this time. Clinton was happy.”

After our talk, both Deery and Khalsa want me to taste what they’ve been talking about. First it’s the grilled Brie in grape leaves, which I’d eyed on the menu; the contrast between the texture of the soft, warm cheese and salty, crisp grape leaf plays in the mouth. The duck-pistachio paté, sweetened with apple, is another tasty and unusual dish. Springs rolls jazzed up with a chile-orange reduction sauce are excellent, and beets with lavender vinaigrette on the side provide another wonderful flavor treat. By the time we get to the Chardonnay-poached leeks over butter lettuce with a lemon sauce—another winner—there’s barely room for a main course, which for me is a nicely done orange-glazed salmon with Zinfandel–red onion marmalade on top and layered vegetables and white bean cake underneath.

Deery continues to talk about food, clearly her passion, and Khalsa reflects on the history of the Chocolate Maven. We all—chef, owner, and guest— revel in the food, nicely presented and delicious.

“How do you like it?” Deery asks me.

There’s only one response I can think of: “I’m happy.”

A Taste of Life in New Mexico

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A Little History Dharm Khalsa and his wife, Guru Kirin, opened Love and Company, a wholesale bakery, in Española in 1993. Preparing breads and desserts in a primitive converted garage, they delivered them to retailers in Santa Fe. If you ask Kirin, the evolution of the enterprise from its modest beginnings to the successful restaurant/ bakery it is today was a result of Khalsa’s inability to say no.

“People would say, ‘Do you make French brioche?’ and he’d say yes. Then we’d have to figure out how to make it.”

At the time, Chocolate Maven (then under different ownership) was a small company headed for bankruptcy, and the couple decided to capitalize on the name, which everyone knew, by purchasing it in 1996. “The place was terrible to bake out of,” Khalsa says, so they found their current location, a former tile showroom. Increasing wholesale accounts was easy, Kirin recounts.

“People taste one wonderful thing after another and it’s sold.”

When they began getting phone requests for Thanksgiving pies, Khalsa, true to form, couldn’t say no, and they had their first retail sales. They cleared out the cluttered space and set up a retail bakery. “Then we thought we might as well serve a little coffee,” Khalsa reflects, but given that the new place was in such an odd location (behind Toyotech in an industrial building on San Mateo Road), the couple didn’t really believe it would work. They developed full breakfast and lunch café menus and quickly began attracting more customers. They decided to open for weekend brunch and added afternoon high tea.

“Then the economy hit the skids,” he recalls. “You’d think we’d be smart and say, ‘Let’s hold back.’” But they didn’t.

“It’s going back to the concept of ‘he can’t say no,’” Kirin suggests. Peter Zimmer, who’d earned a reputation as chef at the Inn of the Anasazi, agreed to develop a dinner menu. People still tended to think of Chocolate Maven as a daytime café and bakery, and dinners were taking a while to catch on. They are counting on Marianne Deery’s kitchen magic to change that.

The most recent chapter of the bakery’s evolution has just taken place, as Khalsa finally had to say no. The economic downturn led to a decrease in their wholesale business, while expensive gas and steeply rising prices for basic ingredients like flour have led to greatly increased costs for production and delivery. Retailers balked at paying more for their products, and profits dwindled. Last month, the couple made the decision to greatly curtail the wholesale side of the operation. Fortunately for the public, we can still experience their wonderful baked goods at their retail location.

Chocolate Maven is located at 821 West San Mateo Rd, Santa Fe, 984.1980 www. chocolatemaven.com | Dharm Khalsa and Guru Kirin

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NOVEMBER 2011

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Farm and Ranch 2012

kids Later in life, when I’m old and grey and my children are grown and gone, I will cherish the memory of my two kids playing in the irrigation ditch, stark naked, a week before Thanksgiving. s t o r y b y K R I S T E N D AV E N P O R T K A T Z photos by GABRIELLA MARKS

We were late getting the garlic planted that year, and snow was threatening at our farm, which sits at 8,000 feet in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. My husband was at his day job, and I planted about a half-acre of garlic by myself, nervous the ground would freeze for good before we could get all the garlic put to bed for winter. The kids and I would wait each morning until the sun thawed the soil above freezing. Then we’d bundle up and trundle outside to the field. I’d summon all the patience in my heart to allow Silas, then age four, to “help” dibble the little holes for the garlic cloves I’d drop in behind him.

Yes, I could have done it ten times faster alone.

But he would soon tire of the dibbling job, and the kids would wander off to the periphery of the garlic field in search of adventures. On warmer days, they inevitably ended up stripping down and getting into the little spring-fed acequia that runs through our land. Luckily, we live way back on a forest road where social workers aren’t typically lurking in the bushes, because I distinctly remember hoping that no one from child welfare would drive by and see my naked children in an icy ditch.

But farm children are hardy children. Now eight years old, my daughter, Ella, boasts to friends about running around in the snow barefoot (failing to mention her mom screeching after her, “PUT SOME SHOES ON, ELLA!”).

At our farmers’ market booth on Saturday, our kids and some of the other vendors’ kids dance around the tables of potatoes, broccoli, garlic, lettuce and other vegetables, begging for sweets (even farm kids love cheese Danishes) and playing games under the tables that threaten to knock over the whole display. We often hear people comment, “Oh how wonderful for your children to be raised on a farm!”

Wonderful indeed. For someone who isn’t living it, it sounds so romantic—children with great freedom and space, frolicking in the daisy fields with baby rabbits. The reality is only somewhat different. Yes, they have a more intimate knowledge of the natural world than many American kids. However, I am also certain my children are the dirtiest

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kids their teachers have ever met. The only time they make it to school without dirt under their fingernails is right after a trip to their Grammy’s house in the city.

Luckily, a lot of new scientific research indicates that kids who get dirty and crawl around in dirt and animal dander have hardy immune systems later in their lives. In fact, kids who live in the dirt have fewer allergies and health problems for their whole lifetimes. My children will surely live to be 100.

When our wild plums are ripe each September, their faces are often caked with plum pulp and juice. Since they almost never wear shoes (and since many of their shoes are lost to the tall grass and thickets of willows, after the kids dumped their footwear one afternoon and promptly forgot where), their little feet are grimy and tough as leather. They are, unfortunately, sunburned way too often, although Ella tends to tan. (“Ella, you’re brown as a little berry!” her Grammy exclaims.)

My mom—also known as Grammy—often tells me that she just can’t believe the things my kids know and understand about the world. These are probably not always things that make her comfortable. (Ask my kids about goat breeding and birth. They’ll give the gory details.) Ella was quite pleased this spring when she received special attention from her third-grade teacher for being one of only two kids in her class who knew what a “perennial” plant was.

A Taste of Life in New Mexico

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kids

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They know what a bean plant looks like, and they know how to pick an entire field of raspberries and eat every last one when no one is looking. They know asparagus tastes the best right after you pick it.

They know borage flowers taste like cucumbers. They know a dandelion from a wild chicory from a pigweed. They know that purslane tastes sour and sweet and a little bit like garden sorrel. They know how to climb a hay pile. They know that honeybees love squash blossoms and pollen from the corn tassels.

They know where the magpies hide their nests and how high up the poplar the redheaded flickers tuck their eggs. They aren’t afraid of a little animal manure. They understand there are microbes in the compost, and they know what worms eat. They know that old eggs float and good eggs sink. They know how to make cheese. My kids have both known how to milk a goat since they were about three—since their little hands were strong enough to squeeze a teat—and sibling arguments are often triggered over who gets to milk our Nubian nanny, named Shooter, first.

They know the slightly spicy, butterscotch scent of ponderosa pine in spring sunshine. They know what it’s like to hold a baby goat less than an hour old, barely clean from his mama’s tongue.

If you send them out to pick carrots, they’ll find them by recognizing the tops—and come back with muddy faces after not bothering to wash off the carrots before they crunch them. (I have photographs of Ella eating dirt when she was 10 months old; there’s no need for her to stop now.)

They have a 20-acre empire where they slowly, over the years, have come to understand all the ways of the plants, the secrets hidden in thickets of brambles and the mannerisms of birds. They have become intimate with the cobwebs and the spiders that live in them. Silas is seven now and has discovered the joy of treetops. He and his sister have built a campsite in the plum forest and a treehouse in the giant juniper.

All summer long, they beg to sleep outside, under the stars.

It is a good life. And I am so grateful. I am not a perfect mother; I’m too often grumpy and busy, and I have never once sat down and finished a whole game of Monopoly with my kids. But any time I start to doubt myself, and the choices we’ve made, I remember: This life here is about as good as it gets. And these are the best years of our lives.

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Making aDifference story by TORI LEE p h o t o s b y K AT E R U S S E L L

| Chef Roland Richter of Joe’s Dining

C

hef Roland Richter and wife, Sheila Nixon, are not just the owners of Joe’s Dining in Santa Fe, they are also longtime passionate proponents of cooking with the freshest ingredients possible. “I grew up in a small town,” recalls Roland of his childhood in Germany. “My mother bought fresh food every day.

I grew up used to seasonality.”

Through their previous restaurant, Pizza Etc., and now Joe’s Dining, Sheila and Roland have long supported Santa Fe’s Farm to Restaurant program, which provides locally grown produce, dairy and meats to local eateries. Participation in the program is not just an occasional preference for Joe’s; it’s built right into the business’s mission statement, of which Sheila is justifiably proud: “To strengthen our health, to protect our land, to grow our economy by serving local, sustainable food.”

Sheila and Roland’s participation in the Farm to Restaurant programs testifies to the strength of their commitment, which began several decades ago when Roland began buying tomatoes at the Santa Fe Farmers’ Market. And as the market has grown, so too have his choices for purchasing locally grown foods. The chef runs down a mental checklist of some of his suppliers. “I buy milk and mozzarella curd from Old Windmill Dairy in Estancia,” he says. “Did you know that ‘mozzarella’ means ‘flower of the milk’? Fresh curd makes all the difference. The dairy does not yet have enough butter production, so that is for the future. I buy wine from Milagro Vineyards in Corrales, eggs from J K Farms in Española. In the summer growing season, I buy 90% of my produce locally. Of course, in the winter that ratio is reversed, but since February I have been able to purchase cooking greens, spinach and chard at the Farmers’ Market.”

Roland can be found most Saturday mornings at the Farmers’ Market. Then, on Saturday afternoons, he is back at Joe’s Dining hosting the restaurant’s signature Meet Your Farmer program.

“We invite people to come for lunch, meet the people who grow their food,” he explains. “Look for people sitting at a table with a sign ‘I grow your food.’ These farmers have been up since three or four in the morning—packing the truck, selling at the market. They need a beer and something to eat afterwards.”

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The menu at Joe’s Dining boasts (among other things) an array of burgers made from beef, buffalo and lamb—and because he knows his providers personally, Roland knows that all his meats come from livestock that are grassfinished. “Feeding livestock grain changes the consistency of the meat,” he says. “Yes, it is forktender, but its nutritional content is depleted.

I buy ground meats raised in free-range, small herds. They are grass-finished. The meat must be cooked slower, but it has full flavor and higher nutritional value. I am not a fan of frozen, fullmuscle meat.”

Chef Roland has been working in kitchens for 40 years, since he was a teenager, and he and Sheila—who met in a restaurant—credit food with bringing and keeping them together.

Cooking situations that Sheila sees as potential crises, he sees as challenges. “He waits until the last minute and then bursts into action to make something,” she observes.

Roland admits there is some truth to his wife’s assertion. “I like winging it,” he says. This is fortunate, because as a chef who sources his

ingredients locally, he never knows precisely what he is going to have to work with on any given day. “Buying local produce is more fun—also more work—to cook with. It is not standard size. Maybe an item is available in quantity, maybe not. I must adapt to cook with what is available. I don’t know availability until the day before.

My kitchen staff has all learned to cook what we get.” He cites local kale as an example. “It comes all in one piece.

The leaves must be cooked separately from the stems, so we must work with it more.”

Joe’s Dining spent in excess of $80,000 in 2011 buying from local food producers, a figure that Roland expects to increase in 2012. He feels good about it, too. “Farmers must know there is a demand for what they plant, that they will be able to sell it. Customers create that demand for better quality ingredients,” he says, adding, “We see the Farm to Restaurant program growing. More farmers planting more varieties.”

For her part, Sheila would like to see more young people try their hand at farming. “We need to make farming sexy, like chef shows made being a chef sexy,” she says, prompting laughter from her husband.

But even with the growth in the Farm to Restaurant program, Santa Fe remains what Roland terms a “food island.” As the chef explains, “Only 4 or 5% of all food consumed locally is produced locally. Last December bad weather closed the highways for several days and food delivery trucks could not get through. I had to shop at local grocery stores for brisket. Many grocery shelves were empty. I estimate Santa Fe has a two-day food supply on hand. We need to grow more.”

In the restaurant’s monthly newsletter “Dija Know…” Sheila writes frequently about the health benefits of eating fresh foods, as well as the social and spiritual connections people develop around food. “Food is the basis of social fabric; eat a healthy dinner with family as often as possible,” she advises. “Use the muscle of at-risk young men in farming. Channel that energy in a positive direction. Small-scale farming can pass on traditional knowledge and skills to the next generation and repair communities.”

Both would like to see tribal enterprises participate in the Farm to Restaurant program; Joe’s Dining used to buy its buffalo from Picuris Pueblo but encountered availability problems due to insufficient quantity.

One commonly made objection to locally grown food is that it is more expensive than mass produced.

Roland doesn’t believe that. Even though the assessment might technically be true on an item-for-item basis, he challenges people to look past short-term considerations and focus on the big picture. “Compare your grocery bill with your medical and prescription bill,” he posits. “I guarantee there is a relation. Fresh food is health food.

That is worth the cost.”

Joe’s Dining is located at 2801 Rodeo Road in the Rodeo Plaza Shopping Center in Santa Fe. They are open daily from 7:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. serving breakfast, lunch and dinner. 471.3800 www.joessantafe.com

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It is May 14th

It is the 14th of May already the days for planting are just about over

winter has followed spring unto this season with afternoon showers of rain, hail, and cold weather receding into promises of warm days that come for short spells and then disappear behind a cloak of dark clouds and damp weather

by LEVI ROMERO

R

ural New Mexico traditions, lowrider culture and rock and roll are the main themes vividly captured and celebrated in the poetry of New Mexico Centennial Poet Levi Romero. Romero has a Masters of Architecture from the University of New Mexico, but it is his ability to build with words for which he is better known. As he puts it in one of his poems, he can “write sound.” The bilingual poet is author of A Poetry of Remembrance: New and Rejected Works, In the Gathering of Silence, and the upcoming Sagrado: A Photopoetics Across the Chicano Homeland, to be published later this year.

the apricots bloomed early but March also fell prey to frost and so this year the tree in the back yard bears no fruit it is that way sometimes it is that way in what we have been told

“one year yes, one year no”

it comes down to that a simple understanding of life’s give and take and we in our lives move forward simply accepting and giving as the earth gives and rejecting and taking as the earth takes because we know nothing else there is nothing else to know it comes down to that

“un año si, un año no”

and love too comes in that similar way and it remains it remains in that way when it does like that so do not be fearful or impatient learn how to sway your life accordingly you will understand what it means the sound of a horse neighing in the moonlight when your season is come love you will know you will know

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Destinations

El vecino

tonight the stars are bright and plentiful and with our necks craning up toward the sky

el vecino se arrima al cerco y me pregunta que si qué estoy haciendo cuidado, no te vaya dar un heart attack, está muy caliente, me dice

we stand attempting to identify the constellations and trying to distinguish the satellites from the jets and the stars I planted the last of the garden today chile, arbejón, cebolla, rabanitos several days ago it was the maíz melones, sandías, calabacitas a warm breeze is blowing across the orchard there has been mention of ghosts and spirits of relatives who come to visit that they move through the fields stooped over like burma grass in the wind las grullas will fly over the village tomorrow northward, their long necks piercing the sky

es el mes de mayo y yo todavía ando peleándole a las charrangas y el con su ranchito que shinea como un espejo ¿va haber agua? le pregunto, como él es de los hombres de edad y mure sabio izque sí, dicen que sí no, cuando hay agua vale nada, dice el vecino el año pasa’o estábamos regando a las dos de la mañana ansina ‘sta pelón, no se mira la agua, luego no corre pero dicen que izque todavía hay nieve pa la Jicarita ¿y sus arboleras, allá bajo, dan fruta? le pregunto viendo que su arbolerita está bien trimiadita como un haircut de peso pues, tengo unos árboles de durazno- esos sí dan ¡o, dan unos duraznos como una béisbol! no, dice el vecino, estos árboles míos no dan fruta, ya ‘stan muy viejos, eluego hela temprano. de este lado del río es muy helador pa ya, pa La Otra Banda, sí se da manzana, pero de este lado, neh una que otra, si no se la come el gusano o la echa a perder el granizo el sol ya va a media mañana y nos despidemos él a su negocio, y yo al mío bueno, ahi nos ‘stamos viendo bueno, me dice el vecino, muncho cuidao, ponte sombrero, no te vaya picar el sol

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theTaoshum

I

n our new monthly column, people-watcher extraordinaire Tania Casselle zeroes in on the people who make Taos hum. Her colorful side-kick, photographer Lenny Foster captures their image so that you, too, can recognize these not-so-ordinary folks of Taos. s t o r y b y TA N I A C A S S E L L E photos by LENNY FOSTER

Allegra Huston

Cisco Guevara

London-born creative powerhouse Huston is the author of Love Child: A Memoir of Family Lost and Found, a frank exploration of her upbringing as daughter of filmmaker John Huston, sister to Anjelica and Tony.

Now her short film Good Luck, Mr Gorski is also winning recognition at international film festivals, after Huston raised $43,000 to produce her script via $20 donations, bake sales, and raffles. “It’s inspired by a really good joke, people would laugh, and I’d invite them to contribute $20. It went viral, donations from Indonesia, Australia, the Netherlands…”

Huston left her London publishing career, working with lit stars including UK Poet Laureate-to-be Andrew Motion, to dedicate time to her own writing, although relocation to New Mexico wasn’t originally on her mind when she visited Taos for a six-month stay. She knew she wanted to move out of the city, possibly to England’s West Country, but landed up farther west than anticipated, settling in Taos in 1999.

“I discovered this beautiful place full of interesting people. I spent a lot of time in Mexico as a kid and Hispanic culture feels comfortable to me. Americans who’ve lived all over the world live in Taos so it’s very cosmopolitan.” She’d also met Cisco Guevara “my husband that I’m not married to” and they now have a son. Huston wrote the first draft of her memoir at Wired? Cafe – “If I’m at home I end up doing a lot of laundry” – and she recharges her batteries by rafting, hiking Italianos Canyon, and watching Dancing With The Stars. “I’m trying to convince Anjelica to do that so I can go and clap. It would be so much fun.” She’s a passionate board member for Taos Shortz (“In line to become one of the top short film festivals in the country”) and the Northern New Mexico Birth Center.

“People come here from New York to have their babies. I believe it would be a better world if women had their babies under midwifery care.”

“The European side of my family came here in 1540 with Coronado and married with the local Indian population and we’ve been here ever since,” says Guevara, owner of Los Rios River Runners. Guevara relishes the variety in Taos’s terrain and weather—not to mention its culture.

“It’s never dull, never boring, there’s always something new to discover.

I love this town because it’s a small town, really traditional… but it has theatre, poetry, writers, movie makers, a nice balance of talent here that’s easygoing, not pretentious.” After 45 years rafting the Rio Grande and Rio Chama, his favorite stretch of river is “Pretty much whatever stretch I’m on.” He notes that his customers often think of their fathers while rafting. “They say I’ve got to bring my dad here, I wish my dad could do this. It’s something about Old Man River, or being with a grizzly guide…”

Guevara performs regularly at the Taos Storytelling Festival since a rafting customer first invited him. “I said ‘I’m not a storyteller’ and he said ‘Oh, yes you are! I’ve been on your raft trips.’ The first time on stage was horrifying, as nerve-wracking as being on top of the boat-eating rapids.” Now he steers a story as confidently as he navigates a river.

Come evening, it’s beer and dinner at Guadalajara Grill or Orlando’s, or dancing at the KTAO Solar Center. The biggest surprise this Taoseño keeps tucked under his signature river-battered hat? “I’m a former New Mexico state champion country western dance dude.” He also teaches dancing. “That’s how Allegra and I met. I was asked to teach lessons in Taos Ski Valley and Allegra’s brother brought her by to learn how to twostep.” Was she a good student? “I pretty much didn’t care,” says Guevara, who after meeting Allegra Huston, apparently had other things on his mind.

See Good Luck, Mr. Gorksi in a download at allegrahuston.com.

To run the rapids with Guevara go to www.losriosriverrunners.com.

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d r a y e n Vi IN THE

story by JAMES SELBY

“What’s the grapevine thinking about in the vineyard?” posed John Williams to a guest last May at his Frog’s Leap Winery in Napa Valley, where he’s been a leader of organic and biodynamic viticulture since 1981. “About getting 96 points? No. It’s thinking, ‘When do I start moving energy down my roots, and how can I get my berries ripe so that the birds will eat them and poop the seeds somewhere else?’”

Thus, the life force manifesto: propagation.

Today’s consumers are looking to survive through purchasing healthier selections at markets (both farmers’ and conventional) and taking to their backyards to grow their own produce, raise chickens or keep bees. But when it comes to pairing their freshly harvested kale or a precious piece of organic beef with a wine of equal wholesomeness and integrity, choices can be less simple and clear. Sustainable sounds good, yes? Organic is even better, no? Biodynamic is, what again? Merde!

On a recent day that felt like spring but looked like winter because of the previous night’s storm, Deborah Madison gave me a tour of her garden in Galisteo. In a walled area behind her home and office, the New Mexico sun had cleared the pathways wending through rows of fruit trees, leafless cottonwoods, and patches of herbs, the heartiest of which—sage, rosemary, thyme—were still persisting. Madison’s enthusiasm fairly brought the garden back to life. “Here I have comfrey, columbine, sorrel, lettuces, lots of flowers, perennials, not annuals. I love native grasses, wild garlic, morning glories,” she said.

We continued through a gate to a small plot where foot-high, bunk-sized, wooden-framed beds were snug under their comforters of snow, like residents of some outdoor dormitory. “Do you know Ken Kuhne?” she asked. “He makes these Grow Y’Own beds, and they’re wonderful.

You fill them with good soil and tons of manure [a recurring theme], and these plots spill over with tomatoes, black-eyed peas, amaranth...” She trailed off as if realizing something was missing, then pointed to a few reedy sticks and brightly added, “Those are artichokes under there; I can pull those up all winter. This is salsify, known as ‘goat’s beard.’ I haven’t quite figured out what to

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Photo: Courtesy of Feudo di Santa Tresa

do with it.” She laughed, studying the furry, parsnipshaped root.

Figuring out what to do with vegetables and fruit is what has made Madison a celebrity. From her early success as chef of Greens, a landmark vegetarian restaurant in San Francisco, to her de rigueur cookbooks (for me it’s Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone), she is the Meryl Streep of culinary literature.

“Sustainable is a huge issue,” she said as we settled in her kitchen. “I grew up in California, and we love so many of the wines.” (By “we,” she means herself and her husband; Madison is married to wellknown artist Patrick McFarlin, who illustrated her book What We Eat When We Eat Alone.) “We’re fans of Ridge Vineyards and we keep some of Paul Draper’s wines. There’s so much mass-produced, industrial wine, though,” said Madison, with a sweep of her arm. “We drink wines we know, like Stag’s Leap Winery. It’s hard to find wines that are affordable and yet made with care, and not merely surfacesustainable.”

Here Madison touched on the issue. How can you tell if the wine is conventional or unadulterated?

In the business of wine, sustainable is trending, and there is a careless rush to slap green-sounding phrases on labels and wine lists, while regulations remain in the grey zone. The California Sustainable Winegrowing Alliance provides verification that a winery or vineyard has adopted correct practices.

They’ve some 227 criteria, yet a vineyard only has to meet 58 to be eligible. That’s a lot of wiggle room.

A winery may take perfectly healthy organic grapes, claim they are “organically grown,” and then subject the resulting wine to any number of mechanical shenanigans and additives.

Even the USDA, with its reassuring-looking organic logo, allows for a number of approved treatments and sprays to be used in the vineyards.

Copper sulfate is allowed in biodynamic viticulture as a fungicide. And what about the dreaded sulfites?

Also known as sulfur dioxide, a sulfite is a preservative added to dried fruits and wine. Some claim it can cause headaches. The headache likely springs from the controversy, as there is no scientific proof that sulfites are the culprit. (It’s thought that “Red Wine Headache,” or RDH, may be caused by histamines or tannin.) Furthermore, the term “sulfite-free” is hooey; all wines contain naturally occurring sulfites.

The issue in question is whether additional sulfites are added, and if so, how much. Organic wines are made without additional sulfites and may declare they have “no sulfites added” or “no sulfites detected.”

Take-no-prisoners biodynamics, the most advanced type of organic farming, is a self-sustaining method that embraces the forces of nature. Nothing is brought in from outside. Animals, water,

treatments—all come from within the ecosystem of the vineyard. It can seem a little hocus-pocus, but the closer you look, the more sense it makes. Celestial rhythms affect tides, why not also the sap in vines? Biodynamic viticulture espouses the use of manure-filled cow horns, buried in the vineyards. The reason, as explained by a representative of Grgich Hills Estate, a certified biodynamic winery in Napa, is that the manure attracts all sorts of living organisms and bacterial populations, which enliven and enrich the soil. Natural wines— grown organically, harvested by hand, made with minimal intervention—provide terroir, taste and smell unlike anything offered by commercial brands. Paul Draper, winemaker at Deborah Madison favorite Ridge Vineyards, said wine is the perfect beverage, as all that is needed is grapes and time. How much more natural can you get?

My own “aha!” moment came with a Maxime Francois Laurent Il Fait Soif. This Grenache based Cotes-du-Rhône, with its intense bouquet of mushroom, crushed blueberry and umami flavors, took me by surprise; so did its $30 price tag. Laurent’s biodynamic cultivation produces smaller yields. Take heart—virtuous wines at reasonable prices are becoming more plentiful, as the use of modern sanitation and closures now allow wine to be held without additives.

You’ll find them not by reading a label, but by asking a local wine merchant. I was shown a lively, elegant Nero d’Avola called Purato, from Sicily’s Feudo di Santa Tresa ($15), and Our Daily Red ($10), a full-bodied, soft blend of Cabernet, Syrah, and Carignan from California. Many European and domestic growers have been farming biodynamically for decades but don’t put it on the label, either because the bureaucracy for certification is daunting or simply because it’s how they’ve always made wine.

“I’m not an expert gardener,” said Madison, pulling out some of her freshly harvested carrots, as big around as a rolling pen. “But, the garden is a great teacher.

What it has taught me, is the plants grow the soil.”

Not the fertilizers, not the chemicals, not the poisons.

Everything we need is under foot. The lesson is taking root. Wineries that play the sustainability trump card are sincerely doing as much as they feel they can to keep the vineyards healthy, to recycle, to use plants, animals and solar energy to limit the use of chemicals, while still protecting their crop and livelihood. In the New Zealand region of Marlborough, Yealands Estate is regarded as “the world’s most sustainable winery,” with its thriving wetlands and “carboNZero” production.

In fact, by the time their wines are shipped into New Mexico, they are still carbon negative.

That morning in Galisteo, as I took my leave from soil sister Deborah Madison—citizen, writer, gardener, cook—I asked what she looked for in a wine, what she wanted in her glass. “I want fruit, delicacy, and,” searching a bit deeper, she added, “earth.”

“That morning in Galisteo, as I took my leave from soil sister Deborah Madison—citizen, writer, gardener, cook—I asked what she looked for in a wine, what she wanted in her glass. ‘I want fruit, delicacy, and,’ searching a bit deeper, she added, ‘earth.’”

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Taste of story by CAITLIN RICHARDS photos by DOUGLAS MERRIAM

S

ince it opened in 2006, La Boca has become a favorite of Santa Fe residents, as well as visitors to our city. And, recently, the restaurant’s awardwinning chef, James Campbell Caruso, has written España: Exploring the Flavors of Spain, a cookbook worthy of La Boca’s reputation for mouth-watering dishes. (Just looking at the cover can make you salivate!) When did this busy chef, husband and father find the time to write a cookbook? “That was the biggest challenge,” he admits, “finding the time.” The process took two years, but the results are stunning.

I had an opportunity to sit down with Caruso to talk about his cookbook, his plans for the future and his desire for La Boca to outlast him. As Caruso puts it, “I want an old employee to drive by years after I’m gone and say, ‘Hey, it’s still there.’”

I want that, too. localflavor: This is your second cookbook.

What new direction did you take with this one?

Caruso: This one is more in the style of La Boca—a modern interpretation of Spanish cooking. We treat ingredients and food traditions differently here than they do in Spain.

|

LF: Do you think we treat dining and food in general differently than they do in Spain and Europe?

Caruso: Definitely. It’s a big difference the way customers view this whole style of eating. It’s been a learning experience, and it’s just really starting to take hold. But I

Chef James Campbell Caruso

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think it’s not a small-plate trend, or a tapas trend; I think we’re seeing a revolution in process in the way we eat in the U. S., and dine out. I think we’re trending toward this style of eating, which is a little more fun, more exciting. The entrée is dead to me, that’s my sad news to tell the world.

LF: I don’t think that’s sad. I like this style of eating, because I like to experience different flavors and the opportunity to try many different foods.

Caruso: It allows you not only to try different things, but it’s a real social way to eat, you’re sharing everything. It’s real interactive—there’s a lot of talk about the food and the wine. It really shifts your focus.

LF: How has your understanding of cooking and creating new dishes changed over time?

Caruso: It expands every time I get to another level. There’s a whole new litany of things I want to try. It’s endless what we can do with a menu like this. We’re not locked into traditional Spanish. We’re definitely inspired by the exuberance and ingredients of Spanish cooking, but we don’t like to lock ourselves in. It’s a little bit more of a modern approach. You do updated versions of a classic dish, and that takes you in another direction. So the more you try, the further you go. I never want to take this to a kind of crazy-professor level of molecular gastronomy. For me, once the food is more interesting for the chef than for the diner, that’s where you lose them. I like to engage people and get them to really connect with the food.

LF: What’s the most important element in creating a new dish?

Caruso: I want the ingredients to work really well together. I don’t like to have a lot of ingredients that get too busy. I base a lot of the dishes on three flavors. There are more ingredients than that, but those are three flavors that I like to click together. I want the flavor combinations to be heard and not lose the essence of the ingredients. I don’t like over-manipulating the food.

LF: What chefs of the past or present do you admire most?

Caruso: I really like a chef named Sam Clark; he’s in London, he has a restaurant called Moro. I got a chance to meet him and cook with him in southern Spain. I really like what he does. He does a blend of Spanish and Arabic food. A lot of the Moroccan influence we have at La Boca and in this book is because of my travel in southern Spain and meeting him.

LF: You really filled a niche in Santa Fe. Caruso: We’re lucky to have three tapas restaurants in Santa Fe—it’s more than most people have. Now it’s starting to get hip; there’s your obligatory classical tapas place in almost every city. Then there are some more creative chefs who are doing similar to what we’re doing—taking a more modern look, making it our own, making it an American version of this dining style. In Santa Fe it’s nice to have three of us. {El Meson, El Farol and La Boca.} It would be nicer if we were close together so you could hop from place to place like you do in Spain. You don’t traditionally stay in one restaurant for the night, you might hit three. I think that’s part of the revolution that’s going on, too. So not only do you get to try a lot of dishes, you get to try different places, get a different feel.

LF: What do you think makes Santa Fe a great food town?

Caruso: The appetite of our local people. They want to eat, and they want to try new things, and I love that. That serves our restaurant well. We always give them new things to try.

LF: How often do you change the menu at La Boca?

Caruso: About every two months—there’s a core of ten tapas that stay on the menu. We play around seasonally.

LF: Do you have another cookbook in you?

Caruso: Oh, yeah, lots. We do about five or six chalkboard specials

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LF: Do you have a favorite ingredient?

Caruso: Probably smoked paprika, pimentón. I’ve been told I use it too much, but I really like it. I use a lot of octopus, too; that’s a good ingredient.

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a night—a lot of times there’s no repeat—and when I write them down at the end of the year, I have a lot of dishes. I started outlining this book, and it was way too big, so I have almost another cookbook ready to write.

de Los Lu e LhoosTaos L Available at Select Purveyors in SantahFe o dand u c dce Los Lu o ch

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LF: What’s your next big challenge? www.kgbspirits.com Caruso: How to serve all the people that want to come to La TAO S LI GHT NI NG W HI SK EY • HAC I E NDA GI N • VO DK A VI R AC O C HA • C O NQU I STADO R O R ANGE LI QU E U R • BR I M STO NE ABSI NT HE Boca. We’re so small. But I have an announcement: I just signed www.kgbspirits.com a lease to expand. [In the former Old Carlos’ Café space at 145 Lincoln Plaza.] We’reTAO shooting for July. It has a patio and S LI GHT NI NG W HI SK EY • HAC I E NDA GI N • VO DK A VI R AC O C HA • C O NQU I STADO R O R ANGE LI QU E U R • BR I M STO NE ABSI NT HE www.kgbspirits.com a nice big kitchen. We’re going to create a taberna, Taberna La TAO S LI GHT NI NG W HI SK EY • HAC I E NDA GI N • VO DK A VI R AC O C HA • C O NQU I STADO R O R ANGE LI QU E U R • BR I M STO NE ABSI NT HE www.kg Boca. It’s like a tavern, a gathering place. It will be a little more casual, no reservations. We’ll have the core of ten items that will be on both menus, and then some exclusive items. It will TAO S LI GHT NI NG W HI SK EY • HAC I E NDA GI N • VO DK A VI R AC O C HA •TAO CO NQU I STADO R EY OR ANGE LIGI QU MOSTO NT HE • HAC • U • C OABSI S LI GHT NI NG W HI SK I E NDA NE VORDK• A BR VI RIAC C HA NE NQU I STADO R O R ANGE LI QU E U R be open for lunch, coffee and pastries, bocadillos and dinner. It • • TAO S LI GHT NI NG W HI SK EY HAC I E NDA GI N VO DK A VI R AC O C HA • C O NQU will also be available for private parties, wine dinners, cooking demonstrations, flamenco shows—we’re going to do some live music, Latino music, over there.

LF: That’s exciting. So you’ll be running two kitchens for two meals a day seven days a week?

Caruso: It’s going to be a busy summer for sure. This was our biggest year ever, it’s just been going up since we opened. But sometimes it’s too small, so that’s what we’re going to try to fix, without messing with this space. I love this space and location, I don’t want to mess with this.

LF: And it will still be here in 20 years when you’re gone.

Caruso: Hopefully it will be here longer than that.

La Boca is located at 72 West Marcy St, 505.982.3433, www. labocasf.com. They’re open daily from 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Brunch is served Saturday and Sunday 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

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Great publication, great people, great value. Reaches both local and tourists in all 3 major state markets, and stays around all month. I love when people come in and say “I saw you in localflavor! I just had to come in and see your cowboy boots!”

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Hungry?

story by CAITLIN RICHARDS photos by DOUGLAS MERRIAM

Manchego en Salsa de Tomate

C

hoosing just a few recipes from España: Exploring the Flavors of Spain isn’t an easy task.

They all look and sound so wonderful. I asked Chef James to pick out a few favorites for us. The Pulpo Frito might be more than the average home cook wants to tackle, but I fell in love with the photo, and it contains Chef James’ two favorite ingredients--not to mention that it’s a special recipe for James.

Marinated Manchego in Fresh Tomato, Olive Oil,and Sherry Vinegar “This is a different way to serve cheese.

Take a classic Spanish Manchego cheese and marinate it in tomatoes, vinegar and olive oil.”

Serves 6 1 pound Manchego cheese 3 ripe tomatoes ½ cup Spanish olive oil 1 Tablespoon sherry vinegar Pinch of salt Cut the cheese into 1-inch cubes and place in a bowl. Cut the tomatoes in half and grate them with a cheese grater over the bowl of cheese. Stir in the oil, vinegar, and salt. Let this marinate at room temperature for 1 hour. Divide among small glass bowls. Serve with toothpicks.

Salmorejo Thick Tomato Bread Puree “This is on the menu right now. It’s a tomato and bread puree, it’s real peasant style. It’s a cross between a gazpacho and a thick puree, you just eat it with a spoon. You can add some hard boiled eggs, or some chopped ham.”

Serves 4 1 ¼ cups extra virgin olive oil, divided 4 (1-inch) slices of baguette 2 ripe tomatoes 4 cloves garlic ½ tablespoon sherry vinegar Chopped hard-boiled egg, for garnish Fried jamón serrano, for garnish Tuna, good-quality canned, for garnish (optional) Heat a skillet with ¼ cup olive oil, and toast the bread until brown and crispy on both sides.

Set aside to cool. Put all ingredients into a blender, and blend until a smooth, thick puree is formed. Chill for one hour.Serve garnished with chopped hard-boiled egg and fried jamón serrano, or good quality canned tuna and olive oil.

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Pulpo Frito Crispy Fried Octopus with Salmon Roe Aioli and Pickled Green Chiles “I used this for a competition I was in in New York.” (Chef Caruso was one of four finalists nation-wide who made it to the finals of the Sherry Council of America’s “Copa Jerez International Food and Sherry Pairing Competition.”)

1 large octopus, cleaned ½ yellow onion, chopped 3 cloves garlic, chopped 1 small tomato, chopped 2 teaspoons salt 2 teaspoons pimentón (Spanish paprika) 4 cups water 4 cups Manzanilla sherry 1 wine cork* Salmon Roe Aioli (below) Pickled Green Chiles (below) Bring all ingredients (except aioli and pickled chiles) to a boil in a large saucepan. Turn down to low heat and cover. Let cook for 2 hours, or until octopus is very tender. Allow to cool and then separate legs from the body. We will fry the 8 legs; save the rest of the body for other uses or discard. *The wine cork makes the octopus tenderer. It is an old European technique that I learned somewhere along the way. I do not know how or why it works; I only know when I don’t use it, the octopus is not as tender.

Salmon Roe Aioli Makes about 1 cup 1 egg yolk Juice of ½ lemon (about 1 Tablespoon) 2 cloves garlic, minced Salt and pepper to taste 1 tablespoon salmon roe ½ cup extra virgin olive oil ½ cup canola oil 1 teaspoon pimenton

With a mortar and pestle, blend the yolk with lemon juice, garlic, salt, pepper, and roe. Add the oils slowly until the aioli thickens.

Stir in pimentón.

1 cup white wine vinegar 1 bay leaf 1 teaspoon dry oregano 2 tablespoons salt 1 teaspoon ground black pepper 4 tablespoons sugar

Juice of ½ orange (1 tablespoon)

2 New Mexico green or poblano

chiles, julienned

¼ red onion, julienned

Combine all ingredients except the chiles and onions in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil for 1 minute. Remove from heat and pour into a bowl with the chiles and onions. Allow to marinate and cool to room temperature. Refrigerate for 2 hours. Strain, discarding the liquid, and use the chiles and onions for the dish.

Fried Octopus

Serves 4

1 quart vegetable oil

3 cups rice flour

2 teaspoons sea salt, divided

3 cups egg whites

Heat the oil in a large pot to 350 degrees. Mix flour with 1 teaspoon sea salt. Dip octopus legs in egg whites and then in the flour-salt mixture. Deepfry until crispy and golden (about 30 seconds). Remove from oil and sprinkle with remaining salt. Serve 2 legs per plate as soon as they are fried, while still hot. Place 1 tablespoon of Pickled Green Chiles on the plate next to the octopus and spoon 2 tablespoons of chilled Salmon Roe Aioli on the side for dipping.

España: Exploring the Flavors of Spain by James Campbell Caruso with photographs by Douglas Merriam is available at La Boca. Chef Caruso will have a book signing party at La Boca on Saturday, May 12th from 3 to 5 p.m. Tapas will be served.

La Boca is located at 72 West Marcy Street, Santa Fe, 505.982.3433, www.labocasf.com

Pickled Green Chiles 1 cup water A Taste of Life in New Mexico

MARCH 2012

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Come spend your summer vacation with us!

Taste the New Southwest Inspired by Northern New Mexico and infused with local and organically sourced ingredients, Chef Charles Dale’s new menu blends a sense of balance, place and comfort to create a new twist on Contemporary American Cuisine.

Katie’s Doggie Bed & Breakfast Day Care or Longer

Patty Prosser Proprietor

1407 Borrego Pass Santa Fe, NM 87507 505.438.0063 pattyprosser.pp@gmail.com

The Spice Lady

Specialty bulk spices, herbs, teas, salts, peppers and curry blends.

Fabulous selection of culinary items. Design your own gift basket.

509 Cordova Rd. Santa Fe (next to CVS)

877.262.4666 198 State Road 592, Santa Fe encantadoresort.com

The Beat Goes On cool consignment clothing • accessories art to wear • books and more...

beyond the ordinary…

333 Montezuma at Guadalupe (near the RailRunner) Santa Fe, NM 505.982.7877

46

M AY 2 0 1 2

magazine.com

Buy a little, buy a lot. If we don’t have it, we’ll get it.

Open Daily 10:00-5:00PM Closed Sundays 505-471-3833 • thespiceladysantafe.com

LAURA SHEPPHERD ATELIER

new collection of silk ralli jackets, completely reversible! shown with Masha Archer jewelry

your local resource for “skinny wraps,” get tightened, toned and firmed up for the summer!

Mother’s Day Brunch Sunday, May 13 ~11:30 am to 3 pm

photosantagto.com

Featuring Compound Classics & Seasonal Specialties

65 w. marcy street santa fe, nm 87501 505.986.1444 laurasheppherd.com

The Compound Restaurant: A Family Tradition Reservations 982.4353

653 Canyon Road

compoundrestaurant.com

Something’s coming...

Something good...

Something’s happening at

ebero.artlab graphic.design web.development internet.marketing 505.428.8187 eberosan@gmail.com

1 2 5 E a s t Pa l a c e, S a n t a Fe, N M 8 7 5 0 1 ( 5 0 5 ) 9 8 8 - 9 2 3 2 | l a c a sa s e n a.c o m

A Taste of Life in New Mexico

M AY 2 0 1 2

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it’s always fresh, always local, always close.

Local ingredients, served locally. We seek out the freshest, seasonal organic produce, meats and fish. Then we serve it up with flair and attentive service right in your neighborhood. Join locals supporting locals. Deliciously.

OLD TOWN ALBUQUERQUE 505.766.5100 www.seasonsabq.com

HISTORIC NOB HILL

ALBUQUERQUE HEIGHTS

505.254.ZINC(9462)

505.294.WINE(9463)

www.zincabq.com

www.savoyabq.com

ALBUQUERQUE, SANTA FE 505.850.2459 www.tasteabq.com

. .truly local.