 Atrisco Cafe & Bar
When the friend I was visiting in Santa Fe suggested this place for a late lunch/early dinner and then mentioned that it was "at the mall," I was skeptical. Not that I thought she was trying to trick me into some Sbarro, but in my experience, even a decent mall sit-down restaurant is going to fall short of the mark. I didn't break out of jail and travel nearly 900 miles on foot to eat at Red Robin, goddamnit! Especially since the whole reason I was in jail was for robbing a Red Robin! What I didn't know then that I know now, is that pretty much any food anywhere in Santa Fe is going to be fantastic. Why, by the end of my visit I was routinely fishing unfinished sopapillas out of restaurant dumpsters—although to be fair, this was mainly because I wasn't finding as much discarded turquoise as I'd initially hoped.
Atrisco truly puts the "all" in "mall restaurant"—as in "all" their food is fuckin' terrific, but also, "all" you really want is a couple'a Frogg Margaritas.
Now, this friend and I have a long history of drinkin' our faces off at places like this, but these Frogg Margaritas took things to a whole new level. On the second one, my friend's face literally began to shrink and fall right off her fuckin' head! Clearly we needed some actual food to complement the insanely strong drinks.
After splitting the cutely-named "Tres Amigos" (guacamole, salsa, and chips), I ordered a green chile cheeseburger with house fries, while she got a cup of black bean soup and a garden salad. All very good, and about $75 total with tip. Subsequently I've had numerous better green chile cheeseburgers in Santa Fe, but that's not a ding against this one—it's just that there are so freakin' many great ones to be had all over this town. Still quite buzzed after the meal, we wandered around DeVargas Center, which has some genuinely quirky and interesting stores, such as the Harrell House Bug Museum! See what I mean about Santa Fe? At their mall, you can hold a tarantula; at yours, you can buy some goddamn Aunted pretzel.
Review by Foy Cartoona, March 2017 |
