A Gringo's Meandering Guide to the Best Margaritas in Santa Fe
Part 1, "The Spirits" of New Mexican Tequila (No offense to my Friends of Bill)
Ok, senor, my wife and I will split the chiles rellenos dinner, and my son will have the steak quesadilla, also with rice and beans. Y dos margaritas.
Of course, amigo.
It’s “the usual” Trules family Mexican restaurant order. Do you recognize it? You would if you read “One Year Anniversary in Santa Fe” in a previous post, and you were trained in General Joan Colaprete’s 10th-grade Honor’s English class (see it HERE on Substack’s “Trules Rules”), where Miss Colaprete honed your abilities to read extra extra carefully by grilling you in rigorous daily tests with ridiculous questions like,
On page 234, on the bottom of paragraph four, what color were Silas Lapham’s wife’s socks?
Man, are you friggin’ kidding us, Miss Colaprete? You need to get married and to get laid.
Anyway, you weren’t in Miss Colaprete’s class, so you probably don’t remember that the three Trules were about to order “the usual” at El Compadre in Echo Park before we headed out of LA for the last time after 40 years in the desert, but the kitchen was too slow, so instead I had my one (uno) fateful flaming margarita before driving south on the I-5 Freeway to Coronado, fell asleep at the wheel, rear-ended a truck, and totaled my Toyota RAV4. Oh, yeah, now you remember!
Doesn’t matter. We eventually made it to Santa Fe over a year ago, and I’m still here to tell the tale.
You want red or green chile, amigo? Or make it Christmas?
It’s the waiter.
Huh?
Ahhhh…. I suddenly realize that…
I’m not in Kansas anymore, Toto!
I mean, I’m not in LA anymore. We’re at Tomasita’s, one of the best-known New Mexican restaurants in Santa Fe.
Notice, I said, New Mexican.
Because… what do I know? I’m a gringo.
Because… si, there is a difference, amigos! Between Mexican and New Mexican.
And it’s not just the food. Like in the red and green chile that my waiter is asking me about. Or in the Christmas chile, obviously a combination of the two!
Food, si, New Mexican food, you see, is a blend of Native American, Spanish, and Anglo tastes. It has its own distinct preparation, ingredients, and flavors. Yes, the defining ingredient is chile, from the spicy chile pepper that is locally grown, green chile around a town called Hatch, in southern New Mexico, and red chile around Chimayo in northern New Mexico.
Maybe that’s why my New Mexico license plate says,
New Mexico, Chile Capital of the World
New Mexican cuisine also emphasizes other native-grown New Mexican spices, herbs, flavors, and vegetables like anise and piñon, along with corn, beans, and squash.
That said, New Mexican food is derived more from Native American origin than from Mexican: fry bread, traditionally baked in the adobe horno ovens of the Pueblo people; puffy sopapillas with honey for desserts. With Hispanic flavors (deriving from the original Spanish colonizers) rather than Mexican or Tex-Mex cuisine, which tends to use beef, which is readily available in Texas, whereas authentic Mexican uses pork.
All of which opens up a whole other stew of vocabulary that’s especially relevant here in Santa Fe and in New Mexico in general: “Native American”, “indigenous”, “Pueblo” “Anasazi”, or “Indian”, as I’ve discussed before in a previous post, or pre-colonial, Spanish, Mexican, Hispanic, Latino, American… everyone in town has their own opinion about the pros and cons of each identifier, and I’ll discuss the repercussions of these volatile opinions a little later in Part 2.
Because wait, I’m supposed to be talking about margaritas here. And not just the one that flamed me into the solid metal repair truck on the I-5 heading south out of LA over a year ago.
No, but the best margaritas in Santa Fe, my new home.
Now I’ll bet that most of you know how to make a margarita, am I right?
Just go to the best Mexican, or New Mexican, bar in town and order one, correcto?
Just kidding.
But here’s the recipe most agreed upon on the internet (for 2 margaritas):
Run lime wedge around the outer rims of 2 rocks glasses and dip the rims in salt. Set aside.
In a cocktail shaker, combine tequila, Cointreau, and lime juice. Fill with ice and shake until thoroughly chilled, about 15 seconds (the bottom of a metal shaker should frost over).
Fill glasses with fresh ice and strain margarita into both glasses. Garnish with lime wheels and serve.
But how about the magical tequila? Do you know where that’s from?
Well… here’s the scoop:
Most tequilas come from the state of Jalisco, where the actual town of Tequila, Mexico exists. But in order for a “spirit” to be called “tequila”, it MUST come from one of five authorized states in Mexico: Guanajuato, Jalisco, Michoacan, Nayarit, or Tamaulipas. It’s illegal to produce tequila in the U.S.
If it’s produced outside one of these five states, it must be called an “agave spirit” or mezcal. Kind of like how if “champagne” is produced outside of Champagne, France, it has to be called “sparkling wine.” Also, and importantly, to be called a tequila, it must be made from at least 51% blue agave.
To begin the complicated, multi-year process of producing tequila, the jimador, or farmer, must plant the blue agave anywhere from 8–12 years before it’s ready for cultivation. Once the plants reach maturity, the jimador takes off the sharp outer leaves, revealing the piña itself (sort of like the heart of an artichoke). Next, the piñas are roasted or steamed, after which they are mashed down, producing the “mosto” which is placed in a fermentation tank where yeast is added. As the yeast eats away the sugars in the mosto, you’re left with “low wine”, which is put in an alambique, or a copper pot, which is heated up to a very high temperature, then cooled rapidly, which finally gives you…. the end product, Tequila!
If you’re looking for THE WORM at the bottom of the tequila bottle, you’ll be disappointed. No matter how hard you look, it won’t be there! The rumor came when tourists confused Oaxacan mezcal with blue agave tequila, because it’s technically illegal to add anything to tequila! So if you need the worm in a mezcal bottle, go to Oaxaca. Or buy one from there!
Now I’m not a tequila connoisseur. And I know there are many. Tequilas and connoisseurs. Me? I usually just get the house margarita. My bad. Do I know the difference between Jose Cuervo, Patron, and Hornitos? Not really. My bad again. But I now know that premium tequilas employ the same distillation techniques as other tequilas, the difference lying in how long they’re aged and the type of barrel they’re aged in, the aging process easily reaching up to three years, sometimes more, for ultra-premium tequila.
So… I have to admit, I need, and I have, a margarita guide here in Santa Fe. His name is Mike Nava. He’s the best pickleball player in town over 55, and quite probably in all of New Mexico. He’s rated 5.0. That’s rarified air, the maximum rating.
He’s smooth as silk on the court (like a well-aged tequila), and he has all the shots. Plus power, speed, all the angles… and a killer drop shot. He almost never loses matches, wins tournaments, and he’s a marvel to watch. I harassed him for months with question after question when I first started playing. He was always friendly, never arrogant, and he never turned me away (unlike some other hotshots who weren’t nearly so kind or helpful). Because he’s soooo good, everyone knows him and looks up to his game.
One day on the old wooden bridge crossing over to the outdoor courts at Fort Marcy, Nava and I got to talking… about pickleball… and life… and we ended up following through with a couple of margaritas at The Atrisco Cafe & Bar, in the nearby DeVargas Mall, a third-generation, family-owned restaurant with its roots at the corner of Atrisco Boulevard and Central Avenue in Albuquerque, which naturally now claims to serve
“the best margarita in Santa Fe”.
Of course, I soon discovered that just about every other New Mexican restaurant in town (and too many others) claim “the same”. But I also soon found out that Atrisco’s is owned by George Gundrey, the same owner of Tomasita’s, the restaurant I mentioned above, and that George is the son of Tomasita’s founder, Georgia Maryol, who first started a small New Mexican café on Hickox Street in Santa Fe in 1974, working with Tomasita Leyba who brought her local recipes to the restaurant. They turned out to be a great success and after building a dedicated clientele and outgrowing that small space, in 1979 Tomasita's moved to the red brick building in Santa Fe's Railyard where it still is today.
Small town, as they say, Santa Fe.
Both restaurants and bars, Tomastia’s and Atrisco’s, now “sisters”, are genuinely authentic, with simple recipes, quality ingredients, locally-grown food, friendly service, and delicious margaritas. They both feel old-world and comfy inside, like part of the original barrio, and that’s the kind of neighborhood restaurant “mi gusto” (I like), no matter how popular they’ve become.
One of the benefits of having Mike Nava (“Nava”) as my “margarita guide”, and occasional pickleball partner is that everyone on the courts wants to join us after a game “for a margarita”, even though it’s probably a weekday around 12 or 1 p.m. Of course, not “everyone”; not the doctors and lawyers and teachers who have to get back to work, but some of the plumbers, roofers, and chimney sweeps who run their own businesses. That’s one of the things I like best about the 700-member Santa Fe Pickleball Club - the diversity - from multi-generation natives and locals to Oklahoma and New York-LA transplants like myself.
And what’s very coooool, there seems to be no class distinction between margarita lovers!
To be continued….. I know… you’re getting thirsty!!!
Next stop - La Choza, my Number One Recommended Margarita Watering Hole in Santa Fe
If you enjoyed this post, or any previous ones, please LIKE IT (by clicking the Heart), and LEAVE A COMMENT. It helps build an enthusiastic and interactive readership.
Also, if you have any friends who you think might enjoy Santa Fe Substack, PLEASE SHARE IT WITH THEM.
ALSO, a REMINDER, to CHECK OUT “TRULES RULES on SUBSTACK” with over 100 posts and re-posts of “rants, raves, reports, and points of view + top-rated travel podcasts and some common sense”.
Thanks so much!!!
Trules
Cheers! Salud!
Travel the world with “e-travels with e. trules” blog
Visit his personal blog Trules Rules HERE
Listen to his travel PODCAST HERE
Or go to his HOMEPAGE
Eric Trules’ Twitter (X) handle: @etrules
.
Re-read and enjoyed dedication to details.
Hmmmm can’t wait for the La Choza article, pickle ball and margaritas 🥶♥️