Just wanted to let everyone know that if you missed hearing the interview on Saturday, it is available to listen online.  During it I was visibly outed as a 6’7″ red-headed black woman, which is totally misleading – it’s only 6’2″.  Ryan neglected to describe the vivid pattern of my J Lo-esque dress or my deadly 5″ stilettos which contribute quite a bit to the height number.  :-)

http://breakthechain.info/2011/05/21/andrea-lin/

Restaurants I wanted to mention but didn’t get around to:

Fat Boy Cafe for great coffee

Cedar Point Grille for a recent revamp that includes great breakfasts and wonderful biscuits and gravy

Slate Street Cafe for just being pretty gosh darned good for a long time

Winning Coffee for being there for all of us coffee hounds long before Charlie Sheen made it trendy

Annapurna Chai Shoppe and Restaurant for Cardamom Pancakes – seriously delicious

Thank you for your support of local restaurants, and tune in this Saturday as the guest will be Cheryl Jamison, a prolific cook and author here in our fabulously spicy state.

I’m a week late, not to mention a dollar short, but you NEED to know that a local radio station has started up a weekly segment where the goal is to promote local restaurants and entice listeners to give up their chain habits and forever avoid places like the Olive Chili Outback Corral kind of spots.

This Saturday will be another live show with at least one featured guest, and yeah, this weekend it IS yours truly:  http://breakthechain.info/

Here’s the press copy from the parent radio station:

“If your loyalties lie with local restaurants – those owned and operated by our friends and neighbors, you’ll love “Break the Chain,” an enlightening and entertaining new radio program hosted by Ryan Scott. Break The Chain premiered on Saturday, May 14th at 3PM on 1550 KIVA AM and www.1550kiva.com. This weekly radio show will feature locally owned and operated restaurants here in New Mexico.

Obviously Break The Chain isn’t about breaking or bankrupting heavily bankrolled chain restaurants. It’s about breaking the chain “habit,” the inclination many have to visit the ubiquitous and convenient chains. Break The Chain is a celebration of local mom-and-pop restaurants, aiming to show the many outstanding alternatives to the familiar chains. It’s an interactive show in which you can call in and express your opinions and share your experiences. Most of all, it’s a fun and lively show you will love.”

Love lamb?  Love all kinds of game meat, gently prepared and exuberantly strong flavored? I was reading the newest copy of New Mexico Magazine today and lit upon a description of a wildly simple entree at a little spot called Atrisco Cafe – leg of lamb burrito with red chile.  Kate Manchester‘s description was evocative enough that we literally scrambled to the car and went up for a late lunch, calling ahead to make sure this now-famous item was still available.

At Atrisco Cafe I had the pleasure of tasting their piece de resistance – a burrito stuffed with roasted leg of lamb from a heritage farm in New Mexico.  Lest you think this is ONLY about Santa Fe – the cafe has history.  George Gundrey opened the spot after generations of family restaurants, including a place at Atrisco & Central in Albuquerque called the Central Cafe, in operation from the 1940′s until the 1970′s.  The whole extended family has their chile-scrubbing hands in places like Horseman’s Haven and Tia Sophia’s – not bad for a story.

The burrito?  It’s really, really, lamby.  And that’s it.  No beans, no garnish.  Even the cheese is gently applied.  It is a good example of why I don’t often order lamb – for my tastes I find many lamb dishes too mild, too toned-down-for-beef-eaters.  But this, this grabbed you by the tongue and said, “hello.  I’m game meat.  How are you today?”

You can revel in that flavor but it does get overwhelming – a friend of mine suggested it was lacking something but we were not sure what.  Maybe calabacitas, maybe some beans, something with a little neutrality.  But if you want to be smacked in the head with your leg of lamb, it’s perfect.

Oh, and their red chile is pretty darn good, too.

Albuquerque now has at least three locations that serve what they describe as frozen yogurt.  What frozen yogurt is, exactly, can vary based on how closely you’ve ever been associated with the crazy health obsession of the Western US in the past decade.  The tart, lean, light “true” frozen yogurt will actually still have living creatures still thrashing about and ready to help out your gut.

Also required – minimal amounts of sugar and only hints – if any – of added fat are the ideal way to make perfect Frozen Yogurt.  But there are issues – what makes ice cream creamy?  High sugar content is the main factor, but secondary is fats and other additives to keep the texture smooth.  So, that generally means that frozen yogurt cannot and will not be as dreamy as ice cream.  And in this case, “stabilizers” are often our friends – most of them are recognizably natural anyway, like gelatin or corn starch.

As long as you understand you are comparing something as different as chicken breasts to a rib-eye steak, we’ll do OK.

Tasting notes will coalesce into an article, based on my own visits of each location. Who will the contenders be?

DeliBerry (Juan Tabo)
Yo Yo Bliss (ABQ Uptown)
LOVE Frozen Yogurt Bar
Olo Yogurt Studio (Nob Hill)
Ellie’s Yoberri Park (closed?)

Are there more?  Please do let me know….