Pasqual's - Santa Fe, NM

Posted By Michael Stern on January 22, 2003 5:17 AM

Pasqual’s is a modest corner café with spectacularly good food. It serves three meals a day, and we love its squash and red onion enchiladas as well as the chicken mole and truly excellent “Ranch Burger” served with garlic fries; but the best time to come is breakfast. The whole wheat pancakes are large but featherweight, served with real maple syrup. French toast is made from house-baked honey whole-wheat bread. Granola is world-class, and the five-grain hot cereal with butter and syrup is impossible to resist. For those who want something really exotic, there is a tamale dulce, wrapped in banana leaves and garnished with Mexican hot chocolate. Or how about fried blue and yellow cornmeal mush?

There is no more wonderful corned beef hash than the one served here. Good-size nuggets of zesty brisket, some of them velvet tender others crunchy, are scattered with scallions over a plate of buttery home fries, the whole shebang topped with two quivery poached eggs. To make this one of the best morning meals ever, we like to side it by a glass of Mexican hot chocolate, which is garnished with freshly grated cinnamon and packs a dizzying cocoa/spice character that is subtle but impossible to stop drinking.

It’s a very popular place. At any mealtime in the split-level dining room, you are lucky to find a seat at a small table or at the large shared one, where a local or a stranger from just about any part of the world might break bread with you.

After a few meals at Pasqual’s, it is easy to feel affection for its unpretentious, sometimes clamorous ambiance; this is a restaurant with a brilliant personality that perfectly complements the high quality fare from the kitchen.

Overall Rating

Corned beef hash

squash & red onion enchiladas

granola

French toast

Mexican Hot Chocolate

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Posted By deb hall on August 5, 2010 12:47 AM

We've been eating at Pasqual's for 14 years, and even though we moved away from Northern New Mexico 9 years ago, we always try to make a pilgrimage there whenever we're in the area. The trick we learned when we lived an hour away was to call and get on the waiting list on Saturday mornings, so by the time we pulled into the Plaza, our hour's wait was up, and we could pretty much get seated right away. (Que bueno, no?)

This trip we had both a breakfast and a lunch there, and the big treat was the watermelon salad as a side dish with the lamb and traditional hamburgers we had. It was a savory salad with a vinagrette and a bit of feta I think- it was refreshing and different.

Our one dissappointment was that they no longer have the sweet tamale with Mexican hot chocolate and mango on the menu.

Service was terrific as always, and we recognized some long-standing staff. Our waitress even invited us to do laundry at her house!

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Posted By Paul Clem on March 13, 2007 6:18 PM

No trip to Santa Fe is complete without a stop at Pasqual's, one block southwest of the plaza, where you can dine on fresh, innovative breakfast/brunch/lunch foods with a southwestern flair. Their cooking applies classic local touches (poblano and other chiles, tomatillo salsa verde, homemade tortillas) with Chez Panisse-style regional and seasonal foods (local trout, thick applewood-smoked bacon, free-range chicken, Niman Ranch pork, local goat cheese).

Can't miss favorites on the menu include smoked trout hash (smoked trout and a great green tomatillo salsa over two poaches eggs on hash browns), eggs Benedict, huevos moltuleños (eggs over black beans, bananas and feta on tortillas) and any of the burritos on the menu. Fresh-squeezed juices and cinnamony Mexican hot chocolates and mochas complement the richly spiced food.

Pasquals serves fresh, impeccably spiced, original southwestern and Mexican takes on classic breakfast fare in a festive and brightly hand-painted two-level dining room. The lines out the door on weekend mornings are a mix of locals and visitors making their weekend pilgrimage to this affordable but delicious Santa Fe classic.

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