Santa Fe: Arts and Culture

Santa Fe Opera House
Image from ArtsJournal Weblog

The Santa Fe Opera House is one of the most beautiful venues I've ever been to, and I remain on their mailing list - forever hopeful for a chance to return. So when I got a 50% discounted offer from the Santa Fe Opera for their new opera: "The Last Savage" back in February - the wheels for our Santa Fe trip were set in motion. What makes the opera experience so breathtaking is not only the world-renowned vocalists, but the scenery... the opera is outdoors - with the mountains and sunset as its backdrop. This was my third opera in Santa Fe, but definitely not my last.

Di and I at the Opera

In addition to attending the opera, Diana and I managed to pack a good amount of art and culture into our 4 day trip. We learned about Santa Fe's history at the Palace of the Governors (which is the oldest continuously occupied public building in the US), and wandered among famous American iconic paintings (such as Warhol's Jackie-O silkscreens, O'Keeffe's landscapes, and Rockwell's "Soda Jerk") at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum.

Iconic New Mexican Painter:
Georgia O'Keeffe (google images)

In addition to formal museums, Diana and I also visited the art galleries on Canyon Road.

Artist Coffee Break?

Canyon Road is Santa Fe's art district - and features over 100 galleries and studios in converted adobe homes. It is one of the premier destinations in the world for art collectors - just behind New York and Paris. In one of the galleries Diana and I came upon, three elderly gentlemen, in "casual wear" were considering purchasing a 22k silver plate. We somehow felt like intruders in a very personal moment in these men's friendship. I would have loved to know the back story behind these three, smiling amigos, and how they came upon this particular art dealer on Canyon Road.

Churches of Santa Fe

Diana and I are both Italian Catholics, so of course we wanted to visit the several historic churches in Santa Fe.

The Cathedral Basilica of St Francis of Assisi

The first Cathedral was built in 1610 by the Franciscan Friars and Spanish colonists, but was destroyed in the Pueblo revolt in 1680. The current Cathedral was rebuilt in 1886.




Interestingly, the French archbishops had all of the traditional New Mexican Mission Style art removed from the Cathedral, but in 1997 the present Archbishop commissioned Santa Fe local folk artist Marie Romero Cash to redo the artwork lining the walls in the Santero style reminiscent of the historic churches.

The Loretto Chapel

Diana and I stayed at the beautiful Inn and Spa of Loretto, in the heart of Santa Fe. It's a first class hotel, and I had one of the best therapeutic massages of my life at their spa (which was rated #25 out of the top 50 spas in the country by Conde Nest). Another really neat thing about the Loretto Inn is that our room overlooked the chapel.

The Loretto Chapel is home to the "miracle staircase" which Diana and I payed $2 to see. At first, I couldn't understand what was so miraculous about it since the stairs looked like, well... stairs.


So we did a little research. Basically, the story goes that nuns built this chapel, but miscalculated the proportions and had no way to get from the ground floor to the 20 foot choir loft. The nuns prayed to St. Joseph (saint of carpenters), and a carpenter showed up in the middle of the night on a donkey, and built the staircase using only a square, tub of water, and a saw. The stairway makes two complete 360 degree turns, has no central support, and no nails. In short, mathematically it shouldn't stay up. Additionally, the wood is not indigenous to the area - no one has any idea where it came from.

After he finished, the carpenter left in the middle of the night, without asking for payment; miracle or not - that was one great guy.

The San Miguel Mission

The San Miguel Mission is the oldest active church in the United States, and it was our third and final stop on our "church tour." While it was the most architectually simple, there was something amazing about it - which made me linger a little longer than normal after we lit candles for our loved ones at the altar.




After all of this religious and historical reverence, we made our way through The Mission's gift shop, and broke out into huge grins when we came across this little gem:

Diana and I are English teachers after all, and we catch spelling errors for a living - so there is something wonderfully entertaining about finding these rare linguistic renegades out in public, especially when you least expect it.

Santa Fe Recipes

Santa Fe is known for its architecture and food, which are both heavily influenced by its Anglo, Spanish and Native American tri-cultural heritage.

The New Mexican desert is dotted with pinkish-beige adobes, which are made by pouring a mixture of mud in between wooden frames. "Recipes" for adobe "mud" differ between Pueblo tribes, and are passed down from mother to daughter. Nearly all of the buildings in Santa Fe are adobes, and recently there has been a push to interview women elders of Pueblo tribes in order to record and preserve this uniquely "green" building method.


In addition to architectural recipes, New Mexico's distinctive culture is reflected in its cuisine, which may be some of the best food this country has to offer. Below are a few of our most memorable epicurean moments...

Breakfast: Luminaria

The locally grown green chile is an absolute staple of New Mexican cuisine (even for breakfast) and has more of a flavor-packed punch than a tabasco-like heat. I love NM green chile, and was anxious for Diana to try some as soon as possible. So, for our first breakfast in Santa Fe, we ate at our hotel's restaurant, Luminaria, which turned out to be wonderful. Diana and I both had eggs scrambled with green chile, tomatoes and avocado, with a side of hash browns, homemade warm tortillas, and fresh pear / ginger juice. It was the perfect start to a delicious trip.

Lunch: Tomasita's

In addition to the green chile, I could not leave Santa Fe without introducing Diana to my beloved sopaipillas, which are puffy, deep fried squares of dough, made in the same tradition as Navajo fry bread. Locals and tourists alike agree - the place for these tasty-pillow-treats is Tomasita's. While people have strong opinions on how to best enjoy their sopaipillas (savory or sweet), I subscribe to the local three-step process:

Step One: break off a large piece of the sopaipilla and smother it in honey-butter.

Step Two: squirt a little local honey over the honey-butter (and no, it's not too much honey).

Step Three: dredge your sticky, golden, buttery bread through a mixture of spicy chile - preferably "Christmas style" (1/2 green and 1/2 red chile).

Diana and I perfected this ritual with a main course of Huevos Rancheros, (corn tortillas layered in chile, beans and cheese with two fried eggs on top) - another Tomasita's classic.

Afternoon Snack: Mangiamo Pronto!

Santa Fe is at 7,000 feet, and the altitude does get to you. One afternoon I took a short nap as Diana tooled around. When I woke up, I got a text from her: "I'm at the gelato place across the street" - leave it to Diana to hunt down an Italian pit-stop in NM. This little cafe turned out to be a winner- with good coffee, creamy salted caramel gelato, and high quality prosciutto wrapped melon.

Dinner: The Shed and The Pink Adobe

We had two outstanding dinners: chicken enchiladas at The Shed and pork tomalles at The Pink Adobe. At both places, we were giddy with the explosion of flavors - and thanked the food gods for leading us to the promise land.

If you look closely at the picture above, you will see some posole on the left hand side of my dinner plate. Posole is a little like a dry popcorn soup, and is made with lime, hominy, pork, chiles, garlic & spices. There is an expression in NM: "rice is nice but posole is holy" - and an argument can be made that you aren't really eating a traditional New Mexican meal unless posole is a part of it. It's sort of bland on its own, but takes on the heat and flavor of whatever it compliments, which makes it a perfect side to any chile-smothered dish.

They say "if you can't stand the heat, stay out of New Mexico: Here chile is king"; I say - long live his majesty's reign.

Some Santa Fe Food Links:

Hatch Chile Festival: Sept 3-4
Santa Fe School of Cooking
Gil's Thrilling (and Filling) Blog

Getting to Santa Fe

When I moved from San Francisco to NJ three years ago, I left behind one of the closest friends I've ever had - Diana. Since we are both teachers, we decided to plan a little summer get away this year for some girl time. We chose to explore Santa Fe, New Mexico because it was somewhat "in the middle" of the two of us, and Diana had never been.

While I have been to Santa Fe at least 6 or 7 times before, I've never navigated it without a car - so I had no idea how to get us from the Albuquerque airport to downtown Santa Fe.


Diana and I decided to jump right into the local flavor of things, and take the train instead of an airport shuttle. Even though we had to wait 2 hrs at the airport (since the train runs so infrequently), we didn't have any problems chatting away the time. On our short (free) bus ride from the airport to the train, our driver gave us a great tip: we should go straight up-stairs and sit on the right side of the train for the best scenery.


While we miscalculated where the "right" side was, the train turned out to be a fantastic, relaxing way to see some beautiful southwest landscapes. Plus - it's dirt cheap: $3 for students and $7 for adults.

Next stop: Santa Fe adventure!

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