Where to
Eat in
Santa Fe
Where to
For many people, a city is its food. Santa Fe is the state capital for art and culture, but it’s also one of the best places in the Southwest to go for craft beer, wine, and fresh produce. Here’s where you’ll want to go to get started on your culinary adventures across the city.
Margarita Trail
Santa Fe is basically the real-life Margaritaville. If green chile burgers are the city’s trademark food, then the margarita is the city’s trademark beverage. The Santa Fe Margarita Trail is a fun program being run by Tourism Santa Fe, taking you from bar to bar for authentic agave tequila margaritas. For those 21 years old and up, it’s a great way to get to know the local watering holes at a discount.
To get started, go to the Santa Fe Visitor Center and buy a Santa Fe Margarita Trail Passport and start visiting participating bars. Present the passport for a one-dollar discount on the special margarita and get your passport stamped. You can earn prizes along the way: A commemorative T-shirt at five stamps, a signed copy of The Great Margarita Book at 20, and a Margarita Bartender Kit once you fill out your book.
Santa Fe is known as a coffee lover’s paradise. Top-tier Iconik Coffee ranks as one of our favorite places for stopping for coffee on the way to work or sipping a leisurely cup on the weekends. There are two locations, one at 1600 Lena Street and one at 202 Galisteo Street.
Here’s what makes Iconik so special: They do all their own bean-roasting. They buy their beans green and roast them in the store. And yes, it smells incredible in the open-air, living-room-like setting of the coffee shop. If you don’t have time to grab a cup, you can buy a pound from the shop, or just walk by the place on your way to the office. The aroma alone will wake you up.
Located at 821 Canyon Road in the Historic Eastside area, The Teahouse attracts coffee lovers for their Santa Fe Chile Mocha Latte, which might just be the best sweet coffee drink in the city. No, they dont actually add ground-up green chile to the brew, but theres a hint of cinnamon that warms you up and is just the perfect thing for chilly mornings.
Santa Fe Coffee
New Mexican Chiles
In New Mexico, you can’t really say it’s summertime until you smell those hatch green chiles being roasted at every supermarket and Mexican restaurant in town. Every New Mexican knows the experience of driving home with a heavy burlap sack of roasted chile in the back seat, filling the car with that smoky, sweet aroma. Here’s a basic primer on the hatch green chile.
- You can get them at most of the locally owned grocery stores and have them roasted on-site. One of Santa Fe’s favorite resources is be The Chile Shop, where you can get powdered chile, dried chile, roasted chile, hot sauce, and even green chile pancake mix.
- Remove the seeds and skins before eating the chile. The smokey, roasted skins look and smell delicious, but they’re like chewing on paper if you actually take a bite. You can strip the skins and seeds easily under cold water in the sink.
- Chiles are seasonal, but they retain their flavor for a long time if you dry or freeze them. Don’t hesitate to buy a 10-pound bag and stock your freezer with a half dozen baggies filled with chiles.
- If you want to see how the locals cook with chiles, try the green chile stew at The Shed or the green chile cheeseburger at the Santa Fe Bite. It’s hard to pick a “best chile burger in Santa Fe,” but the Bite’s is certainly in the running.
New Mexico is a farming state. In Santa Fe, you can stock your kitchen without ever setting foot in a supermarket. The best farmers market in the city known to be the Santa Fe Farmers Market. Open from 8 AM to 1 PM every Saturday (all year) and Tuesday (May through November) at 1607 Paseo de Peralta, Suite A. Smaller neighborhood markets like the Rancho Santa Fe Market can also be found throughout the city.