Coyote Cafe & Cantina, which was one of the first restaurants in the country to introduce diners to regional and native Southwestern ingredients, will celebrate its 40th anniversary in two years and is proud to announce the appointment of Executive Chef Travis Limoge. Limoge is the latest chef to uphold the traditions of this iconic restaurant, and in doing so he is remaining at the forefront of what it means now to work with local farmers and sustainable ingredients.
“This restaurant has always been a trailblazer and that is why we are especially thrilled to welcome Travis. He brings a lot of experience in supporting local culture and he is determined to demonstrate we can work with small businesses to exclusively use their products on a larger scale,” says owner Quinn Stephenson, who began his own working relationship with Coyote Cafe at age 19.
Limoge built his career cooking at restaurants throughout California, Oregon and Colorado more recently owned and operated PIRATA in Puerto Escondido, Oaxaca, a 20-seat restaurant where he served a 10-course tasting menu working with just a single farm and single fisherman. He also spent time in his home state of Vermont exploring techniques to preserve summer’s bounty in cold weather regions. By hosting guest chef dinners and collaborating with local craft brewers he also deepened his knowledge of the microbial world.
Already after just a few short months, he’s converted 100% of the café’s produce sourcing to local organic farms, visiting them at the twice weekly market and making trips to their farms and communities, and planning for the future, together. He’s not only looking at what’s in season now but building a larder, ensuring inflections of terroir appear on the menu year-round.
As Limoge says of creating a menu, “The challenge is being able to speak to the terroir of the place year-round. A summer menu is easy, it’s a walk through a meadow. The only way to achieve this when winter sets in is to capture the essence of the seasons and preserve them using techniques handed down from our ancestors.”
The food at Coyote Cafe is inherently Southwestern and Travis is most proud of dishes such as the Ceviche, which is a super expression of himself, featuring Kampachi, grapefruit, orange honey, pollen, mint, and a dashi crisp. Another specialty on the menu is Chama River Greens with baby kale, piñon, cotija, and pepita dressing and Limoge’s Broken Arrow Quail with blue corn, sage, cherry, and Southwestern five spice may be Limoge’s ultimate expression of what the Southwest should taste like. For this dish he was inspired by a barefoot walk through the caves of Bandelier National Monument.
Desserts include Mesilla pecan pie with salted butterscotch ice cream; piñon buttercakes with mascarpone mousse, brûlée pineapple and piñon brittle; and Mexican hot chocolate empanadas with banana dulce de leche, to name a few.
The beverage program at Coyote Cafe is primarily agave-focused, based around tequila and Mezcal. Owner Quinn Stephenson began working at Coyote Cafe in his late teens and soon moved into a bartending role. Before the age of 30 he was a partner in the restaurant and his first love remains the wine and spirits programs. One of the showstoppers on the menu is the Salty Señorita, made with tequila, Cointreau and topped with Stephenson’s invention, salted lime foam. The Tickled Pink Paloma features Dragon fruit and Salted Pop Rocks and the Norteño Margarita includes Hatch Green Chile and Chapulin salt.
Wine Director Simon Lee-Plunket and Stephenson have created a wine list that is global in scope and is intended to support the diversity and complexity of the menu. While there are well-known wines on the list, Lee-Plunket wants to introduce diners to varietals and regions that may be less familiar. The wine list is organized by varietal and region with mixed pages listed lightest to fullest. The Sommelier Selections section showcases food-friendly, off-the-beaten-path gems and Reduced Selections section offers more well-known labels.
Coyote Cafe, located on the second floor of the Water Street building, features one of the first open kitchens in a fine-Dining restaurant in the country. Five circular banquettes line the perimeter of the room and a custom banquette in the center of the room offers four seating areas for tables of four. Tables line the floor to ceiling windows at the front of the room and provide views overlooking the nearby rooftops and street below. The Chef’s Counter provides seating for 6 to watch the action in the kitchen. The muted color palette of the walls, seating and flooring – deep blues, grays, and black – drive one’s focus to the food on their plates and the artwork throughout the room. A dramatic red glass chandelier at the center of the room was designed to look like a Chile ristra, the traditional bunches of chiles one finds hanging everywhere in Santa Fe. Lit from below it casts shadows on the ceiling. Artwork by Nestor Melchor and local photography line the walls, lit from behind, providing dramatic effect in contrast to the subdued color palette of the room. Other pops of color come in the form of brightly colored striped back cushions on the outer banquettes and throw pillows found at the center tables.
Coyote Cantina, the building’s rooftop space focuses on more casual fare and the atmosphere is relaxed. A giant mural of a coyote leads diners up to the cantina where an open fireplace anchors the covered patio. Tables are covered with Mexican oilcloth fabric and bar height seating runs the length of the front of the building for idyllic sunset viewing. A small two top on a perch a few steps above may be the most romantic table in town and bar seating under the awning is where locals and guests alike post up for friendly conversation and a menu of elevated Southwestern fare such as Green Chile pork posole, BBQ Duck Quesadillas, and Barbacoa tacos.
The restaurant offers dinner reservations daily starting at 5 p.m. and the cantina opens daily at 11:30
a.m. Reservations are not required for the cantina.
