Cafe Coyote’s Dishes Don’t Live Up to Menu’s Promise

Sopapillas , posole , jalapeno tortellini, duck breast in juniper berry marinade--these are all on the menu at the new Cafe Coyote in Old Town, and they all sound interesting.

But then, just about everything at the Cafe Coyote looks or sounds interesting. It’s the reality that falls short.

Novelties like grilled halibut tacos and duck-stuffed tamales exist alongside such accepted standards of Southwestern cuisine as black bean chili, blue corn chips and fajitas . And the restaurant itself, upstairs at the Old Town Esplanade, flatters the eye so effectively that after sampling some of the dishes you could be forgiven for assuming that all the creative effort expended upon the place went into the decor.

Cafe Coyote is not related to the famous Coyote Cafe in trendy-chic-upscale-clever Santa Fe, N. M., although a disingenuous-seeming menu note describes Santa Fe as the hometown of the restaurant’s imaginary coyote mascot (artsy-craftsy wooden carvings of coyotes in various poses abound throughout the restaurant). The cooking style also is advertised to be the new Southwestern style developed in Santa Fe.

Tackling a Tough One

That may be true, although if the virtually unchewable beef in the fajitas and tacos and the asphalt-like dough of the Pueblo Indian pizza are typical of Santa Fe cooking, the only conclusion that could be drawn would be that the residents of this favored city are equipped with teeth sheathed in stainless steel.

Southwestern cuisine, like California cuisine, cuisine nouvelle , la cucina novella and all the other updates, is artificial, which is not a criticism, because all these styles also represent thoughtful elaborations and modernizations of traditional cooking styles. Cornmeal, cumin, pine nuts, chilies of various strengths and tomatoes thus play major roles, but in combination with ingredients that the original Southwesterners did not know, including fresh ocean fish and shrimp, which reason tells us could not have appeared on New Mexico tables until the advent of refrigeration. Cafe Coyote’s pastas, seasoned with Southwestern flavors, are obvious examples of this reinterpretation of traditional cooking.

Make no mistake, some items are both inventive and tasty. The house quesadilla, for example, goes well beyond the cheese-covered tortilla favored in San Diego to include a savory stuffing of svelte oyster mushrooms, pungent pine nuts and fashionable, sun-dried tomatoes, with a spoonful of fresh mango salsa plopped in the center to underline the overall cleverness of the thing. The grilled pasilla pepper, which imitates the more familiar chili relleno in all respects except the cooking method (chilies rellenos are fried), is similarly exceptional, the cheese stuffing quite suave and the red chili sauce and mango salsa serving as provocative counterpoints.

A Happier Offering

The scampi chalupa also was among Cafe Coyote’s happier offerings. Pizza-like in appearance, it consisted of a toasted tortilla tantalizingly topped with Tabascoed tomato puree, black bean chili, grated cheese, avocado and plump shrimp, an effective layering of ingredients that resulted in a satisfying dish. (Black beans repeat endlessly on this menu, both as topping and as side dish, and generally to good effect.)

However, other dishes that were as visually attractive were disagreeable, beginning with an order of beef fajitas , garnished with peppers, onions and mushrooms, that included chunks of beef that no amount of chewing would render palatable. The experience of chewing leather soles or lengths of rubber hose may not be dissimilar to that provided by a chunk of this restaurant’s fajitas . Nor was this wretched beef an isolated incident, because beef tacos served two nights later included equally tooth-defying meat. These tacos were filled with bits of steak rather than the locally familiar shredded beef, which would have been fine, except that many pieces were both tough and raw.

Things went so badly on the second visit, in fact, that one guest finally tossed down his fork and declared, “This place is the pits.” Several dishes arrived stone-cold on super-heated plates, suggesting that they had been prepared too soon, and that an ineffective attempt to reheat them had been made. The good, fragile corn chips and demure salsa that arrived gratis with the menus on the previous visit never appeared, and all but one of the desserts were unavailable, but there was one thread of consistency between the two dinners: Sopapillas , the famous fried, puffed bread of New Mexico cooking, were not to be had on either occasion. They appear at the head of the menu (the description mentions orange honey and honey butter), and they may be good, when they’re on hand.

To base a Southwestern-style pizza on a cornmeal crust seems a natural, but this one was so dry, thick and hard that it seemed like half-baked clay--the topping of fresh tomatoes, three cheeses and crumbled chorizo was wasted.

Spiced Tomato Sauce

The blend of cornmeal and hominy that encased chunks of moist duck and mushroom in the tamales, on the other hand, was soft and succulent, and nicely picked up by the spiced tomato sauce that blanketed the dish. A highly-seasoned stew of fresh corn accompanied the tamales and was, all in all, one of the restaurant’s best preparations.

A sleeper on the menu is the “lemon peppered” linguine, which tasted of neither lemon nor pepper but did offer the soft, seductive flavor of saffron in every bite. A smooth, creamy and light dish, this was an example of Southwestern updating headed in the right direction. The menu also offers a second pasta, of noodle pockets stuffed with sage-scented chicken.

Among other dishes are gazpacho, posole (a stew of chicken and hominy), halibut tacos, barbecued salmon, rib eye steak (with a “pistachio Dijon pesto “ that sounds like a classic among culinary mixed metaphors) and a peppered chicken salad.

The menu mentions four desserts, but only the apple raspberry pie was available on the night dessert was desired. The term “half-baked” may have been invented in anticipation of that piece of pie, and, at $4.50 a slice, there are better ways to spend money.

* CAFE COYOTE

2461 San Diego Ave.

291-4695

Dinner served nightly.

Credit cards accepted.

Dinner for two, including a glass of wine each, tax and tip, $38 to $60.