San Marcos Cafe

When we came across the San Marcos Café along the Turquoise Trail to Cerrillos, a heretofore unrecognized rule of finding good Roadfood dawned on us: look for restaurants with live poultry strutting around. Blue Heaven in Key West was the first such place on the good-eats honor roll. The San Marcos café is surrounded by peacocks and peahens, wild turkeys, and roosters all cavorting around. They are not allowed in the dining area, but about twenty years ago there actually was one very famous leghorn rooster named Buddy, who served long tenure as unofficial maitre d’ of the restaurant. Dressed in black tie, Buddy cheerfully greeted guests at the door and crowed through the breakfast hour.

Wandering chickens notwithstanding, San Marcos Café is a real find. A cozy, charming ranch house decorated in country-kitchen style (old enameled stoves, wooden cupboards, knickknacks galore), it serves one of the best cinnamon rolls we’ve ever devoured. It’s an unusual roll in that it’s taller than it is wide; and rather than being dense and doughy like so many others, it is crisp and lightweight, almost croissant-like in character. A beautiful thing!

Other breakfasts are wonderful, too. We sampled “eggs San Marcos” which is a large serving of fluffy scrambled eggs wrapped inside a tortilla and sided by beans, chili, and guacamole under a mantle of melted cheese. We also had a half-order of biscuits and gravy (one large one), the gravy hugely sausage-flavored and yet not the least bit unctuous. Some of the other breakfast choices include a pork chop with eggs, machaca (beef and eggs with pico de gallo), and smoked chicken sausage, We’ve yet to have lunch at San Marcos Café, but we intend to!