One Night in Albuquerque

I had one day in ABQ. This is what I did:

Bosque for a late lunch/beers
La Cumbre for mid afternoon beers
Il Vicino for evening beers

Break

Went to Bistronomy B2B for burgers/beer

Night cap at Marble.

Die/Pass out.

Woke up and went to Nexus and headed out.

 

Hmmm... 5-6 hours in Burque. Let's see.

I'm assuming you'll be hungry, if so, as @aschwab mentioned, Bistronomy B2B is a good stop, tons of local beers for cheap and good burgers. But you may also want some good New Mexican food, if so I'd encourage you to hit Cocina Azul on 12th and Mountain. Great food and it's a 2 minute drive from Marble Brewery, which you can make your second stop. Tractor's new location is close by too, if you're feeling really ambitious you can hit both for a beer in an hour.

Afterwards, head to La Cumbre for the Project Dank, Elevated and Kettle Bell. You'll probably be wasted after this, so I hope your wife is DDing. Take the short drive (30 seconds) to Il Vicino and have one beer or a sampler and have a snack (the sandwiches are good too).

From there, head north about 5 minutes to Nexus brewery. If you're hungry, the food here's solid. If not, have a beer here and then head to Bosque. At Bosque, you can have a beer and sandwiches or soup.

If you're headed north on I-25, there's a few great breweries in Santa Fe too.

 

I gotta say the two above have covered mostly everything. Just some cautionary tales for you. Every brewery in town has signage for "respecting their three beer limit". I hear a lot of out of towners be surprised by this. I see more than half the people at La Cumbre ending up at Il Vicino. So the enforcement aspect is merely on the establishments to enforce what they see and maybe hear. The three can be any size as I've found out the hard way. If you order 3 10oz beers. That's the same as getting a full pint or hefe pint of beer. Some places I have seen some leniency. But for the most part, they are on top of things. ie, they may forget if you want that 4th beer... Regarding ordering up samples and flights... I believe no single person can have more than 22 oz. of beer in front of them. So you may be able to get 4 5oz samples at a time, and another 4 later on. But I believe these may count as beers for your limit.

My typical Saturday afternoon is usually one or two paths.

1/ Start at La Cumbre around 1pm. I had breakfast around 9am so no food just yet. I end up drinking 2 or 3 beers. Time there could end up being 2 hours.. Ask for some peanuts, theyll give you a little tray. I then head over to Il Vicino canteen for lunch and maybe 1-2 more beers. Time here is another 1-2 hours. I then usually want some new scenary and head towards Marble downtown.. Sitting on the patio around 4pm should yield a solid crowd and atmosphere. After Marble, you can now head back towards I-40 to Tractor's new taproom on 4th street. Another great patio scene is unfolding. Beers here are more iffy imho... Every place seems to be more than willing to provide a small sample of whatever you want to try, so askaway.

Both Marble and La Cumbre allow outside food into their establishment. This can be your own bag of peanuts, bag of chips, or a full on to-go food (say a pizza from Brickyard)

The other path is as follows:
2/ Start at Nexus for some lunch. I like one or two of their beers. Head down the frontage road and around to the other side of the frontage road to Chama River. Solid choices here. After Chama, you can take the frontage road to Griegos/Comanche and hit the back side of Il Vicino and La Cumbre. This second way you should store away most of your energy for La Cumbre.. Whereas you would be starting with the beast at the beginning. I've done both and see no ill benefits of either. La Cumbre/Il Vicino are basically in the middle of the two brewery sectors in town... North of LC/ IV is Chama, Nexus, and Bosque.. South of them is Marble and Tractor. Whatever you do, give yourself a full three beer effort at LC (unless you have growlers)

I will say, I've never been to B2B but their beer list seems to list every house beer of every local brewery in town. I usually go to the source. But that appears to be a solid option as well A third path could take you to B2B, down to Marble, and across to La Cumbre and Il Vicino, or in reverse.

 

Your ABQ beet stops have been pretty well covered - so, for Breakfast in ABQ we ALWAYS recommend Sophia's Place (get the blue corn pancakes with pinion nut maple syrup and fresh berries.. add a side of bacon and coffee.

Great.. now I just made myself homesick because Germany has nothing like it..

 

This thread's been great, I'll be in ABQ next Thurs-Sat, so I'll be using these suggestions as well Thanks all!

 

Don't be afraid to pass on bosque. Each time I've had their brews they have a soapy taste to them. They're just not quite at the same level that marble and La Cumbre are at.

 

I want to give many of these guys third and fourth and fifth chances.. There has been quite the change up of brewers shuffling around the ABQ area. I think Blue Corn's main guy is at Bosque now. Nexus' main brewer moves and La Cumbre's asst. brewer shuffles over there. I even think the new Boxing Bear has brought in Chama River's old main brewer.

Regarding food/cusine. That's a whole other thread for another day. Green chile and Red Chile have some devoted followers of certain restraunts. I'm a big fan of Barela's coffee houses chicharrones with red chile on the side. Same with green chile cheeseburgers. Seek out yelp or other blogs and youll find some awesome suggestions.

 

When are you coming? And from where are you coming? Any chance you can bring some Texas goodies?

 

Hi. Just wanted to let it be known that there is a solid difference between Il Vicino canteen (main brewery site; closest to La Cumbre) and the satellite restaurants (nob hill and west side). Their facebook page should make that distinction as well I hope.

The restaurants have some great wood brick oven pizzas and quality salad choices, with about 4-5 "regular" il vicino beers and possibly 1-2 seasonals.

The main brew site does not have a main kitchen space and or brick oven (thank the wacky licquor/brewery license rules in the state). I don't believe they share any of the same food items on each others menu. They have mainly sandwiches, some soups, salads, pretzel/ cheese and meat type "bar" food choices, along with about 8-10 more beer choices.

I haven't been let down by either food wise,so you should be okay. Just wanted to clarify for those checking out this thread. As far as beer, I think Il Vicino shines bright with many of their seasonal offerings. If you want to try one different beer and have some pizza, the restaraunts are valid choices. I tend to always lean towards the sandwich/bar food aspect with more choices, which happens to be closer to LC and has a nice patio space.

EDIT: As per a suggestion earlier in this thread, I tried B2B a weekend or two back and was sort of disappointed. Their beer "list" is extensive. But what they actually have available is almost pitiful. They no longer have Marble beers on tap. More than half of everything else is out of stock. That price point of $3.66 is killer. I guess if you want to try what they do happen to have (even if its a sierra blanca alien pilsner etc.), go right ahead... Maybe I caught them on a bad day where 80% of their kegs were empty..

 

I agree with @Oktoberfiesta, give these guys another chance. John Bullard is definitely making his presence felt at Bosque, IMHO. He has tweaked several of their regulars and put out his first IPA at Bosque...Fisticuff IPA. I was very impressed with Fisticuff....seriously...it was beyond respectable.

 

My last month at Chama was spent getting John's feet wet in his first full time brewery job and I could tell he was a very smart guy then. He has since proven himself to be one of the best brewers in the state and one of the better one's in the country. I haven't made it over to try some of his newer offerings, but Bosque should be on anyone's places to visit when in the state now.

 

hey ABQ BA's, any quick tips on a grocery or liquor store to find some Elevated or possibly even the new Dank tonight, preferably near I-40? stopping for the night on way back to Texas. thanks, I'll hang up and listen.

 

There's a Trader Joe's right off I-40 that always has both. 2 minutes tops from the Louisiana exit. Total Wine is nearby too, but they don't sell Elevated fresh. If you exit on Carlisle and head south about 5 minutes you'll hit Jubilation which is my favorite store in ABQ. They always have both beers as well and usually have the freshest of the freshest.

BUT, if you're going to exit off Carlisle, you might as well head 5 minutes north and you'll be at La Cumbre and can have both beers on tap and buy 4-packs of Elevated and bombers of Dank right from the source.

 

thanks!

 

Well, they say that Santa Fe is less than 90 miles away...

 

I'll just piggyback off this post. Will be in ABQ next weekend! Is there more than one Marble and if so which one is best?