California Dreamin'
Mesilla's new St. Clair Winery & Bistro is like a visit to California wine country, without the drive.
If you long to tour California wine country like those guys in the movie Sideways but gouging gas prices have pinched your plans, a trip to the new St. Clair Winery & Bistro in Mesilla is the next best thing. It's the new home for the tasting room for the wide variety of wines produced by the Deming-based New Mexico Wineries (see the November 2006 Desert Exposure), formerly across the street under the Blue Teal moniker. And now you can combine your sipping with feasting from an innovative menu that ranges from steaks to panini sandwiches.
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The dining room likewise merges wine tasting with bistro tables. A long wooden tasting bar runs the width of the room, and wine bottles dominate the decor. It feels as though you're eating dinner at someplace in Napa Valley.
Or you can opt for dining outside on the patio, in the shade of cheery red awnings and umbrellas, where wine barrels-turned-planters continue the oenological theme. The metal-mesh chairs may make you squirm in-between flights of chardonnay, however, and the constant swoosh of Avenida de Mesilla traffic does spoil the Sideways-ish illusion a bit, so be forewarned.
If you come for lunch—hey, a glass of wine in the middle of the day, why
not?—the main menu choices are a variety of meal-sized salads, the aforementioned
paninis (most at $7.45) and a selection of other sandwiches ($7.95). The Cuban
panini called out to us, and the Southwest egg salad was intriguing if you
like that sort of thing, but ultimately the salmon and goat cheese panini,
studded with capers and sun-dried tomatoes, won us over. It proved crispy on
the outside, smoky and creamy on the inside—which kept trying to goosh to
the outside every time we took a bite. Among the standard sandwiches, the grilled
ham and brie and the Kobe burger (also a dinner option) tempted, but we figured
the true test of any Mesilla eatery had to be the Mesilla chicken sandwich—a
huge chicken breast bedecked with equally mammoth green-chile slices and cheese.
We splurged and substituted sweet-potato fries for the fruit salad on the side
and were not the least bit sorry. (Nor did we leave a single sweet-and-salty,
crispy
-crunchy fry on the plate.)
The dinner menu picks up many of these themes. You can start with salad or soup, or try the appetizers—tilapia tenders, perhaps (also an entree), or the clever "nosh" platter with cheese, nuts, olives and other bite-sized goodies. Yes, the entrees include Chicken Picado, a de-sandwiched take on our Mesilla chicken, served with redskin mashed potatoes ($12). Or there's the New Mexico Chile Chicken, served over bowtie pasta with provolone, sun-dried tomatoes and a cream sauce ($13). Pasta Danielle, which substitutes a Creole sauce atop the bowtie pasta and comes in either chicken ($12) or shrimp ($14) versions, is also available at lunch. Another pasta dish recently added to the menu, Pasta Del Faro, combines shrimp sauteed in Pinot Grigio, garlic, olive oil, artichoke hearts, olives, red peppers, capers and feta cheese ($14).
Back to the chicken, though: Our waitress—service is efficient and friendly, without being in-your-face—recommended the Garlic Chicken ($12). It's slow-cooked in chardonnay and 40 cloves of garlic. If all that garlic scares you—it shouldn't—there's also Pollo a la Parmigiana, a breaded and sauteed chicken breast served over bowtie pasta, covered first in alfredo sauce and then marinara and cheese.
We also mentioned steak, didn't we? At dinner, meaty options include a flat-iron steak "topped with D.H. Cabernet-infused gorgonzola crumbles" ($14) and a more conventional flame-broiled ribeye ($18). You can add green chile to either for an extra $2. The wine theme continues in the Cabernet-Braised Pot Roast ($12) and even the Duke City Ribs, which are marinated in cabernet and zinfandel ($13 half slab, $19 full slab).
In the unlikely event you still have room, dessert sounds delicious (we were stuffed): bread pudding, Granola Apple Crisp, cannoli, Bailey's Chocolate Delight (all $5).
And let's not forget the whole raison d'etre of the place—the wine. By the glass, you can pick from 14 reds and 10 whites, with still more available by the bottle. All, of course, are New Mexico Wineries products, representing the firm's whole array of labels.
When you pay your surprisingly modest tab and step out into the parking lot, you may find yourself a bit unnerved that the scenery is shops rather than vineyard-laced hillsides, and that the license plates mostly say "Land of Enchantment" rather than "California." That's OK. Go home, pop Sideways in the DVD player again, and plan what you'll order next time at the St. Clair Winery & Bistro.
—David A. Fryxell
St. Clair Winery & Bistro, 1800 Avenida de Mesilla, 524-0390. Open Sunday-Thursday 11 a.m.-9 p.m., Friday-Saturday 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Major credit cards accepted.
Desert Exposure editor David A. Fryxell likes wine entirely too much.