Santa Fe: Art, Food, and Chocolate, oh my!

I just got back from my dream vacation in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Wow.

Photo: San Miguel Church, Santa Fe, built 1610

I knew it would be cool and fun and arty. But I was unprepared for the magnitude of the awesomeness.

It occurred to me that maybe I shouldn’t write about it, wanting to keep the secret to myself. But then I realized (1) it’s not exactly a secret that Santa Fe is cool and artistic (after all, even clueless I knew that much), and (2) my obscure little blog is hardly going to make a dent in Santa Fe’s tourism industry.

So fine, let’s talk about Santa Fe and how amazing it is.

First of all there’s the food. I love hot and spicy food. Mexican, Chinese, Thai, Indian, bring it on! The hotter the better. Sadly for me, the vast majority of the US feels otherwise. I’ve lived in New England, California, the Mid-Atlantic, and the Midwest, and I can say with authority that most Americans are spice wimps.

But not New Mexico! This is the one place in the US where spicy is the norm. To New Mexicans, chile peppers are a major food group, and they unapologetically add chiles or chile sauce to just about everything. I love it.

There’s a huge debate in New Mexico over which is better, red or green chile sauce. The difference between the two is quite striking, and I had great fun sampling both and coming to my own conclusions. You can order a dish “Christmas” which means you get both red and green sauces for a side-by-side comparison. The red chile sauce is made from dried, ground-up red chiles, while the green is made from the same chiles picked while still green. The red has a deep, rich smoky flavor. Green has a bright, fresh, tart flavor. Everyone has their favorite. I tried both several times but I quickly came to strongly prefer the green.

Interestingly, in spite of getting all sorts of recommendations from friends, people on Twitter, foodie blogs and rating websites, we never found the holy grail for foodies: the perfect authentic New Mexican restaurant. Not for lack of trying, I assure you. We ate at plenty of decent little places that came highly recommended, but none were real standouts. The best chile sauce we had was on an amazing plate of huevos rancheros at a breakfast place (The Chocolate Maven). The best dinner we had was at a Spanish tapas place called El Meson – amazing food but not particularly New Mexican. I’m sure there are lots of superb authentic New Mexican restaurants, but we didn’t quite find them. Still, the hunt was fun, and turned up a few goodies here and there.

Art. Did I mention art? Because you can’t go to Santa Fe without noticing the art. It’s everywhere. You trip over it just turning around. Our hotel room was decorated with original art. Several pieces. Even in the bathroom! Swoon.

Photo: Allan Houser sculpture "When Friends Meet"

Every restaurant and cafe we ate in had art hanging on the walls, all of it for sale. (We bought a small piece from one restaurant where we had dinner.) In downtown Santa Fe, art galleries seem to outnumber all other businesses. One street, Canyon Road, is almost nothing but art galleries for its entire length. But even off of Canyon Road art galleries are everywhere.

Photo: Canyon Road, Santa Fe

Sculpture is everywhere too. Just wandering around town you see sculptures in public spaces, at the State Capitol building, at bus stops, in gardens, everywhere. Plenty of art galleries display large sculptures outside. I was particularly struck by the number of private homes, many quite modest, with sculpture visible in the front yard.

For an artist like me, all this art everywhere is almost too much to take. It’s like throwing someone dying of thirst into a swimming pool full of drinking water. I felt overwhelmed and overstimulated (but you know, in a good way). So different from Los Angeles! In Santa Fe art is a way of life, fully incorporated into every aspect of living. I’ve never seen anything like it. These are my people!

So, chocolate. This is the part I really didn’t expect. We hadn’t thought of Santa Fe as a major chocolate destination. But while planning our trip we came across something called the Santa Fe Chocolate Trail, and from that discovered the Mecca for serious chocolate lovers: Kakawa Chocolate House.

Photo: Kakawa Chocolate House, Santa Fe

Kakawa is not for chocolate wimps. Their chocolates are dark, bitter, rich, varied, and complex. Not to mention extensively researched and historically accurate. The house specialty is their drinking chocolates, hot concoctions that you sip slowly and savor like fine wine. When you go there in person, you can sample as many of their dozens of drinking chocolates as they have on hand (usually about a dozen) for free before ordering. Oh, and they will also cheerfully custom blend a half-and-half version if you just can’t decide between two. Try a blend of Jeffersonian and Modern Mexican. That was our hands-down favorite.

Beyond Kakawa there are several other good places for chocolate in Santa Fe. We didn’t visit the other stores on the Chocolate Trail but did make it to the Chocolate Maven, which is actually a bakery and breakfast restaurant. True to their name the chocolate croissants are beyond description (we watched them being made while we ate breakfast). Their plain croissants are also amazing: flaky and buttery yet satisfyingly substantial. Then there’s the Spanish Table, a cookery store that will blow the mind of any serious cook. They had several specialty Spanish chocolates available so of course we just had to buy them. We came home with quite a bit of chocolate, and a newfound respect for Santa Fe as a serious chocolate destination.

Photo: Kakawa’s make-your-own hot chocolate wafers on the left, Spanish Blanxart chocolate bars for either eating or making hot chocolate, and a bag of Blanxart powdered hot chocolate mix on the right. Quite a haul.

Was it the trip of a lifetime, as I had predicted? Sort of… it was certainly a fantastic trip, but it won’t be the only one of my lifetime! I’ll definitely be back. I’ve found art-food-chocolate heaven.

Santa Fe

I’m off on vacation… in Santa Fe! Which is pretty much like Disneyland for artists. I’ll tell you about it when I get back.

Oh, and if you buy one of my paintings while I’m gone? Well, you’ll just have to wait til I get back before I can ship it to you. Don’t worry, it’s just a few days.

“Dots 14″ little bitty painting

The latest in my ongoing series of small “little bitty” original paintings, each only 5 x 7 inches (or 12.7 x 17.8 cm if you’re into that kind of thing). Each is unique, all are experimental.

This one’s kind of like a maze:

By the way, there’s no right way up for this painting (or any of the others, for that matter). You can display it any way up you like.

“Dots 14″ by Barbara J Carter

5×7″ (12.7 x 17.8 cm) Acrylic on canvasboard

$45 plus postage ($1.50 in the US, $3 everywhere else) and sales tax in California.

No PayPal account needed, just a credit card.

“Dots 13″ little-bitty painting

The latest in my series of “little-bitty” dot paintings:

“Dots 13″ by Barbara J Carter

Acrylic on canvasboard, 5×7″ (12.7 x 17.8 cm)

$45 plus postage ($1.50 in the US, $3.00 outside the US) and sales tax in California

No PayPal account needed, just a credit card.

Meet me in Manhattan Beach

I’m making my Manhattan Beach debut this weekend (October 3-4, 2009) at the Manhattan Beach Hometown Fair. I’ll be showing my art in booth 252 in the Arts & Crafts section. Stop by between 10 and 5 and say hi!

The Manhattan Beach Hometown Fair is an annual event in the now-tony city of Manhattan Beach, California, the very same suburb of Los Angeles where I spent the entirety of my uneventful youth. Back in the day it was a sleepy little beach town full of surfers and hippies driving beat-up VW vans decorated with peace signs. The grubby little town is all grown-up and gentrified now, with wide clean cobblestone sidewalks and flower tubs and McMansions everywhere you look.

Anyway, they’ve been holding the Hometown Fair every year since dirt was new (OK, only 37 years). It’s a sprawling affair covering all of Live Oak Park plus a long stretch of Valley Drive and the median between Valley and Ardmore. You need to park a few miles away in a lot on Aviation Boulevard just south of Marine and take the free shuttle to the fair. Bring the kids, leave the dogs at home. The fair is very kid-oriented with all sorts of fun and goofy things for them to do.

Here’s a smattering of items I can see marked on the fair’s map: Beer garden, wine garden, chili cook-off, free games, children’s play area, free speech, giant slide, petting zoo, pony rides,  finger painting, wild animal show, velcro wall, pirates for hire, treasure hunt, magician, main stage & south stage, batting cages. You get the idea. Something for everyone!

Here’s the official Manhattan Beach Hometown Fair web site.

Meet me in Manhattan Beach!

New little-bitty painting “Dots 12 (Open Grid)”

“Dots 12 (Open Grid)” is the latest in a series of what I call “little bitty” paintings. They’re all 5×7 inches (that’s 12.7 x 17.8 cm if you’re metrically inclined), which is super small compared with my “usual” paintings.

These little bitty paintings are more experimental than my big serious paintings. They are studies, explorations of possibilities. They allow me to break free of any preconceptions I might have (oh yes, I have a few!) about how to make a painting.

“Dots 12″

For this one, I originally planned out an elaborate grid of dots that would be completely filled in. But while painting it, I started leaving gaps here and there. I thought I’d fill in the gaps with different colors. But partway through I realized I liked the effect of the gaps, so I left them. The grid is there, but it’s hinted at rather than explicitly filled in. I like that.

Like the others, this one’s for sale. I can send it anywhere in the world the mail service reaches. So far, other little bitty paintings have been sent as far as Poland, Sweden, and even Oregon.

“Dots 12 (Open Grid)” by Barbara J Carter

5×7 inches (12.7 x 17.8 cm)

Acrylic on canvasboard

$45 plus postage ($1.50 in US, $3.00 elsewhere) and sales tax in California

No PayPal account needed, just a credit card.

More “little bitty” dot paintings

Here are my two latest “little bitty” dot paintings, just finished this week.

These things have been flying off the shelves, so to speak. I figured I’d better get cracking and make some more!

“Dots 10 (Wavy Lines)”

5×7 inches (12.7 x 17.8 cm)

Acrylic on canvasboard

$45 (plus $1.50 shipping in the US or $3.00 shipping worldwide, and sales tax in California only)

Buy “Dots 10″ (no PayPal account needed, just a credit card)

“Dots 11 (Circles)”

5×7 inches (12.7 x 17.8 cm)

Acrylic on canvasboard

$45 (plus $1.50 shipping in the US or $3.00 shipping worldwide, sales tax in California only)

Buy “Dots 11″ (no PayPal account needed, just a credit card)

Baby Lizard

I visited the Huntington last weekend. While resting on one of the many benches in the gardens I had a moment with a baby lizard.

As you may have gathered from my angry rattlesnake story (not to mention my sojourn into the uncharted territory of county fairs) I’m quite the animal lover. So any chance to get this close to a wild animal, even just a lowly lizard, was a treat for me.

I was surprised how long it sat still for me. After taking the above photo I lightly stroked its back with a fingertip. It put up with my attention for a few seconds, then finally scampered away.

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My very first open studio is Saturday!

Just a quick reminder: I’m holding my very first open studio art party at my studio this Saturday, September 12, 2009, from 1pm to 6pm.

My cluttered studio will be open to visitors Saturday

My studio is located in Valencia (Santa Clarita), California. That’s just north of Los Angeles. Everyone who is subscribed to my monthly email newsletter got all the details including the address. Want in too? Drop me an email! (info@barbarajcarter.com)