Sara Moffat, La Mama co-owner, shucks oysters at the Marcy Street business' grand opening in May. La Mama is serving fresh East and West coast oysters every Wednesday through the summer as one of it's featured days.
Wine distributor Austin Flick explains La Mama's choices of natural wines to a customer at the business' grand opening in May. Tasting Tuesdays are another summer feature, with menu items paired to La Mama's wine list.
Sara Moffat, La Mama co-owner, shucks oysters at the Marcy Street business' grand opening in May. La Mama is serving fresh East and West coast oysters every Wednesday through the summer as one of it's featured days.
Ashley Perry
Sasha Pogodeava, assistant general manager at La Mama, brings food to the patio on a recent weekday.
It’s hard to pin a label on La Mama — or at least a label that fits into a headline or an elevator pitch. Santa Fe’s new coffee shop/all-day cafe/grocer/natural wine bar is adding “collaborator” to its list of descriptors this summer.
In addition to its own eclectic offerings, the business, which opened in April, is collaborating with two Santa Fe foodies to bring their special menu items to La Mama on certain days throughout summer.
Every Thursday, Santa Fe’s Tender Fire Kitchen (which also operates out of El Rey Court, 1862 Cerrillos Road, and Nuckolls Brewing, 1611 Alcaldesa Street) rolls a portable brick oven onto the patio at La Mama to take orders for its popular sourdough pizza. “They already have a fan base, so we wanted to bring that here and offer it in a different setting,” says La Mama co-owner Sara Moffat.
Every Monday, local chef Sarah Stearns makes her famous smashburger recipe (it starts with loosely packed ground beef) out of La Mama’s kitchen. “We did it for the grand opening, and everybody loved it so much that we decided, ‘This could be fun for summer,’” says co-owner Jen Turner.
Wine distributor Austin Flick explains La Mama's choices of natural wines to a customer at the business' grand opening in May. Tasting Tuesdays are another summer feature, with menu items paired to La Mama's wine list.
Ashley Perry
Moffat, Turner, and co-owner Anna Sheffield (known to staff as the Mamas) are adding to the fun with three more in-house, day-of-the-week special events for the summer.
On Sundays, create-your-own wine cocktails made with La Mama’s natural wine and paired (if desired) with tarot card readings. Sign up, then sip your Bellinis or other concoctions while waiting for your reading by La Mama sous-chef Anya Klapischak, who’s available after 3 p.m., or by guest reader Georgia Carbone, founder of Georgia Electra art studio. Tasting Tuesdays feature a special menu and free tasting to highlight the natural wines sold by the glass and by the bottle. “That way, people can taste our bottle list and then be able to buy a bottle that they know,” says Moffat. And on Wednesdays, East and West coast oysters shucked by La Mama staff will be served with natural wine or beer from Bow & Arrow Brewing of Albuquerque.
The Mamas bonded over natural wine (each had specialized in it during earlier gigs), and they’re happy to explain it to a newcomer: “Basically, it’s wine without the crap,” Turner says, referring to pesticides, herbicides, and additives. In the U.S., winemakers can add up to 76 chemicals to wine without listing any of these on a label, she says.
The specialty nights are just for summer, but collaborations will continue. “The menu will morph a little bit for fall,” Turner says. “We might do more workshops or pop-up chef dinners, but we’ll probably be doing less everyday kinds of things and more special events.”
“We’re very interested in collaboration,” Moffat adds. “A lot of people eat here. They have their coffee here. They eat breakfast. They eat lunch. They eat dinner. They do their grocery shopping. We kind of wanted to create one more reason for them to come. We want them to always be here.”
