Month: September 2017

The Skillet: Fast-casual dining

Posted in Business, food4 Comments

The Skillet - Las Vegas, NMFor foodies on the go

Fans of The Skillet, get ready to chow down on old favorites and new menu items. The food truck with an attitude and funky decor is now a 90-seat restaurant and bar. The new digs will be open soon in the old wool warehouse on 12th Street. Radical decor and a trendy ambiance invite diners to sit awhile. Part of the renovation included the installation of an all new kitchen and overhaul of the electrical wiring. Through the construction and revitalization of the building, owner/operators Isaac and Shawna Sandoval oversaw the process and put their unique stamp on the eatery. As talented artists the Sandovals have created an experiential dining space in a fast-casual setting. They expect the restaurant will be open by the end of the month. In this Q&A, the couple talks about bringing their vision to life.

ORP: How did the ambiance and décor of The Skillet develop?
Isaac: We approached the design of The Skillet as an art installation. We used the time we had during construction to make works of art for the restaurant. Shawna and I are both artists. We have different approaches to making art. A lot of how things turned out were a product of us working together. We also had a great crew of assistants and other artist working with us to execute our vision. We worked together to create an immersive art environment. We wanted to create a space that was different, a place where people could sit and interact with artworks without being in a high-pressure situation that I think sometimes happens when visiting a museum or gallery. Some of the art was built with specific intent to the space, and some was made, and then the space was built around it. The tile work on the bar, for instance, was an idea Shawna had to take some of the design from the food truck into the restaurant. Meanwhile, the eight-foot donkey bust that I made over the course of a couple of weeks, had no specific place in the building until we finally put it up. Really, the whole processes of making the art was quite fluid. One project would influence another, and it seems to have become a new body of artwork itself.
Shawna: Our background in the arts informs much of what we were able to create in the business. The overall design is a total collaboration between us. We tend to make decisions as we go, coming up with design solutions on the fly, or in other instances, taking time to plan out larger components. The goal for the overall feel of the place was to create something aesthetically pleasing with an enjoyable ambiance, but also something with a bit of an edge that makes looking around at the artwork part of the experience.

The Skillet Owner
Isaac and Shawna Sandoval

OPR: Your food from The Skillet Rolling Kitchen was along the lines of fusion cuisine rather than typical Northern New Mexico foods. Talk about how you developed the menu in the new restaurant.
Isaac: Northern New Mexican food is – in itself – a fusion food. Chile sauce often contains a roux, which is a French technique, and dishes that we call “Spanish” are Mexican. There was a time not too long ago, that we were part of Mexico. Northern New Mexican food was very much influenced by Mexican food but it is a different cuisine than American-Mexican (Tex Mex), and to paint the cuisine of Mexico with a broad brush would be like saying all American food is a cheese burger. There is something specific and special about the type of food that is prepared in the area.

My background in cooking is Northern New Mexican food. I love to eat and try new foods/ingredients. Because of my background, I know that you can put pretty much anything in a tortilla and it has the potential to be awesome. When planning our menu, we wanted something different, but relatable. Shawna and I really wanted a fun menu, that wasn’t too fussy or would take too long. Most of the items from our food truck menu will still be available, along with new burritos and an appetizer menu. Our menu has items guests will be able to share over a beer or get a fast bite.
Shawna: We wanted to stick with many of the same menu items offered at our food truck because it is the food that helped us develop our customer base to begin with. We are keeping the fast-casual aspect of the menu knowing our customers appreciated that they could get in and out quickly at lunch with a satisfying meal. We are expanding the menu quite a bit to include more appetizers, salads, and burrito creations with new flavor combinations.

ORP: Will it change seasonally or as you are inspired as chef?
Isaac: As a food truck, we tried to keep our regular menu items while integrating new or different items throughout the year. Once we get settled with the restaurant we plan on doing regular daily specials, and offer something different. For instance, every Friday we might have a chicken fried steak with coleslaw and Mac and cheese special but it might be wrapped into a burrito. At this point it’s hard to say, I am too excited. I think with having a bigger kitchen than the food truck kitchen, the possibilities really grow.

ORP: What advice did you get from your entrepreneurial parents that gives you confidence about opening your own place?
Isaac: My parents have been our biggest guidance throughout this whole project. They have years of experience in the industry and are very knowledgeable about restaurants. I have grown up watching them work day in and out, dealing with customers and see how they handle employees in a professional manner. I have worked for my parents for many years now; everything I know, I know because of them.
Shawna: Hard work equals success. It’s a tough business at times, but with owner dedication, the restaurant business can really be rewarding.

ORP: What influenced your decision to expand from the rolling kitchen concept to a brick and mortar restaurant?
Isaac: The major influence was the support we had. We were a food truck for three summers before we decided to fully commit to a restaurant. Every year we were open we grew a larger following and grew slowly, adding new art to the environment, and integrating live music. At the end of the day, we were really at the mercy of Mother Nature. During the monsoon, we would get rained out. In fall, winter could be five minutes away and last until the first week of June. It created an inconsistent schedule that was bad for business. When the opportunity to purchase a liquor license came up, we knew a brick and mortar restaurant and bar would be a good undertaking.
Shawna: We learned a lot about the food business with the food truck and we were ready to scale to something bigger. The new location is the manifestation of our need to see our dreams for our business fulfilled.

ORP: How many do you expect to employ?
Isaac: We will employ bartenders, kitchen staff, cocktail servers, security, and dishwashers, 20-30 in all.

ORP: What is your food philosophy in terms of fresh and locally sourced when possible?
Isaac: In a perfect world everyone would be buying direct from local farmers. In that world, we would be eating green chile, squash, onions, some peppers and beef or lamb. In that same world, we wouldn’t be eating guacamole or sushi. When the food truck was open, we used locally raised eggs, which I loved, but near the end of the summer the chickens had a hard time producing enough eggs for the truck. I try to go to the farmers’ market on a weekly basis and buy what I can, but at the volume our food truck produced we had to outsource. That said, we do prepare most of our dishes from scratch or make them as fresh as possible.

ORP: What appeals to you about being a culinary entrepreneur?
Isaac: I love working with my hands. I love that cutting a case of tomatoes can become a meditation. I love that the situation in a kitchen can go from 0-100 in a matter of minutes. I love the rush of getting long tickets coming out of the printer. I love taking an ingredient and changing it into something completely different.
Shawna: We grew up in the business, Isaac with his family here in Las Vegas. My very first of many restaurant jobs was washing dishes. After graduating college, there was something about the business that kept pulling us back in. We love the challenges and being our own boss. Seeing our vision make people happy, creates a lot of satisfaction for us.

OPR: What are your hours of operation?
Isaac: We will be opening at 11 a.m. ’til close, Monday through Saturday.

ORP: Will reservations be recommended?
Isaac: Our restaurant is a fast-casual environment. We can seat about 90 people in the restaurant and 25 of those seats are at the bar. Outside, our two patios can seat another 50 plus a standing bar. We will be a different dining experience than what some might be used to. Customers order at the counter; we will not have servers. We will have cocktail servers to take drink orders and bring food out. We will also take call-in orders to go. We want The Skillet to be a place where people can get something delicious fast and easy.

ORP: What are examples of specialty drinks you will serve?
Isaac: We have a wide variety of really refreshing margaritas and cocktails. One example of a cocktail we offer is the Red Dawn, made with hibiscus tea, tequila, and grapefruit juice.

ORP: Do you plan to have live music/entertainment?
Isaac: Last year we had a band or musician playing once a week for most of the summer. We are reaching out to local talent, and traveling bands to play throughout the year. If anyone is interested in playing or performing they can email us a sample of their work at Giantskillet@gmail.com or contact us on our website www.giantskillet.com

ORP: What is your anticipated opening day.
Isaac: If everything goes as expected, we will open by the end of the month.

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The skinny on The Skillet:

What: The Skillet
Location: 612 12th St., Las Vegas, NM
Phone: 505-563-0477
Website: www.giantskillet.com
Instagram: @giantskillet
Facebook: The Skillet: Rolling Kitchen and Catering
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Donkey image: Courtesy photo

The way it was, on Sept. 10, 2001

Posted in Opinion1 Comment

By M.E. Sprengelmeyer
The Communicator, Santa Rosa, N.M.

Hopefully, somebody rang a bell on Sunday. All of us should have paused to remember. It has been 16 years now.

Do you remember where you were that day, Sept. 10, 2001?

Nothing particularly exciting happened in the world that day. But that was the point.

It was the last day of the “old normal,” before the terrorist attacks of the next morning, Sept. 11, 2001, would usher in the era of the “new normal.”

Before that day, our country did not seem to be in a constant state of war. We could walk into our federal government buildings without going through security gates. You could even sit with your loved ones at the departures gate in the airport, watch the planes come in, and give them a hug right before they walked through the door.

In hindsight, we were in the preliminary stages of a viciously divided, partisan period of American history. But our leaders were still decent enough people that when they got through a disputed presidential election that had to be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court, the loser congratulated the winner, made sure everyone heard him acknowledge the new guy as “my president,” and allowed our country to move forward. No hard feelings. (OK, maybe a little…)

Life was so much different on the day before the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. A whole generation of young soldiers had volunteered for service thinking the chances were slim that they’d actually end up fighting in a war.

Soon, first in Afghanistan and then in Iraq, young infantrymen would come up and tell me and some of the other embedded journalists that they enlisted for college money or other reasons. Yes, they took their training seriously and they got ready, they said. But in all honesty, a lot of them said, they never really thought they’d get to put it to use in an actual battlefield.

That’s because it seemed like a different world on Sept. 10, 2001.

Behind the scenes, people at the highest level of the U.S. government knew we were approaching a more dangerous world, with terrorist groups and rogue states positioning themselves to shatter the relative stability of the geopolitical maps.

On Aug. 6, 2001, President George W. Bush had received a classified briefing report that spoke of the evil ambitions of the terrorist group Al Qaeda and its enigmatic leader, Osama bin Laden. The now-infamous headline was: “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.”

But the American public wouldn’t hear about that until more than a month later, after it was too late.

In the weeks leading up to the terrorist attacks, it was business as usual in the United States. In the middle of August, I traveled out to Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, went on a little hike and got to see President Bush do what they said he liked to do best: clear brush and help care for the land in a beautiful place.

He was all smiles later at the YMCA, joking with reporters in the lunch line and answering one important-sounding question about the Israelis and the Palestinians. But there was no mention of the Al Qaeda memo. Nothing that would indicate we were a country on edge.

Now, ever since that day-after the day-before, we’re a country that seems constantly on edge. We still worry about terrorists. We worry about our armed forces, who are still in harm’s way in Afghanistan and Iraq. We worry about places like Syria and Iran. And now, suddenly, the fear has been ramped up another notch with all the doomsday talk surrounding the nuclear showdown with North Korea.

Here at home, we now accept things that were unthinkable on Sept. 10, 2001. It’s presumed that the United States government will do a certain amount of electronic spying on its own people in the name of “homeland security.” We accept all sorts of compromises in our liberties, like drastic changes in airport security, pat-down searches at high-profile sporting events and more.

Meanwhile, at a new height in the information age, we don’t know what to believe anymore. The partisan divisions no longer are polite. They’re endemic, particularly vicious, and people on all sides try to spin them to their own advantage.

In many ways, we’ve all become way more cynical about the world in which we live – and, arguably, were more on edge today than we were in the immediate aftermath of the 2001 terrorist attacks. Being on edge, constantly, is just another part of the “new normal.”

This year, we waited until Monday to commemorate the 16-year anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001. But maybe we should do something different this year. Let’s commemorate Sept. 10, 2001, figure out how life was better. Figure out whether we were too complacent for our own good.

Maybe, if we think about it, we can remember something positive about our lives before the world changed and see if we can sneak it into the world today.
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Originally printed in The Communicator, Santa Rosa, NM,
Reprinted here by permission of:
Tom McDonald
Gazette Media Services
Community News Exchange

Sheer Gumption and Making it Work

Posted in Business, food6 Comments

Amanda Medina, baking up a business…

It takes unique talent and passion to create something people like to look at that also satisfies a yearning for a delicious treat to cap off special occasions. Amanda Medina of SugarBomb Bake Shoppe nails it every time. Her Facebook reviews are numerous and enthusiastic.

  • She always does an amazing job! My graduation cake was perfect and tasted so good! AE
  • Absolutely love SugarBomb. Everything that I have ever ordered has exceeded my expectations. Wouldn’t order from anywhere else. LT
  • SugarBomb is the BOMB! I’ve never been disappointed! Always been satisfied! FP

 

Baker Amanda Medina
Amanda Medina

This culinary entrepreneur defines what it means to create a business from nothing and make it into a stellar success.

ORP: Briefly talk about why you started SugarBomb Bake Shoppe.
Amanda: SugarBomb was started out of combination of curiosity, passion for the craft and the desire to create something my way, from the ground up. Throughout my childhood, my mom owned her own flower shop, The Awesome Blossom, and it really resonated with me. I saw the struggles of owning your own small business, but it was the successes that really made the impression. I wanted to be my own boss and create something that was a representation of me. Baking has always been a hobby of mine, so it seemed a natural fit. It was a craft that I could hone and really make my own.

ORP: How did you become interested in baking?
Amanda: It started in high school. I’d taken a few culinary arts classes and fell in love with it. It was also at that time that cupcakeries were trendy and cake-related TV shows were becoming popular. I would make cakes from mixes and try to decorate them with fondant to replicate what I’d see on those shows.

A cake for the bookish
Bookish

ORP: You started out as a home-based operation. What are the challenges to doing that?
Amanda: I think having a home based business has a bit of a negative connotation. People are a little more wary because they can’t just come in and browse. I feel like I’ve really had to prove myself and my product. I’ve definitely earned every one of my customers!

ORP: What is the biggest challenge you faced in the beginning and how did you overcome it?
Amanda: The biggest challenge in the beginning was getting the word out there in ways that would be beneficial to the business, but also fiscally responsible for me. I came into this very naive. That may have been a blessing in disguise because the things I did then were done out of sheer gumption and hunger to make it work. From day one I had the desire to succeed at this. Everyday, every cake I make, I still strive to be better, learn more about my craft and to improve. I think having that mindset has helped me to overcome a lot of the struggles involved in having a home-based business.

ORP: What gives you the greatest joy as a professional baker?
Amanda: The reactions, for sure! Nothing compares to seeing a bride and groom see their cake for the first time or a three-year-old excitedly shrieking about their cake. And as much as I love the initial visual reactions, I love the texts or calls that often come later telling me how it tasted “…even better than it looked,” even more! Those make all the sleepless nights and hours of work more than worth it!

The Wild One
The Wild One

ORP: What is the most important trait for someone who wants to be a culinary entrepreneur?
Amanda: A bit of stubbornness. There are going to be so many hurdles to overcome that you have to be a little stubborn. You have to be willing to stick to your guns, believe wholeheartedly in your product and be willing to sacrifice to make it work. Also, I think there’s a balance of being confident in your product and having the humility to always want to learn more.

ORP: You are now the kitchen manager at La Cocina Commercial Kitchen at Luna Community College. Talk about that and what it means to you to have access to a commercial kitchen for your business.
Amanda: A commercial kitchen is a game changer! Right now, I am only allowed to sell direct to consumers. Producing in the commercial kitchen would enable me to wholesale (my products) and potentially get my items in restaurants or even grocery stores. It completely broadens the market and allows for faster and more efficient production. La Cocina Commercial Kitchen is a great resource for up and coming, and established business owners in our community. I definitely have plans to utilize it to grow SugarBomb.

ORP: You are also teaching a baking basics class at Luna Community College this fall. What prompted you to do that and what are you most looking forward to as an instructor?
Amanda: Initially, I wanted to teach the class as a challenge for myself. I haven’t always been super comfortable with public speaking so I thought it would help me break that. Talking about baking and the tips and tricks I’ve picked up along the way comes natural so it’s been nice to be able to share that with a group of people who are equally interested in baking. There’s such a range of students in the class, all the way from beginners to people who already work as professional bakers. I tell my class all the time that we are all learning new things from each other. It’s the only the third week but it’s been such an enriching experience already.

ORP: Any advice for beginning culinary entrepreneurs?
Amanda: Go for it! Even if you don’t know exactly what you’re doing, if you have a passion, go for it. Put your heart and soul into it and don’t be afraid to ask for help. There are some amazing people in the food industry here in Las Vegas that are willing to share their expertise. SugarBomb is a custom cake Shoppe. I strive to make everything from flavor to decor completely custom and one of a kind.

SugarBomb ontact information:
Phone: 505.429.4581
sugarbombbakeshoppe@gmail.com
www.facebook.com/sugarbomb.bakeshoppe

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Cake photos (Books and Wild One) courtesy of Amanda Medina, SugarBomb Bake Shoppe

 

Be Bold

Posted in Inspiration

For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love, and of self-discipline. 2 Timothy 1:7

Mattress Mack helping outBe bold. Be bold with the talents you have been given. Be bold in prayer. Be bold in caring for other people. Be bold. We are given the strength and courage for every trial and every joy. Select what you choose to be bold about. Do what you do out of love. Discipline your life and your time to go about your bold acts with intention so the outcome helps others and makes the world a better place. Mattress Mack in Houston didn’t have to open his showroom to victims of hurricane Harvey, but he did. This is one selfless act that will live in the memory of everyone he helped and those who took a lesson from his generosity. This is a bold thing Jim McIngvale did, not because he had to, but because he wanted to. He not only opened his doors, he sent out box trucks that could get through high water and picked up about 200 stranded people. What do you do when something needs to be done? Figure out the best thing you are able to do, and do it.

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Photo of kids being kids at Mattress Mack’s showroom, taking a break from the devastation outside. Image from Mattress Mack’s twitter account.