BBC article here.
If New Mexico could have one state food, it would be the green chile cheeseburger, with each restaurant, diner and roadhouse cafe claiming to have the ultimate version.
If New Mexico could have one state food, it would be the green chile cheeseburger, with each restaurant, diner and roadhouse cafe claiming to have the ultimate version.
The GCCB is widely thought to have originated in ...The Owl Bar & Café, located 100 miles north of Hatch in the tiny New Mexico town of San Antonio. Its location is key to its existence: The Owl Bar & Café is just a 30-minute drive from the Trinity Testing Site at the White Sands Missile Range..
"When they arrived in town from their secret laboratory at Los Alamos two hours north of here, they were masquerading as prospectors," explained Janice Argabright, fourth-generation owner of The Owl Bar & Café, as she told me about the Manhattan Project scientists...
The Owl Bar started with her great-grandfather in the late 1930s. "He had a mercantile store with little cabins that he would rent out," she said. He also had the only payphone in town, so these "prospectors" would come and do their work and make calls. "They rented their rooms and when they asked for something to drink and eat, we started serving food."
This was when Argabright's grandfather returned from the Navy. He needed money, so he opened a little bar in the mercantile store. "He was the one who started cooking," she said, "beginning with hamburgers, adding cheese and serving them with green chile on a separate plate."
The day the dishwasher didn't turn up for work changed the course of New Mexico's culinary history. "With no clean plates left, my grandfather put the green chiles in the burger. So that's how we came up with the green chile cheeseburger dish we know today – and The Owl Bar & Café was born."
"When they arrived in town from their secret laboratory at Los Alamos two hours north of here, they were masquerading as prospectors," explained Janice Argabright, fourth-generation owner of The Owl Bar & Café, as she told me about the Manhattan Project scientists...
The Owl Bar started with her great-grandfather in the late 1930s. "He had a mercantile store with little cabins that he would rent out," she said. He also had the only payphone in town, so these "prospectors" would come and do their work and make calls. "They rented their rooms and when they asked for something to drink and eat, we started serving food."
This was when Argabright's grandfather returned from the Navy. He needed money, so he opened a little bar in the mercantile store. "He was the one who started cooking," she said, "beginning with hamburgers, adding cheese and serving them with green chile on a separate plate."
The day the dishwasher didn't turn up for work changed the course of New Mexico's culinary history. "With no clean plates left, my grandfather put the green chiles in the burger. So that's how we came up with the green chile cheeseburger dish we know today – and The Owl Bar & Café was born."
