A Review of Laura's Cafe and the Desert Moon Bar and Grill in Santa Fe, New Mexico

Laura's Café is a hidden treasure connected to the Days Inn. If you're looking for a true taste of México - and prefer to do it without the luxury of linen napkins and lingering servers - this is the place for you.

The dining room, a perfect rendering of south-of-the-border roadside-diner simplicity, swells constantly with day laborers, hungry hotel guests, and chumps like me. The menu is a veritable Mexican comfort-food playbook, encompassing everything from menudo (tripe soup) to tocino (bacon)-wrapped hot dogs.

My gigantic ground-beef burrito with potatoes and red-chile sauce proved to be worth the wait and the price. Wrapped in foil and served in a paper-lined plastic basket, this roll-up was meant to be eaten quickly - and, given its flavor, 1 was happy to oblige. Tender russet potatoes, juicy ground beef, and perhaps the city's best red-chile sauce melded beautifully inside a soft, homemade-tasting flour tortilla. At under S4.50 - including a can of Coca Cola - this meal ís one of the best-kept secrets in town. The décor is decidedly low-key - the long line of people waiting for a table is ail the decoration necessary.

Given the slow service, I recommend calling ahead for takeout. If you have time to kill, take a seat and enjoy a true taste of roadside México.

Almost, but not quite ...
Tucked inside the Holiday Inn a few blocks west of Zafarano Drive, Desert Moon Bar & Grill offers an upscale menu with a few cheeky wines by the glass. The staff is chock-full of veteran Santa Fe servers, and their attentiveness is noteworthy.

Our server made recommendations from the menu, and we settled on his choices in good faith. My glass of 2001 tempranillo (Spanish, sub-Rioja) was a juicy, fruity steal at $8 a glass. It went perfectly with my huge rib-eye steak, which was cooked slightly beyond the requested medium-rare. My partner's seared sea scallops were good despite a few rubbery mollusks. Both entrées were served with undercooked broccoli and similarly prepared baby carrots and sided with overly garlicky basil mashed potatoes.

Our starter - a sample platter of Asian nibbles including crab wontons, pork pot stickers, and coconut shrimp - was unappealing and institutional at best. A shared, fresh-tasting house salad ended up being the meals best offering. It's a shame to have such a great floor staff paired with what can only be described as mediocre food. With a few adjustments in food quality and pricing, this desert moon could glow much brighter.