SpiceLines

Hollyhocks in never-never land--part of the pervading fantasy of Santa Fe. One
writer has described New Mexico's adobe capital as "Tahiti in the desert."

Yes, yes. I know. Too many concho-belt-clad tourists, too much bad Western art, too few parking places downtown.

At least that’s how it was four years ago in Santa Fe. But guess what?

The high desert capital of New Mexico has recaptured its glow. Sidewalks are nearly empty, desirable reservations are a breeze, and even those elusive parking spots aren’t too hard to come by. Blame the faltering economy, but enjoy the slower pace--while it lasts.

Visiting Santa Fe is a little like jumping down the rabbit hole. I’ve come to think of it as America’s never-never land, or as Chris Wilson wrote in The Myth of Santa Fe, “Tahiti in the desert, bathed in rosy sunsets.” The city itself is an adobe fantasy, but the rugged mountains, ultra violet light, and high pitched yipping of the coyotes are all gloriously real. Here are 11 reasons to fall under its spell all over again:

Roasting poblano chiles on a stovetop grill gives the fruity-tasting peppers a hint
of smoke. Once peeled and diced, the mildly spicy chiles can add zest to a host of
recipes, from grilled steak and lamb stew to lightly cooked squash and corn.

Roasting fresh peppers, incendiary or sweet, is a simple chore if you have a flame. It takes fire—on the grill or on the stovetop--to blacken the outer skin, cook the flesh of the pepper just enough to intensify its natural flavor and impart the smoky taste that makes them so delicious.

In Mexico—and New Mexico—summer squash are known as calabacitas. Small, tender calabacitas may be elongated like baby zucchini, or plump and rounded like little pears. But however they’re shaped, they have a sweet, delicate flavor that trumps the pallid taste of the big overgrown doorstoppers.

Saturday at the Carrboro farmers market, I found an abundance of young summer squash--some dark green, some golden, and my favorite, one with a lime green neck and a pale—yellow belly. And although it hasn’t been a great year for corn—the drought took care of that—I ran across one farmer with a truckload of Silver Queen ears picked earlier that morning. The shucks were still dewy, and the kernels, the color of moonlight, unbelievably sweet and tender.

Ruth Reichl is obsessed with chiles.

So the August, 2008 issue of Gourmet is exploding with hot stuff. In “Datil Be Fine,” roadfoodies Jane and Michael Stern write about the datil pepper, a smoldering habanero relative, a “slow-rolling capsicum wave that swells with sweet-tart citrus zestiness” in Minorcan clam chowder in St. Augustine, Florida. Pennsylvania farmer Tim Stark dishes about his customers’ craving for the fieriest chiles in “Burning Love,” an excerpt from his upcoming book, Heirloom. (Best anecdote: the photographer who bought 8 bushels of red chiles so Penelope Cruz could lie upon them in a promo shot for Woman on Top.) And in “This Rough Magic,” Ronnie Lundy drives through northern New Mexico, sampling red and green chiles along the way.

Today's tomato haul includes, clockwise from top left, Sun Golds; mini-Cherokee
Purples; Chelseys; a mixture of Whoppers, Better Boys, Celebrities, and Lemon
Boys; Juliets; Viva Romas. Center: Green Zebras and a Striped German Johnson.

Sometimes I just can’t help myself.

I did try to curb my obsession. Really I did. At 8:52 I was flowing from downward dog to plank to cobra and back again. At the end of yoga class, I felt calm and serene, completely without desire. For a second.

And then I saw the tomatoes.

Ah, the Hatch chiles have arrived from New Mexico.

At the ridiculous price of 50 cents a pound, I’ve stocked up. This morning they were just languishing, untouched and unloved, in the supermarket bin. Does no one else in North Carolina know how delicious these incendiary green peppers are?

Right now I’m fire-roasting a dozen or so on my outdoor grill. They’ll spice up a cornbread later today, and next week I’ll finally get to make classic New Mexican pork and green chile stew. But while I’m inhaling clouds of spicy, chile-scented smoke —and choking a little—I’m pondering a question I posed last week.

It’s not that O Ya is a secret. Not even remotely.

It’s been on every Boston foodie’s short list almost since it opened in 2007. This spring, when New York Times food critic Frank Bruni named it the #1 “most promising new restaurant” in America, the stampede began.

Still it's not that easy to find, even with the discreet sign hanging over the door. It’s tucked away on a dimly lit block in Boston’s historic Leather District. And the door itself, a solid slab of roughhewn wood, is slightly forbidding.

Just the sort of door that should have an iron grille, allowing a pair of suspicious eyes to investigate before opening, just a crack, to let you slip through.

A tropical escape, at home: A chaise made up with
Chinese silks, a vase of fragrant tuberoses, and a glass
of iced lemongrass tea on a silver tray.

Fay rolled by us, dropping solid sheets of rain, crackling lightning and the odd tornado or two.

Today, we could be in the tropics. The ground is steaming, the banana has unfurled another surfboard-sized leaf, and white butterfly petals are emerging from pointy ginger buds.

All that’s missing is a python slithering through the billowing waves of lime-green potato vines.