Thomas Breen photos
No guacamole left behind at Westville’s new “Camacho Garage.”
The chipotle ketchup on my notebook didn’t quite fit the script.
Nearly everyone at the tables around me was well-coiffed, wore stylish, wrinkle-free clothing, and stood up periodically to take pictures of the crowd and close ups of their food.
“Are all these people influencers?” someone at a nearby table asked her dining partner.
I think by virtue of the fact that I spilled a fair amount of chipotle ketchup on my notepad, I am not an influencer.
But I was hungry. And well rewarded.
With one fell swoop of a chip, my partner and I were transported — to a Westville just a little bit brighter thanks to the brilliant culinary mind of master chef Arturo Franco-Camacho.
Franco-Camacho and his business partners Robert Bolduc and Marc Knight invited a few dozen members of the press to get a socially-distanced taste of Camacho Garage, their new “Mexican street food” restaurant at 36 Fountain St.
That’s the former New Haven Savings Bank building near the corner of Fountain Street and Central Avenue that has been transformed into a fashionable new eatery by the same team that runs New Haven’s Geronimo Tequila Bar and Southwest Grill, Shell & Bones Oyster Bar and Grill, and Bar Yoshi in Nantucket.
The restaurant is hosting its official grand opening on Sept. 28, with a soft opening slated for later this week.
I was lucky enough to share an outdoor table at Wednesday’s media preview with New Haven Arts Paper Editor Lucy Gellman — a reporter with a much more perceptive palette and nuanced food vocabulary than I.
She also happens to be my fiance, and helped serve as a foodie guide along the path of tacos, tapas, and one mojito (shared by the two of us) carried by masked and gloved servers out of Franco-Camacho’s latest local kitchen.
The restaurant itself — composed of glass, steel, and concrete and appropriately dubbed “industrial chic” in an attendant press release — is modeled after a body shop Franco-Camacho worked in as a child in his hometown of Tijuana. His dad ran that garage and would make tacos for his children during their lunch breaks.
Chef Franco-Camacho: Meeting the pandemic with action.
Walking from table to table along the restaurant’s outdoor patios, his shock-white hair iridescent against the sunset, Franco-Camacho said he’s looking to honor his father’s dedication to simple, authentic and fresh flavors and ingredients.
Asked about any jitters he may feel about opening a new restaurant amidst a pandemic, Franco-Camacho took a breath, smiled. Then he said, “I go by: The best cure for fear is action.”
Westville Nightlife Renaissance
The myriad staff on call for Wednesday’s media trial run were equally enthusiastic about the long-in-the-works restaurant finally opening its door in lower Westville.
Bartender Paddy Meyer (pictured above) lives just two blocks away from his new place of work. He said that Camacho Garage, “a real-deal, full-service restaurant and bar,” should help dispel any notions that Westville is just a “sleepy little neighborhood.”
He said the restaurant is poised to help fill a niche left vacant by the former Delaney’s that burned down in 2014 — a bustling neighborhood haunt with great food and drink that’s open late and a true anchor for the village. He noted that the newly opened Delaney’s Tap Room just across the street on Whalley Avenue should do exactly the same in bringing in a “new era of nightlife and bars in Westville.”
Assistant Manager Christine Puglisi (pictured) agreed. A Westville native who grew up on Fountain Street, attended Edgewood School, and has spent the past five years working at Shell & Bones, Puglisi recalled grieving when Delaney’s burned down. She celebrated that Camacho Garage, the new Delaney’s, and the new nearby cafe Pistachio have all opened at the same time.
“This is a perfect time for a resurgence in lower Westville,” she said.
Camacho Garage’s bar.
Puglisi said that part of what makes working at Franco-Camacho’s restaurants so galvanizing is the physical design of the spaces themselves.
“Our ownership team is notorious for its elegant design,” she said. And, true to form, Camacho Garage is anchored by a “characteristically large, monstrous, beautiful bar.”
Guac and chips, ready to be served.
The press release for the restaurant’s opening states that the space was designed by Christian P. Arkay-Leliever. “The space features an industrial chic look of concrete, wire, glass and steel, with the zinc-top bar, reminiscent of a vintage workbench, being the central energy to the indoor space,” it reads. “The color scheme incorporates the ‘Petroliana’ feel with burnt red, vintage greens and whites and concrete grey featured throughout the space, including the leather covered machine shop-like bar stools, blackened steel chairs with green leather seats and high and low-top tables and banquettes made of reclaimed oak treated with an antique varnish.”
Eland Cruz (pictured), a waitress at Camacho Garage who previously worked at Atticus Bookstore and Cafe on Chapel Street, said this is her first time working with a team to help open up a new restaurant.
“It’s a sense of pride,” she said about embarking with her colleagues on this new venture.
Fresh
Clockwise from top left: Guacamole and chips, mojito, ceviche, notebook.
OK. Now to the food.
Cruz brought me and Lucy long, paper menus stamped with the Camacho Garage logo that offered a glimpse of the “contemporary Mexican street food” cuisine inspired by Franco-Camacho’s childhood.
There are plenty of tacos (al pastor, pocho asado, carne asada, duck carnitas, lamb barbacoa) as well as fried sweet plantains, Mexican street corn, sliced avocado, clam ceviche, tinga tostada, and much more.
For the Wednesday media taster, we didn’t actually order anything off the menu. Rather, Cruz brought out various dishes pre-selected by the kitchen.
Lucy Gellman, and mojito.
We started off with a mojito (Lucy’s take: “Refreshing. Obviously a lot of mint, heavy on the tonic, very sweet, and lots of lemon”), a plate of vegetarian ceviche (“Very good. Mushrooms, lime, cilantro, tomato”), and another of chips and guacamole (“Smooth, salty, creamy, with some blended onion that gives it a really nice bite”).
Next up: Fries with lemon mayo and chipotle ketchup (“Spicy, salty, a chili mayo that’s really nice, like curry ketchup, but sophisticated”).
These went pretty quick …
Then two tacos: the Vegetariano, with mushrooms, nopales, caramelized onion, spinach, and queso cotija, and the Ensenada Fish Taco, with beer battered cod, cabbage slaw, serrano salsa fresca, and baja crema. (“Everything’s really fresh.”)
And last but not least, dessert. Sweet fried plaintains, figs filled with chocolate and cinnamon, and a tamarind paleta. (“It’s all really, really fresh food. With the tamarind paleta, it’s just like eating the fruit. They let the fruit do its job.”)
Before we eased ourselves out of our seats and prepared to head home after a meal well met, Lucy jotted down a final note — a wise one, I’m sure. But to find out what it was, you’ll have to read her piece here.