hot sƅot
by Amanda MacLaren | by Briana Brough
The Accordion Club 316 W. Geer St. theaccordionclub.com
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RAFT MARGARITAS. STRAWBERRY RUM JELLO SHOTS. Wine on tap. Cans of domestic beers on the shelves behind the bar. Six packs in a retail cooler, ready to be taken home by a customer on his or her way out of The Accordion Club, the latest addition to the restaurant and bar scene on Geer Street. A little more than a year ago, the location “just kind of fell into my lap” says owner Scott Richie, formerly of Whiskey and Vin Rouge, among others. He wasn’t looking for a space, but when he saw the “For Lease” sign in the window of this building – once a part of the La Costena Supermarket – a half block from his house, he wanted to check it out. “Not looking to do anything, just being nosy,” Scott says. After a two-hour showing and a follow-up phone call telling him the space was his should he want it, Scott says he “ran home, told [his wife] Talitha, and she was 100% for it.”
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June/July 2017
Then he had to figure out what to put in it. “For 15 years now, I’ve been walking by this strip,” he says. “There were a lot of nights that I’d get off bartending, walk home and wish there was a place where I could get a beer and kind of disappear, maybe get a bite of food and a six pack to go. It’s turned out to be exactly what I wished was always here.” Scott worked on the demo and the carpentry for The Accordion Club – named for his grandfather, a street musician who played the accordion – while Talitha and her brother, chef Aaron Benjamin of Gocciolina, developed recipes based on food they grew up eating in New Mexico. “The whole time Talitha and I have been together, she and her family have raved and raved about Hatch, New Mexico green chiles.” So, they brought in a whole pallet’s worth (1,700 pounds) of Hatch chiles for the club’s