The Martin Hotel in Winnemucca, Nevada, is a highly regarded restaurant in a tiny little casino town on Interstate 80. And it’s a trencherman’s paradise: if you like good food you probably like LOTS of it. (Don’t trust anyone who says he/she is a “foodie” but doesn’t eat much!). At any rate, here’s the meal I had at the Martin two nights ago. But first, here’s a bit of information about the restaurant from its website:

The Martin Hotel is located on the corner of Railroad and Melarkey Streets in Winnemucca. Established in 1898, and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, its dining rooms served heavy passenger and commercial traffic generated by the adjacent Southern Pacific Railroad. As a rooming house it was once a favorite place for area cattle ranchers and sheep men to stay on their infrequent trips to town.
The Martin’s family style Basque dining room, bar, and meeting rooms are still a favorite gathering place for area ranchers, townsfolk, and travelers alike. With its unique stucco exterior, familiar veranda, and hitching posts, and its interiors covered with an amazing variety of pressed tin walls and ceilings, the Martin Hotel offers a truly wonderful setting to experience an authentic family style Basque American meal.

The approach. I hadn’t had anything to eat all day but a cup of black coffee in Idaho. I refrained from eating, for I knew what was coming.

Immediately after you’re seated, you’re given a full carafe of not-bad California pinot noir and a basket of freshly baked sourdough bread (and butter). It’s tempting to tuck into all that delicious bread (sourdough is the best of all white breads, I think), but I restrained myself, for I knew what was coming.

This is all homey comfort food, and none the worse for that.

The “amuse-bouche” was a huge tureen (only half is shown here) of homemade chicken noodle soup, with fat house-made noodles, large chunks of chicken, and vegetables. Again, I ate only the half (one bowlful), for I knew what was coming.

Another huge bowl, this time of a garlic-infused salad of iceberg lettuce. They also give you a dish of slightly warm kidney beans, and recommend you put them on the salad. I was dubious, but the combination of crunchy lettuce and savory beans was great, especially when you sopped up the bean juice with the sourdough bread. But I ate only half the salad, for I knew what was coming.

Below were my side dishes, and they informed me that I could have more if I wanted. At the top is a bowl of the best mashed potatoes I’ve ever had in a restaurant: clearly homemade, suffused with garlic (apparently garlic is like salt to the Basques), and probably made with both cream and butter. Below that is a bowl of chicken Basque big chunks of chicken cooked with paprika, onions, and vegetables. Imagine a bowl of meat being a side dish!  Finally, at bottom we have the vegetable: green beans (a bit overcooked but still good).

Your one choice in this family-style meal is the main course. I vascillated between the pork chops, lamb chops, or lamb shank (there are about a dozen other entrees), but finally chose the lamb shank, for Basques are lambivores. It came with a huge mound of homemade french fries (skin still on them) and some mint jelly. Notice the copious shavings of raw garlic on the lamb. I’m proud to say that I polished it all off, but couldn’t finish the side dishes. The lamb was excellent, gamey and juicy. (Lamb is a much underrated meat, and, in my opinion, the best of all meats to accompany a good Bordeaux or Burgundy.)

You won’t have any trouble with vampires after eating a meal like this.

And if that weren’t enough, dessert is included in the meal: a large bowl of bread pudding (one of my favorite desserts), infused with cardamom, studded with raisins and topped with real whipped cream. It was terrific, but I’m ashamed to say that, full as I was, I ate only about 60% of it. This may well be the first dessert I’ve had that I didn’t finish.

After all that food and wine I went back to my cheap motel room ($45), lay down on the bed and groaned for a couple hours while watching St. Louis play the Cubs on the big-screen television. Life is good.

If you’re in Winnemucca Nevada, which you will be if you take I-80 from Utah to California or vice versa, be sure to have lunch or dinner at this place. It’s open 7 days a week.