Boxcar moving to former Blue Corn Cafe space downtown
Jun. 19—A new era starts for the Boxcar sports bar in July, with private rooms — including a speakeasy and TV-free cafe — a 50-seat bar and 50 beers on draft at Plaza Mercado.
The bar and restaurant will open at its new location, with an expanded menu and early morning hours for the breakfast crowd, as early as July 1 but for "certain by July 15," owner Sylwia Handzel said.
"We wanted to have a great place for locals," Handzel said. "We were part of establishing the Railyard as a second Plaza. Our campaign here is to get locals to come downtown again. We want you to come down here. We don't want to price you out."
Handzel stressed the Sandoval Garage is no more than 100 yards away and street parking is easy at night.
A new location for Boxcar, which opened on Guadalupe Street in 2015, has been in the works since 2019 as landlord Barker Realty indicated a desire for the sports bar to leave, leading to a 2022 lawsuit to evict the bar. Since then, lease extensions have been granted, the current one ending July 15, Handzel said.
Handzel and Tate Mraz, with whom she opened Boxcar after both had worked at its predecessor, the Junction, initially sought to build a three-story location near the former teen arts center Warehouse 21, but the Santa Fe Railyard Community Corp. did not approve the project.
Handzel and Mraz, now operations manager at Boxcar, had the basic ideas then for a next-generation business. Mraz got in touch with Santa Fe Dining, which had closed and never reopened Blue Corn Cafe in March 2020.
Handzel inked a lease for the Blue Corn Cafe space and a neighboring retail space in February 2022, and it has taken 16 months to reconcile city approvals and permitting and construction and dealing with the various surprises that older buildings present.
The "opening soon" signs that have decorated Plaza Mercado since last year should become reality in the coming weeks.
Boxcar's current 3,400-square-foot space is an open, split-level room with the smaller, elevated section doubling as a stage for late-night concerts. Concerts typically didn't start until after sports ended on the business's 15 televisions.
The new 9,400-square-foot space at Plaza Mercado can have multiple events happening at one time with 32 televisions scattered about. (Except in the cafe area.)
"We have small private-room capabilities," Handzel said. "We have large private-room capabilities. I have rooms for 10. We have a room for 250."
The new Boxcar will have capacity for 463 people versus the 122-person capacity on Guadalupe.
Most interior walls in the new space were torn down and five new rooms were created but a certain openness remains.
People who remember Blue Corn Cafe may not recognize the place, as more windows have been installed and the patio now has a direct link with the bar area — even with counter seating both inside and out, so people can face each other with one in the bar and one on the patio.
Beyond the bar, open space extends across the room. All of it can host one sports party. Or a room partition can set off 12 seats of the bar, create a concert venue on one side and maintain the sports bar on the other.
"I'll be able to do 6 p.m. jazz shows [or concerts any time of day]," Handzel said.
The new Boxcar will be open throughout the day from 6:30 a.m. to 2 a.m., offering breakfast for the first time — coffee and grab-and-go at 6:30, a sit-down menu at 7, and the bar will be open for breakfast. Handzel has assembled 120 employees and a team of specialists to hone the expanded offerings.
"Think Whole Foods salad bar but affordable and downtown," Handzel said. "The cafe is the no-TV zone. Some people don't want to sit in a place with 12 TVs."
The Boxcar menu will move from the Railyard to Plaza Mercado but will be expanded, said Eric Stumpf, executive chef of all four Boxcar properties, including the Boxcar and Admiral's Cove Resort that Handzel and Mraz opened in Lemoyne, Neb., in May 2021.
Stumpf plans to add tomahawk grilled steaks, pastas, risotto and other dishes.
"You can't get a [steak] filet for less than $65 in Santa Fe," Stumpf said. "No filet is worth $65. We will charge like $40 for the same type of steak. I want to elevate it without being pretentious."
Handzel plans to add a "cocktail culture."
"We will have the largest tequila selection," she said. "We are going to have the most distinctive whiskey and bourbon selection in town."
Boxcar was open early mornings for special sports events such as World Cup soccer and the Olympics, but regular English Premier League soccer did not warrant early hours. That is changing at Mercado Plaza, Handzel pledges.
"There's a 7 a.m. Manchester United game, we will be showing it," Handzel said. "We have always been a community gathering space. This will allow us to expand on that. Every sports package under the sun, we're going to get it."
