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El Patio is the perfect encapsulation of a neighborhood restaurant.

Open seven days a week from morning to night, it鈥檚 a place where you can hunker down for some studying, have a meeting, or catch up with friends over drinks and a manageable, affordable menu of New Mexican comfort food.

Even the building, a pitched-roof, wood-shingled structure set back from the sidewalk behind a picket fence, looks more like a home than a restaurant.

Dave and Gloria Sandoval opened El Patio way back in 1977 on a tree-shaded street south of the University of New Mexico and maintained its charms even as the neighborhood around it changed from small bungalow homes to the multistory blocks of the Brickyard District.

The success of the original spurred the opening of a second location in 2018 on Rio Grande Boulevard north of Old Town. To help distinguish the two, the words 鈥渄e sa国际传媒官网网页入口鈥� have been appended to the original location, 鈥淩io鈥� to the newer one. The Rio Grande location has a full bar, while the sa国际传媒官网网页入口 spot serves beer and wine.

Through it all, the original spot has remained as vital as ever, even as the Sandovals passed the day-to-day operations on to their sons.

El Patio is one of those places you miss when you haven鈥檛 been there in a while, and so it was that I returned to it on a recent Saturday night. A show at Popejoy had crowds filling the restaurants across from UNM, but a couple of streets west at El Patio, the mood was more relaxed. Under the shade of two long-armed mulberry trees strung with lights, diners chatted and laughed. Ample street parking is available in the area, with the meters shutting off at 6 p.m., and there are a few paid lots within walking distance.

In contrast to the patio, the clean, well-lit dining room was empty when we arrived at 6. Two- and four-top tables filled the space around a small bar faced with reclaimed wood, while wall-mounted speakers rained down easy listening hits from the 1970s and 鈥�80s at low volume.

The front side of El Patio鈥檚 menu of New Mexican standards is broken into Appetizers, Platos and Specialties. The 10 appetizers run from $5 for Chips & Salsa to $11.95 for Frito Pie.

The small section of Specialties include Fish Taco Fridays ($14.50), a Green Chile Cheeseburger ($14) and a Taco Salad ($11.50), but the go-to here is the outstanding Green Chile Stew ($10) served in a bowl alongside a folded-up flour tortilla. The electric broth brimmed with falling-apart-tender pork, soft chunks of potato and green chile for some finishing fire. El Patio has a reputation for blazing-hot chile, but I found it tolerable, especially as I got used to it. The accompanying tortilla and Dr Pepper helped. It鈥檚 one of best examples of this iconic dish in town.

The bulk of the menu consists of Platos served with beans, papas and a sopaipilla. The 11 options are broken into meat and vegetarian categories, with prices ranging from $13.95 for two Tacos to $20.95 for the Carne Adovada.

Green Chile Chicken Enchiladas ($18.50), a signature dish, arrived on a big round plate evenly divided between beans, potatoes and two blue corn enchiladas hiding under a pile of lettuce and diced tomato. Green chile sauce surrounded it all like a moat. The chicken, shredded down to threads, was moist and picked up a lot of heat from the green chile. The beans were soft but not mashed and with the potatoes absorbed the sauce and tamped down its heat. A very good, if slightly underheated, version of a New Mexico classic.

The Chile Relleno ($19.50), another Plato, gave us a chance to sample El Patio鈥檚 red chile. It had more smoke and less heat than the green but still carried a noticeable charge. Under shredded lettuce and chopped tomatoes, the rellenos wore a light, airy crust around tender peppers that oozed melted white cheese. The sauce provided a charge of flavor to the beans and the rubble of well-cooked potatoes. A credible version of this old standby.

The meal鈥檚 exclamation point was provided by the sopaipilla served in a red plastic basket. Timed to come out fresh from the fryer at the end of the meal, it was lightly browned, a little greasy and hot enough that it could have been served with oven mitts. The paper thin, easy-to-tear upper half opened on a thicker bottom ideal for catching a drizzle of honey. It might spoil you for the stiff, room-temperature versions you get at many places in town.

El Patio also offers breakfast until 3 p.m. 鈥� late enough for even the most hungover college student. I checked out the breakfast menu during lunch hour just a week after my dinner. Surprisingly, the midday scene was busier than the one at Saturday dinner. Only one two-top table on the patio and a couple of four-tops inside were available. Items on the breakfast menu are priced from $11.50 to $14. All savory offerings, except for the pancakes.

My order of Hash and Eggs ($14.50) arrived with a cup of red chile sauce served on the side. A pile of diced potatoes and chunks of chorizo sausage dominated the plate. The yolks of two eggs cooked over easy, leaking into the sauce, made for a very rich, hearty dish enlivened with smoke and spice from the chorizo. The meal was capped once again with a very hot, very good sopaipilla. Consider this an appetizing alternative to huevos rancheros.

While the sopaipillas with honey more than suffice as a dessert, El Patio offers two other sweet finishes: Flan ($8) and Bizcochitos ($1.50). The flan, a slightly misshapen cylinder dressed with a couple of squirts of whipped cream, was decent, its egginess cut with a bitter shot of burnt caramel.

Our dinnertime server was so adept we assumed she had been at the job for years, but she told us she had been there less than a month. A testament to good hiring and training. The lunchtime server was also friendly and efficient even as he juggled multiple tables inside and on the patio. Both servers were well-versed on the gluten-friendly options peppered throughout the menu.

Now in its sixth decade, El Patio continues to operate at a high level. It remains the quintessential neighborhood spot.