The savory and unmistakable aroma of smoking meat filled the parking lot well outside the Ribs restaurant on a recent weekend.
After being closed a month following the untimely deaths of owners Chad and Brad Gunter, the popular East Mountain eatery tucked into a Sandia Park strip mall has been undergoing a soft re-opening.
A small, candle-filled shrine adorned with two American flags, pale pink roses, a cross and a wooden wreath surrounding an angel sits in the corner by the restaurant’s entry.
Hand-lettered signs on red construction paper taped to the doors read, “We miss you sweet boys,” and, “Thank you for all you have done for our community.”
The Gunter brothers were killed on Nov. 9 when a semi-truck swerved off of eastbound I-40 near Moriarty, careened across more than 200 yards of underbrush, and plowed all the way through a blacksmithing shop and school that the Gunters also owned and operated.
The restaurant on NM 14 has been a fixture in the community for some time, a place not only known for its tantalizingly good, hearty food but also as a gathering place.
“I’m devastated not only for the loss of two great people but also for their family and their children,” local state Rep. Stefani Lord wrote at the time on X (Twitter). “So many tears have been shed over this shocking tragedy. There is a huge hole in our community. Ribs isn’t just a restaurant; it’s a place where everyone feels like family.”
But now the restaurant that specializes in tender pulled pork, hickory-fired, slow-roasted brisket and, of course, sauce-slathered ribs of all kinds is open again.
All 30 employees returned to work on the first weekend, said Asa Bortz-Johnson, one of the three remaining owners, and they were paid during the interim.
“We didn’t have a single employee leave,” he said. “We felt we had a moral and proper obligation to continue to pay these guys. Who can go 30 days without a paycheck to come back, and then another two weeks after that? We also have the best team. They’re the best. We started paying them weekly after the incident.”
The establishment re-opened Dec. 9 in a rather soft manner, he said.
“It was soft in the sense that we told people through our email list but we didn’t go nuts telling people about it,” Bortz-Johnson said. “We were out of practice and we had to get our sea legs back.”
Plus, there was the whole psychological hurdle of the brothers’ absence to overcome.
“There was the emotional side of the thing, as well,” Bortz-Johnson said. “We are a family here. Everyone was close to them. So our overall ability to cope while operating, we didn’t want to bombard ourselves with work.”
In that respect, things are slowly, incrementally, improving.
“It’s getting better,” he said. “Every day is a little easier than the last. But there are constant reminders here. The brothers were here all the time. We each find our own individual ways to handle the situation we’re in and move with the business and all of our personal lives.”
Bortz-Johnson was not only a business partner with the brothers but his wife is the sister of Chad Gunter’s wife, Veronica.
“On top of it all, outside my wife, they were the closest humans I had,” he said. “We spoke every single day. We were always chitchatting about the world. We worked together all the time. You understand the reality, but it’s really hard to accept and come to terms with the new life terms and they’re not in it.”
Re-opening the restaurant also was important because it’s another step in the healing process, he said, especially for Veronica Gunter and her two young boys.
“One of the primary things and a central focus of the restaurant are the employees and the family,” Bortz-Johnson said. “One of the things we’re doing is constantly looking out for or doing our best to be there for Veronica and their boys, Preston and Colton. They lost not just their dad, but their uncle on that day. They were a central part of their lives. As father figures and as providers and just being there for them in life and that’s something that can’t be replaced.”