Whispering Canyon Cafe

We reluctantly tore ourselves away from Geyser Point and wandered past the resort’s pool and into the hotel’s lobby and the entrance to Whispering Canyon Cafe. We were lead through the noisy dining room to a quieter space that overlooked the lobby just beyond. Besides the din of families having dinner, the restaurant bustles with servers theatrically shouting orders across the room and relating their roles and backstories to their guests. (I won’t go into it, but apparently they’re all members of a Western town called into service to help out with the tourists, or something like that. I repeat: whatever.)

Here we had more appetizers, including Pulled Pork Spring Rolls, which seemed an odd item for a Western themed restaurant but then Ricky Ly of Tasty Chomps pointed out that the railroads that crossed the American desert were built by Chinese immigrants, so we’ll go with that.

We also had Indian Fry Bread — yeah, they use the word Indian — which was absolutely delicious. (The spring rolls were just so-so.) The bread was soft and doughy and sweet. It didn’t need the sauces of tomato jam, cilantro aioli or apple ketchup (which looked and tasted a lot like apple sauce).

Before we left, we were also given a taste of the cafe’s barbecued ribs — big, meaty and appropriately messy. The sweet sauce and tender meat took our minds off the fact that children were running by on stick horses.