Soon, with the support of local chefs, farmers, and other food community types (including Crooked Sky Farms and Fox Restaurant Concepts), The Joy Bus became The Joy Bus Diner, a Shea Boulevard restaurant (3375 East Shea Boulevard, to be exact) whose profits fund the food-delivery campaign. The organization’s board is a Who’s Who of local food professionals including Tracy Dempsey (Tracy Dempsey’s Originals), Gio Osso (Virtu Honest Craft), and Bernie Kantak (Citizen Public House, The Gladly).
That tony board was resistant when Caraway suggested a four-walls diner. “They were reminding me how hard it is to run a restaurant,” Caraway recalls. “And I was saying, ‘Yeah, but I know that. It’s all I’ve ever done.’”
5700 East McDonald Drive, Paradise Valley
Elements at Sanctuary is no secret. Executive chef Beau MacMillan, who’s thrown down with Bobby Flay and cooked for Jay Z and Beyonce, helped put Scottsdale on the food map with his seasonal menu focusing on local ingredients infused with Asian flavors. (Chef de cuisine Samantha Sanz is no slouch, either.) Not only will you have an unforgettable meal think braised volcano lamb shank with smoked eggplant, or black truffle lobster risotto with chanterelle mushrooms but the mountain views are also so swoon-worthy that you’ll at least
feel like you’re on vacation.
It s always a good time to make the argument that Phoenix is the best pizza town in America. There’s the diversity of pizza-making traditions every major pizza-making philosophy, from Chicago deep-dish to wood-fired Neapolitan style, is well-represented in the Valley. There is the concentration of talented pizzaioli in the Arizona desert, an unlikely yet fortunate development that has helped Phoenix become a culinary destination for diehard pizza aficionados. And there is the simple fact that it’s become harder and harder to keep track of the ever-expanding roster of great pizzerias around town.
Pizzeria Bianco Multiple Locations
Pizzeria Bianco has become the measuring stick by which every other wood-fired pizza joint in town is to be measured from now until the very concept of Phoenix becomes obsolete. “I think so-and-so’s pizza is even better than Bianco’s” is a controversial yet commonplace piece of rhetoric you will sometimes hear people throw around town, in a s
Chris Malloy
Belly Kitchen and Bar 4971 North 7th Avenue One of the many ways that Belly rocks is by making simple food sing. A lemongrass-scented horchata sugar so muted that the fragrant rice and the great perfume of the lemongrass can tango is a drink destined to be slurped down on your drive home from scoring takeout. Consider, why not, a simple side of sautéed seasonal vegetables rippling with umami bass notes, even the meaty fist of cauliflower tender at the core. Or take the claypot-cooked chicken, dark thigh chunks and sinewy-looking strips uncommonly succulent, touched by the warmth of turmeric and a measured zap of fish sauce. The quartet behind Instrumental Hospitality, Michael Babcock, Wayne Coats, Paul Waxman, and Robert Cissell, already has their restaurant humming. And that’s without even writing about A-sides and cocktails.