Restaurants

Does Phoenix really need another steak house? That’s what pops to mind considering the recent arrival of the swank, upscale Donovan’s near 32nd Street and Camelback. I mean, if there’s anything you can say definitively about Phoenix, other than the temperature of the sidewalk in August, it’s that we’re one…

Tina Tamrat Hildebrand laughs and smiles shyly when I play reporter rather than gentleman, and ask her age. This fetching little Ethiopian lady could pass for someone in her mid-to-late 20s, but curiosity has yet to kill the culinary critic, which is why I pose the question. “You know, in…

The ker-plunk and whoosh is most pronounced right around the intersection of Tempe’s Fifth Street and Mill Avenue, or, as I like to call it, the corner of Hooters and Gordon Biersch. No doubt you’ve heard it before: the sound of your soul being flushed into the rancid sewer of…

I’m convinced there’s a conspiracy of dunces out there, hell-bent on making the dining experience as consistently staid and by-the-numbers as an effin’ copy of Reader’s Digest. Scribblers of that pinkie-in-the-air genre known as “food writing” — the unfortunate tribe in which I’m lumped — are by far the worst…

Sitting in the dark-orange, Dr. No-like bar at Scottsdale’s Stingray Sushi, drinking a tall glass of Kirin draft and watching the promising Phoenix Suns get spanked by San Antonio recently, it occurred to me that I probably feel the same way toward Stingray Sushi as I do toward our basketball…

On the whole, 2004 has been a good year for this portly penman, as enjoyable dining experiences have easily outweighed poor ones. Indeed, what stays with me, in the form of fat cells as well as recollections, are the great meals I’ve had on my various eating expeditions throughout the…

What a colossal difference a second visit to a restaurant can make. See, my modus operandi as a critic is generally as follows: I pick a place I want to review, then I dine there at least twice, usually with guests, so I can nibble off their plates unsuspected by…

Everyone knows about Pavlov’s dogs: those canines that helped Russian scientist Ivan Pavlov demonstrate that the natural flow of saliva in Sparky’s mouth could be induced by external stimuli, like a bell ringing. Pavlov referred to this as a “conditioned reflex,” and his findings netted him a Nobel prize way…

Hey, I may come off in print as a bloated narcissist, but I do get my comeuppance often enough. Take, for example, a question I had for a colleague after visiting the six-month-old Coyoacán steak house on South Central Avenue. The restaurant sits nearly at the foot of South Mountain,…

It’s a fine Tuesday morning, and I’m seated at a table in Matt’s Big Breakfast, the new diner that opened a month ago on First Street and McKinley, next to the Coronado Hotel, in the same spot where the eatery Chez Bubba used to do business. The sun is shining,…

I’ve always loathed Thanksgiving, so don’t expect some column from me telling you how to cook a turkey with a beer can stuck up its butt, or where to snarf the best stuffing in the Valley. Everything about the holiday nauseates me: the enforced familial bonding; the orgy of unoriginal…

Folks call and write me with some amazing requests. Usually, I do my best to reply in a timely manner, but occasionally, the inquiries veer into the asinine zone, in which case, I may never respond. For example, if you’re a PR flack who wonders why I never called back…

I’ve been jonesing of late for some really excellent house-made pasta. No doubt what brought this on was my slightly disappointing visit a couple of weeks back to the James Hotel’s Fiamma Trattoria, where it seemed like everything but its house-made pasta was first-class. Since the James tirelessly trumpets the…

I am terribly pained that all the fuss concerning the Boston Red Sox, the World Series, and the Curse of the Bambino is finally over. Not that I cared a whit for a bunch of gum-chewing knuckle-draggers running around a diamond to the cheers of the hoi polloi. I prefer…

In my line of work, a double-wide backside seems to come with the territory. I’m sure there are certain female food critics in Arizona whose tailbones are as sharp as needles, but really, ladies and gents, should you trust a thin restaurant reviewer, someone more concerned with donning a size…

Whenever I wax homesick for La-la Land, I need only stop by Scottsdale’s James Hotel for a fix of that über-modern, über-sophisticated vibe that the City of Angels has in great store. Pass through the James’ lobby towards its J-bar, and you could just as well be at The Standard…

I recently read online that the ugliest man in Hollywood, and a piss-poor actor to boot, Billy Bob Thornton, badmouthed the immortal Bard, calling Shakespeare “bullshit,” and thereby confirming my opinion of Monsieur Sling Blade as one dumb redneck. I take comfort in the fact that BBT’s fame is short-lived,…

My initial experience dining at Flat Iron Rotisserie and Grill, the new, Southwestern-themed establishment on Indian School Road, can be compared to meeting a bewitchingly beautiful Monica Bellucci-esque femme fatale at a party. There’s an instant, smoldering attraction. Your eyes lock in a flirtatious dance, and you find yourself saying…

As you may have gleaned from perusing this space previously, I take a dim view of conventional wisdom and the morons who spout it. Al Pacino’s character Ricky Roma in the screen version of Glenglarry Glen Ross sums up my P.O.V. when he states that he subscribes to the law…

What would you eat if it were your last night on Earth, and you could have just about anything you wanted? That’s the hypothetical dilemma I’ve been mulling since a friend of mine gave me this odd little book titled Last Suppers (Loompanics Unlimited), which is all about the final…

, Redendos Pizzeria and Pasta