Resturants: Ethnic and Specialty

It seems so obvious. Arizona's indigenous foods -- delicacies like fresh local fish, wheat, melons, pistachios, olives, chiles, citrus and squash. Yet amazingly, no chef has really tried it here, until this year, with James Beard Award-winning chef Janos Wilder. Wilder, already famous for his innovative French-Southwestern Janos restaurant in Tucson, has brought us fine dining drawn from our state's Native American heritage. How authentic is it? The chef works with Pima/Maricopa Indian farmers to harvest the finest of their 35,000 acres of land and aqua farms on their reservation surrounding Kai.

Dishes come looking like earth and sky, and tasting of heaven. They're inspired all on their own, but made even more magical with Mexican, Pacific Rim and European touches. The olive oil that starts our meal is grown and pressed on-site, and dotted with sesame and pumpkin seeds. We slather it over superb crusty bread, crunchy and sweet-tart with apricots and pumpkin seed, or cranberries and hazelnuts. Rack of lamb comes rubbed in chunky pecan-crust mushroom-infused cornbread pudding, and a mole sauce fashioned from ingredients supplied by Native Seeds SEARCH (a Tucson-based nonprofit that protects and cultivates ancient indigenous agricultural methods). Lobster fry bread is lavish, the thin dough capped with an entire four-ounce Maine lobster tail, roasted corn, avocado and garlic butter.

Beautiful food, straight from Arizona -- that's A-O-Kai with us.

The cooks at Pho Bang continue to craft the most outrageously decadent Vietnamese dishes in town. This long-standing restaurant doesn't get hung up on pretense -- dishes come rapid-fire out of the kitchen, sometimes sloppy on their plates, sometimes with nary a smile from our server. But the prices are so low, and the food so cunning, we never quibble. Besides our favorite pho (15 varieties), there's an impressive array of exotica like canh chua ca (catfish soup with pineapple and vegetables in a spicy lemon sauce), or tom va bo nuong vi.

How cool is it to sit down at our own tabletop grill, and be presented with a large plate circled with whisper-thin slices of lightly oiled raw beef, whole shrimp, sliced onion, chopped scallion and peanuts? On the side is xalach dia, an array of sliced carrot, cucumber, pickled radish, whole scallion heads, mint, cilantro and lettuce, alongside plates of rice paper sheets and butter. In fact, everything at this cozy hole-in-the-wall is remarkable.

Chef Mahmmud Jaafari knows his Persian cuisine. He also knows his Mediterranean, Italian, American, Mexican, Cajun and vegetarian foods, and even a smattering of Oriental influences. The result is one of the most exciting restaurants in this town, with cooking that is defined most simply as Middle Eastern. This is knock-your-socks-off caliber, with appetizers like pourani (parboiled spinach blended with yogurt and deeply perfumed with garlic, onion and olive oil, spooned with homemade whole-wheat pita bread triangles). You'll crave every bit of his from-scratch cooking (even pita is homemade), like the oil-free minestrone dusted with Parmesan, and a salad of angel hair pasta and romaine tossed with feta, Parmesan, scallions, tomatoes, avocado paste and mountains of garlic. There are complex stews, tender lamb gyros and elegant salmon with grilled eggplant-wrapped asparagus topped with dill cream on saffron rice. This is a place you must find for yourself: Persian Garden truly is a magical culinary carpet ride.

Readers' Choice for Best Mediterranean Restaurant: Pita Jungle

We're all for eating healthfully. We just don't want to think about it -- all that balancing of nutrients and calories, and then, does the stuff even taste good? Happily, Soma has done the work for us. Everything on the extensive breakfast, lunch and dinner menu is broken down by protein, carbs, fat, fiber and calories. Everything is fashioned from lean meats and monounsaturated fats, with virtually no oil and lots of good-for-us grains and veggies.

But even better, the chef who created the menu is nationally acclaimed James McDevitt, so all the Asian-American treats taste terrific. This is real food, like a charred filet of soy-garlic marinated top sirloin (just 350 calories), or center cut pork chops with Chinese mustard applesauce, sweet potatoes, spinach and caramelized onions (798 calories for two meaty chops). For breakfast, we can feast on crepes stuffed with apple-cranberry tart, or a pita bulging with apple-sage sausage and scrambled eggs (50 percent egg whites). Lunch might be mahi-mahi tacos with ginger-carrot vinaigrette, or lettuce wraps, with three bundles of moist chicken chunk breast, sliced toasted almonds, string-thin carrots and bean sprouts. For dinner, we can choose thrills like sake glazed chicken with jasmine rice and spinach, or pork tenderloin with ginger-plum barbecue sauce.

With gourmet food like this, in such an upscale, bistro-style setting, we sure don't feel like hippies. And with such body positive food, we sure don't look it, either -- hippy, that is.

Readers' Choice: Pita Jungle

This is the first place to which we direct diners when turning them on to the distinctive cuisine that is Southwestern. Many people think our Southwestern signature is standard Mexican stuff. Some think it's, gasp, Tex-Mex. Many think it's cowboy cookouts. Too many think we're all just sitting out in the desert here munching on cactus and lizards. One taste of the items on Windows' stunning menu, though, and they understand: Southwestern is all about elegance, high style, and dramatic pairings of regional ingredients. Real Southwestern cooking is as intricate, artistic and stunning as the colors of a mountain mesa at sunset.

Start with cornbread-crusted crab cakes spiked with mango, avocado and citrus, or a sweet onion and lobster tamale with roasted corn salsa. Move on to Arizona mixed greens tossed with toasted pepitas (pumpkin seeds) and tangy-sweet prickly pear vinaigrette. Indulge in entrees like grilled veal chop with ham hock hominy cake, vegetable salad and chipotle demi-glacé, or pan-seared trout with yellow corn grits, artichokes, roasted corn and garlic cream sauce. Splurge, finally, with citrus and pine nut cake filled with goat cheese, orange caramel and cajeta ice cream.

Windows wows us with its wine list, including selections from Mexico, Chile and Argentina, and with its specialty margaritas fashioned from boutique mescals and fine tequilas. The decor is as delicious as the food, too, lush in sand-colored furnishings, regional pottery and paintings, panoramic golf course views and the warmth of a carved travertine fireplace.

Food this fine doesn't come cheap, but for something as special as this Southwestern sensation, it's worth every precious penny.

Readers' Choice: Z'Tejas Grill

Chef-owner Daniel Malventano has been knocking our socks off with his spectacular Italian fare for more than a decade. Sometimes it's a little hard to keep up with him, given his penchant for changing the restaurant's name (it started as Il Forno, then became Acqua e Sale, and has just been rechristened Daniel's). Who cares what he calls it, though, as long as he never stops serving up the same level of classical dishes that he travels around the world to research and perfect. There's no one else who serves succulent diver sea scallops in black truffle mousse, duck ravioli in butter-sage sauce with blood orange reduction, or our favorite class act: pork tenderloin roasted in amarone wine reduction, julienne prosciutto, sun-dried plums and crème de cassis with butternut squash-mashed potatoes and baby vegetables. Bellisima!

We've been contemplating taking up the Atkins Diet. That's the only way we can justify the gluttonous meat orgy that is a meal at Drinkwater's. This place is a caloric menace, with massive steaks (33-ounce rib eye chop), veal (a full pound) and pork chops, entire 22-ounce racks of lamb and whole roasted chickens (one and a half pounds).

This isn't just any meat, either, but the best USDA Prime, Midwest corn-fed steer, cut in the in-house butcher shop, wet-aged for 21 to 28 days, seasoned, broiled at 1,800 degrees, slicked with clarified butter and presented on a sizzling, 400-degree plate. We can even get our steak crusted with Gorgonzola for extra impact.

No fancy diet can justify the indulgence of Drinkwater's side dishes -- of table-tilting proportions -- but we can never say no to full-pound baked potatoes drenched in butter and sour cream, soup-plate-size twice-baked spuds, or buckets of broccoli swamped in oceans of melted cheese. They're just too tasty.

We pay for our gorging -- an easy 30 bucks on just a piece of meat (no salad, no potato, no vegetable included, nothing but the plate). And we'll pay again for months as we drag ourselves to our Stairmaster. But we'll keep coming back, because with Drinkwater's, there's just no way to pretend we've got willpower.

The best seafood in the Valley can be found in a dark room, buried in an underground building, across the street from a cemetery. But the owners of the Salt Cellar seem to understand that, when it comes to a fine tradition of excellent food, reasonable prices and a comfortable setting, it doesn't matter where the actual property is. So rather than go for a glitzy, high-profile location, these folks have kept the Cellar pretty much as it was when it first opened in 1981. What they save in rent, they pass on to us in lower prices for exquisitely fresh seafood flown in daily from places like Hawaii, Chesapeake Bay, Alaska, Boston, British Columbia, Idaho and the Gulf of Mexico. The cellar keeps us coming back for its seasonal specialties, too, like turtle soup, and smoked blue marlin. Great seafood, for just a few clams? Who could ask for anything more?

Readers' Choice: The Salt Cellar

We eat a vegetarian diet because we want to feel healthy. But that doesn't mean we don't want deeply flavored, interesting foods. Plaid delivers -- the kick-back, casual den strewn with sofas caters to a hip, multinational college student clientele. We like the salad "plaidders," omelets served all day, the "plaid" Thai noodles, Caribbean jerked tofu and lemongrass tofu served over rice. Some of the most exciting dishes show up as daily specials, like black bean pepper stir fry in Asian brown sauce, and Singapore curry. It's an interesting environment, too, earthy and hodgepodge, full of tree-hugging fellow diners, but with a full bar.

Readers' Choice: Pita Jungle

Japanese restaurants have been proliferating all across the Valley like shiitake mushrooms after a rain. Why, within a mile or two of our beloved Sushi on Shea, there's almost a half-dozen of the ethnic restaurants. Yet as much as we were impressed with the quality of SonS when it first opened in 1994, we're that much more in love with it today.

SonS never lets us down with the basics. This is consistently perfect maguro, hamachi and red snapper sashimi. Salmon melts like butter in our mouths. Tempura emerges from the fryer light and crispy; tonkatsu is the real thing, with moist slabs of pork crunchy in panko and served over crisp green cabbage. No details are missed, either -- the green salad is slicked with dynamite ginger soy vinaigrette, miso soup is always hot and rich, and white rice is always exquisitely fluffy-sticky.

SonS goes the extra mile, offering traditional dishes like shabu-shabu and nabeyaki udon. And the kitchen is always coming up with something new and exciting, like the recent addition of carpaccio, lacy thin strips of raw tuna dressed in a gripping horseradish-hot wasabi cream.

After almost a decade, our romance with Sushi on Shea just keeps getting more passionate.

Readers' Choice: RA Sushi Bar Restaurant

A half-hour north of town, it's worth a jaunt to this old-fashioned saloon with, yikes, honest-to-goodness real cowboys. Rock Springs has a history as delicious as its food, existing since the 1800s as an Indian encampment, a bivouac, a watering stop for miners, and a stagecoach stop. In 1918, it was enhanced to include a general store, hotel, and saloon.

Today, Rock Springs is as rustic as ever, dark, with lots of rough wood, an 1856 Brunswick bar and an antique soda fountain. Cowboy twangers play live music on weekends, and on the last Saturday of every month, there's a Hogs in Heat Barbecue and Nut Fry (yes, Bradshaw mountain oysters, battered and deep-fried, also known as the private parts of calves and lambs).

The old-time menu features lots of mesquite-smoked Midwestern beef and old-fashioned barbecue, catfish, trout, chicken-fried steak and liver and onions. When the rooster crows, cooks dish up breakfasts of steak and eggs, biscuits and gravy, buttermilk pancakes and grits. If a homemade hot buttered cinnamon roll isn't enough, dive into one of Penny's Pies, baked fresh every day. Now that's some gosh-darn honest cowboy cookin'!

Readers' Choice for Best Steak Restaurant: Ruth's Chris Steak House

While Americans salute a cheeseburger and French fries as a national treasure, people in India feast on the signature dish of tandoori. That's chicken marinated in yogurt and mild spices, cooked in its own juices over red-hot charcoals, then roasted with onions in a tandoor (a special clay oven imported from India) to a crisp, tender copper brown. We have hot dogs. Indians snack on lamb boti kebab, marinated lamb meat in morsel-size pieces skewered over hot charcoals with mint chutney and onion. Sure, we love our American food, but you get the picture: There are many more intricacies to Indian dishes. And no one makes the complex recipes sparkle like Indian Delhi Palace. It's difficult to choose from the massive menu. So we suggest letting the chef do it, with one of the complete meals offered. Our favorite is the tandoori dinner, with shish kebab, tandoori chicken, lamb tikka, vegetable curry, naan, dessert, chutney and tea. This is a culture we're proud to be part of.

Readers' Choice: Delhi Palace

Greekfest owners Tony and Susan Makridis wish us "kali orexi" -- have a good appetite. And man, we're going to need it, because with one look at their expansive menu, we know we've got to have it all. This is a taverna absolutely brimming with good times (yes, the cheerful waiters yell "opa!" when they flame our saganaki cheese), and great food. Steaming ceramic crocks of moussaka, pastitsio and youvetsi are sublime pasta-meat casseroles. Lamb and chicken turn on a souvla over crackling fires. The desserts are prepared with ritualistic family tradition, like natural yogurt and honey with walnuts. Hey, if this stuff is good enough for the Olympian gods, then it's good enough for us.

Readers' Choice: Greekfest

One of our friends is a chef, living in that fresh food capital, Berkeley. She came to visit, and we took her to dinner at Christopher's. Months after that meal, she still raves about the incredible truffle-infused prime sirloin she ate, the tender meat served with fareki (a Middle Eastern grain), shallot confit and rich red wine bone marrow sauce. She still swoons over the decadent soup of wild mushrooms and foie gras, the frisée salad with lardons, poached eggs and sherry vinaigrette. If there were a restaurant like this in her hometown, she keeps repeating, she'd eat there every day.

So how lucky are we, because we can eat this fantastic French food every day, for lunch, dinner, and even late night (the place serves until midnight seven days a week). Christopher's has kept us thrilled since chef Christopher Gross first opened this comfortable, elegant bistro in 1998, and we swear, he just keeps getting better. Chalk it up to the simple grace of his Gallic classics, emphasizing artisan ingredients from local and regional farmers. Salmon is smoked in-house, most dishes are prepared in a wood-burning oven, and the traditional French touches are all there (fantastic wine list, an extensive cheese program).

And ooh la la -- the desserts! Parnassienne of chocolate mousse has no equal. Christopher's, c'est magnifique.

Readers' Choice: La Madeleine French Bakery & Cafe

The only problem we have with Tao Garden is deciding what to eat: Everything on the restaurant's 210-plus-item menu is spectacular. Sometimes we're in the mood for mainstream, so we fill up on perfect pot stickers, fiery kung pao chicken and black beef chow mein. Other times, we're craving adventure, so we order authentic Cantonese or Mandarin specialties like fish maw with crab soup; salted fish, chicken and tofu hot pot; sautéed squid with preserved greens; and prawns with crispy fried milk. We're always up for a dive into Tao's fresh fish tanks, stocked with live lobster, crab, tilapia, rock cod, flatfish, catfish, scallops and clams. The kitchen has ingenious ways of preparing its catch, and we're sure to ask about the daily specials (printed in Chinese but cheerfully translated by a friendly staff). At least one dining decision is simple -- for best Chinese food in the Valley, we choose Tao Garden.

Readers' Choice: P.F. Chang's China Bistro

The last time we tried cooking at home, we caused a fire (okay, so flaming dishes don't belong on wooden tables). Then, we went to Tabletop, where the staff actually encourages us to play with flames, because we cook our own food at the table, on centerpieces of shiny stainless-steel grills. We can grill our own bulgogi, thin slices of rib eye marinated in sugar, garlic, soy sauce, sesame oil and possibly kiwi (the fruit's acidity acts as a tenderizer). The thin slices cook in minutes, and under the careful supervision of our server, no one gets hurt. There's so much to love about Korean food, and it's all found here: dozens of kimchee snacks, and ginseng kalbi (marinated barbecued beef short ribs on a sizzling platter to be rolled with thick red-chile paste, onions and sliced jalapeños like a Korean taco). Unless we're Korean, this is a place where it's expected to ask questions -- why do some dishes come with scissors, for example. But the staffers are always happy to answer, happy to demonstrate, and discreet enough with their handling of the fire extinguisher that we feel no shame.

We could gush over the hip-happening ambiance of Sapporo, packed to the rim with beautiful people sipping beautiful cocktails in a beautiful atmosphere. We love the sushi and teppanyaki. But it's the Pacific Rim menu items that get our hearts pattering like chopsticks drumming on a table. From the katsu fried calamari with sambal chile and rice vinegar to the crispy shrimp stuffed with lobster mousse and spicy Japanese butter, all dishes are spectacular, crafted with the freshest ingredients by chefs who are willing to take the risk to bring Valley diners something different. It's all just soy, soy great.

Schnitzel! We love that word. But more than saying it, we love eating the tasty meat cutlets, dipped in batter and fried. At Haus Murphy's, we fill up on fine varieties including Wiener schnitzel, jäger schnitzel, Balkan schnitzel, paprika schnitzel, Holstein schnitzel, prager schnitzel, schweizer schnitzel and chicken schnitzel. Sausages! We adore sausages, and no one presents the wide variety found at Haus Murphy's, like nurnberger bratwurst, knackwurst, krakauer wurst, thuringer bratwurst, weisswurst and spicy bratwurst. Sauerbraten! Szegediner gulash, kassler kotelett, hackbraten! We love all that, too. No, we're not going to detail all those specialty dishes for you. Just trust us. Go. Order something. Anything. Get one of eight German drafts, and enjoy the strolling accordionist. We promise that, though you may not be able to pronounce what you're eating, you will love it.

Sometimes Cajuns and Creoles like to fight over food. Cajuns tend to think Creoles are stuck-up, what with their French-inspired cuisine and fancier ingredients. Creoles tend to believe that Cajuns are at best bourgeoisie, given to snacking on such lower-level swamp critters as alligator, crawfish and, yes, even squirrel. Voodoo Daddy's doesn't have squirrel, and it doesn't have luxe dishes like deep-dish rabbit and foie gras pie. But it does have an impressive enough selection of New Orleans-style dishes to keep even the most orthodox Cajuns and Creoles happy. We appreciate the casual but excellent fried green tomatoes, the gator bites (marinated chunks of alligator dusted in corn meal and fried in peanut oil), and the fragrant frog legs piquant (sautéed in peppery tomato-based sauce, simmered with andouille sausage and green olives over long grain white rice). When we're feeling a touch fancier, we go for the Oysters Bienville (a dozen fresh shucked Louisiana gulf oysters topped with cheese, breadcrumbs and herbs, broiled until golden on top), or duck confit salad (sautéed duck mixed with salad greens, onions and a warm balsamic vinaigrette topped with duck cracklings). We always finish up with a fine dessert: French bread pudding with raisins, pecans and whiskey sauce. Let the two camps duke it out; all we can say is, ooh wee, these vittles are all good.

Readers' Choice: Voodoo Daddy's

What, exactly, is New American food? Nobody really knows. But ultimately, it seems to come down to presenting diners with dishes they think they might know, but then, surprise! There's some crazy twist to keep you scratching your head. Often, it's delicious in an exciting kind of way; at Cowboy Ciao, the surprise is always spectacular. Executive chef Bernie Kantak has come up with dishes like chile gratin (elk, beef loin, white beans, smoked Cheddar and Gouda); rare tuna with ground hops and chamomile over curried chow-chow and mango soy; or peppercorn ostrich tenderloin with blackberry compote and cocoa-nib mashed Yukon golds. You may think you know what you're in for with grilled duck breasts, but then Kantak sideswipes you with apple-chipotle marinade, ancho-pecan chutney and smoked Gouda grits. You may not always recognize the dinners at Cowboy Ciao, but you're going to love them.

This no-frills joint stuck in a strip mall between stores that sell cheap water and cigarettes has a devoutly loyal following, and with good reason. It's the place to go for happily inexpensive southern Italian fare, lunch or dinner. The owner, a Jewish Italophile who is the principal cellist for the Phoenix Symphony, is apt to greet you at the door and recommend his special of the day before you order at the front counter. The venerable staff (some of them have worked there for years) will fix your meal any way you like it. These days, with everyone and his mother on some kind of diet, that can mean an awful lot: If you ask, the guys will whip you up an antipasto that the late Dr. Atkins would appreciate from low-carb, high-protein heaven. A meal at Giuseppe's isn't complete without the sampler plate of bruschetta. It starts with a toasted piece of Italian bread topped with tomato, garlic and herbs, and goes from there (cheeses, meats and grilled vegetables). Three pieces for five bucks is an eminently fair price. Oh, and don't forget to BYOB. The bottle of vino you bring in probably will cost you more than the entire meal itself.

Readers' Choice for Best Italian Restaurant: Olive Garden

At some point, the meaning of "gourmet" has been lost. It's come to mean crazy, wild concoctions, with bizarre foods and even weirder combinations. But actually, gourmet means "a connoisseur of fine food and drink." So there's no better restaurant to celebrate fine food and drink than at Rancho Pinot. Co-owner Tom Kaufman is a wine genius, with a hugely clever and creative wine list (love the illustrations!). Co-owner Chrysa Kaufman is a food genius, and leader of the Phoenix chapter of Slow Food, an international group that cherishes farm-fresh foods, natural ingredients, and the joy of relaxing over a meticulously prepared meal.

The Kaufmans can get a bit wacko in their intense drive to prepare the most perfect food (don't ask for substitutions). But it's only from their obsession for the best in every bite of food, every sip of drink. The menu changes constantly, depending on what is the best available from organic farms and local artisans, and by what Chrysa deems acceptable to her creative skills.

Try this place once, and learn the difference between just food, and true art.