Best Place to Take a First Date 2010 | The Parlor | Food & Drink | Phoenix
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Best Place to Take a First Date

The Parlor

Heather Hoch
Hitting the town with somebody new? Tasty eats like grilled asparagus with preserved lemon, delicious handmade pastas (we love the tagliatelle with speck, grilled radicchio, and pecorino crema), juicy burgers, and, of course, pizzas make this parlor a favorite for both lunch and dinner. Craft cocktails, beer, and wine keep conversation well lubricated, so to speak, and if it turns out that your date isn't all that interesting, there's plenty of fun people-watching in the dining room, outdoor patio, and bar area. You can't go wrong with The Parlor.

Best View

J&G Steakhouse

Courtesy of J&G Steakhouse
It doesn't matter whether it's a clear, starry night, a hazy pink sunset, or the middle of an electrical storm, there's no better place to dine and get an eyeful of the Valley than from J&G Steakhouse. Perched up at The Phoenician, facing south, celebrity chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten's stylish steakhouse has vast city views that compete with the excellent steakhouse fare coming out of chef de cuisine Jacques Qualin's kitchen. While we prefer to get the deluxe treatment in the dining room, the views are just as good from the lounge, where you can order a burger and beer and get a taste of the J&G experience at a sweet price.

Best Hot Spot

Modern Steak

Courtesy of Modern Steak
Steaks here are delicious, but there's more than meats, er, meets the eye at Modern Steak. We also adore the lovely, fresh salads, quirky eats like the foot-long Kobe beef hotdog, appealing seafood dishes such as miso-glazed Chilean sea bass with crispy oyster mushrooms, and desserts that aren't just an afterthought (a sampler of moist cupcakes, crowned with creamy frosting, is our favorite). What's more, the scene here is packed with tasty eye candy — just wading through the crowd to get to the bar makes for interesting people-watching, and the cleverly shaded patio makes dining right next to the Fashion Square parking lot seem genuinely desirable. Who'da thunk it?

Best Hummus

Dr. Hummus

Sick of typical dips? Scoop up something with a little snap from Sabeur Ruin, a.k.a. Dr. Hummus. A native of North Africa, Ruin regularly prescribes his chickpea concoctions as the cure-all for dull party fare. A secret family recipe handed down from his grandmother, the hummus comes in four flavors, including Original, Artichoke, Garlic, and as a nod to Ruin's adopted hometown of Phoenix, Spicy Jalapeño. Pair one of these with Dr. Hummus' homemade pita chips and you've got a healthful snack that is just what the doctor ordered.

Best Sausage

Schreiner's Fine Sausages

Kyle Lamb
Describe a flavor with adjectives like smoky, spicy, and multi-layered, and you might expect to be sampling a fine wine, not noshing on the culinary handiwork of the folks at Schreiner's Fine Sausages. After having purchased the business from its original owners, Gary Schiller has been handcrafting quality meat products for almost 30 years. His experience and love for the business is evident in the amazing flavors produced in the small smoke shop located behind the iconic red-and-white retail front. With more than 60 varieties to choose from, we feel confident that just one bite of a Schreiner's sausage will have you singing its praises.

Best Kimchee

Paldo Market

When it comes to food, simple is usually best. Why mess up something yummy with unnecessary complication? So when we're hungry for kimchee, we simply head for Paldo Market. Paldo has freshly made containers of the Korean staple ready to go in multiple varieties. If Napa cabbage is your favorite flavor, rest assured it's so delicious that the temptation to consume it all on the drive home may be too much to resist. We prefer the green onion version, stir-fried with a little bulgogi. Either way you're consuming a locally made version of a dish Health magazine declared one of the world's healthiest foods.

Best Use of Bacon

Bacon Brownies

We shouldn't be telling you about this. But on Friday mornings, Royal at the Market gives birth to the most decadent of breakfast treats. It's got chocolate. It's got bacon. It's available for only a few nanoseconds. We're talking about bacon brownies. If you're at the Royal at 8 a.m. (if you can't make it that early, you don't deserve the brownies), you'll smell them baking. Get in line and pray to God that there's no one ahead of you. The faithful will be rewarded with the most lusciously indulgent salty square of satisfaction known to man. Those who show up late will find that they're sold out. How long do you expect bacon brownies to last?

Best Use of Veal

House of Tricks' Veal Bacon

Chef Kelly Fletcher may not be the first to make a VLT, but he'd argue that his is absolutely the best. And we wouldn't disagree. He's no stranger to using controversial ingredients — not that he thinks veal should even be in that category. But he loves telling the story about the time he shot a segment with a local television station and was asked to make a few dishes. His last dish used foie gras. Within minutes of the segment airing, Fletcher says, the restaurant phone was ringing with threats and arguments. Good thing he loves it. When he gets pushback from an ingredient, it only fuels his desire to make more. Okay, back to the veal bacon: Fletcher brought in a veal breast (same cut as a pork belly) and kept turning it over, as it reminded him of the cut of pork he used for Tricks' bacon. "So I said, 'Fuck it, we're making veal bacon — no, we're making VLTs!'" says Fletcher. Topped with white truffle aioli, cherry tomatoes, and arugula, and hugged by a pâté à choux bun, Fletcher's VLTs aren't getting any threats from us.

Best Use of Prunes

Prune Danish

There's plenty to love about this super-authentic bakery/cafe, which specializes in Polish and Eastern European delicacies, baked fresh every day and displayed in vintage-looking, glass-fronted cases. We're crazy about their fruit-filled doughnuts, the pierogi, and the hot, black, chicory-flavored coffee they serve here. We're nuts about the little grocery section stocked with non-perishables like we've only ever seen in little Polish villages. But the single item that keeps us coming back, time and again, is Europa's tasty, flaky prune Danish. Baked in-house every day, it's a sweet-glazed, tangy, prune-filled marvel that nearly floats from our plate into our now-happy mouth. Yum.

Best Kalamata Olive Bread

Jonathan Robins Bakery

Katie Walter
What's soft, inviting, and vaguely exotic? Get your head out of the gutter and into an oven. We're talking about bread — the most wonderful bread we've laid teeth on. Jonathan Robins' kalamata olive bread came into our life via the Tempe Farmers Market, the only place in town to purchase it. It's packed full of olives, making it so delicious that spreads, butters, and other toppings only distract from the deliciousness. One day we may try one of the bakery's other breads. One day.

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