Descending from Pinnacle Peak the other day, after a repast at Sassi, the new, resort-like restaurant fashioned to resemble an Italian villa, the initial stanza of Coleridge’s Kubla Khan rang in my noggin. You know the lines, “In Xanadu did Kubla Khan/a stately pleasure dome decree . . . “…
It is bad enough when your male peers disrespect your music because you’re female. But when your audience begins requesting Tupac Shakur and Busta Rhymes, that is not only dissing the music. That’s disrespecting the Mexican culture. Fortunately, the members of Mariachi Pasión — believed to be Arizona’s first all-female…
Those of you old enough to have lived through any part of the Cold War — or to have suffered through a political conversation with a devout Libertarian — will be familiar with the oft-repeated mantra that capitalism is the most efficient system on earth, unlike communism, which is grossly…
I was in Tempe last week, sitting in a cafe and flipping through my recent purchase from a nearby bookshop of a rare copy of Valentine Penrose’s The Bloody Countess: The Atrocities of Erzsebet Bathory, when a bizarre desire took hold of me. Those of you familiar with this 16th-century…
So I was over at Mikey’s the other day, doing bong hits and watching episode after episode of Cartoon Network’s Aqua Teen Hunger Force, which makes a lot more sense once the sinsemilla turns the reasoning center of your brain to oatmeal. Mikey had Tivo’d a mess of them, and…
Salsa music conjures images of virile men spinning graceful women on the dance floor, a sexual pantomime of a man trying to seduce a woman while she pushes him away, only to encourage him to try again. It depicts unresolved sexual tension between a man and a woman in their…
One of the joys of writing a weekly column for New Times is that I’m pretty much given carte blanche to cut through the ca-ca that other news outlets lay on with a trowel. Take, for example, the current coverage of former president Ronald Reagan’s demise: the tearful remembrances, the…
I suppose most folks have their own, somewhat flattering image of themselves, and I am no different in this regard. In my mind’s eye, I’m a cross between Sydney Greenstreet’s character Signor Ferrari in Casablanca and the so-called “wickedest man in the world” Aleister Crowley, though I lean more toward…
What better way to kick off the weekend than by dangling upside down while a barmaid pours a kamikaze shot down your throat? How about standing before a chanting crowd, while your significant other pushes a lime through one pants hole and out the other without the use of his…
Occasionally, I feel like the Ted Bundy of food critics, trawling sundry restaurant rows here in Phoenix, looking for my next victim. It has something to do with exorcising my inner Jack the Ripper, albeit with the written word as my butcher knife. Unlike Bundy, et al., my “victims” are…
Last week, I was perusing this book Bizarrism, a compilation of “Strange Lives, Cults and Celebrated Lunacy” by Aussie author Chris Mikul, when I was overcome by an irresistible yearning to taste the treasures of the briny deep. Or, to state it more plainly, I was bloody hungry for seafood…
I have been very, very spoiled in the past when it comes to churrascaria, or Brazilian barbecue. I didn’t realize how spoiled until I visited the new Brazeiro Steakhouse in Scottsdale’s Fashion Square. But more on that place in a moment. You see, fortune has heretofore led my belly to…
Los Angeles may have the ocean, a temperate climate, Hollywood starlets and the Lakers, but the Valley cleans La-La Land’s proverbial clock when it comes to pizza. Perhaps Angelenos are too busy eating tofu and primping for their close-ups, but for whatever reason, in El Lay, it’s either Wolfgang Puck…
Don’t read this if you’re hungry — or trying to do the low carb thing. The Flores Bakery — a small, sweet-smelling shop on Avenida del Yaqui, the main drag in Guadalupe — is the place to go for authentic Mexican baked goods, anything from a pumpkin empanada to a…
I’d been sitting on the fence for the past week about Rokerij, Richardson Browne’s classy new chop shop, when I happened to take a look at the fine print on the menu of this stone-and-wood surf-and-turf joint, which reads: “Sorry, we do not provide highchairs or booster seats.” In other…
One of the bonuses of dwelling in a real metropolis is having a reputable Indian eatery within reasonable distance of one’s digs. When I resided in New York, I was the luckiest I’ve ever been in this regard. My building was near 23rd Street and Lexington Avenue, and just a…
Death and taxes. The two unavoidables of human existence had me knee-deep in the dumps. It happened after I visited my local H&R Block on Camelback to see how much I didn’t get back from the supposedly massive Bush tax cut. Okay, I admit, I did qualify for a piddling…
Ecuador is perhaps best known for its Galápagos Islands, but the food’s not bad, either. Chef Rosa Rosas prepares some of the best in the Valley at Mi Cocina, Mi Pais, a restaurant tucked away in a northwest Phoenix strip mall. Tapestries on the mango-colored walls are decorated with flamingos,…
Let me share a little secret with you: Journalists love to eat and eat well, but we’re also notoriously cheap. In part, this has to do with the fact that almost no one gets rich off scribbling for a living. And probably, deservedly so, if you judge by what’s sometimes…
Allow me to address a theme that runs through a number of missives I’ve received from my detractors, most of whom have this ass-backwards notion that restaurant reviews should be as chipper as the banter of those coifed nimrods over at Good Morning Arizona. That is, when somebody deigns to…
The good news first: I’ve recently had the pleasure of eating at the hippest new sushi joint in the Valley, with maki rolls so innovative, and yet professionally prepared, that I’d almost be willing to move upstairs from the place so that I could get my daily fix. Now the…
It’s Friday and most of the lunch crowd at Pitic Restaurant is feasting on delicious Mexican dishes — without meat, of course. It’s Lent. Lent is a time of self-denial, but there’s one treat unique to this time of year. At Pitic and at other Mexican eateries in town, the…
