For many years, my family celebrated the holidays by ourselves. All the major groups of relatives were located 38 hours away by car so we rarely saw them. Most of our interactions with cousins and aunts and uncles took place via the U.S. Postal Service. Then came cheap airfares. And…
CREW, 34505 North Scottsdale Road (El Pedregal Marketplace), Scottsdale, 480-488-8840. Hours: Lunch, 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Monday through Saturday; closed for lunch Sunday; Dinner, 5:30 to 9 p.m. Sunday through Thursday; 5:30 to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday. The proprietors of year-old CREW modestly describe their restaurant as a…
A barren island in the San Francisco Bay, Alcatraz was from 1933 to 1963 the site of the notorious federal prison known by its residents as “The Rock” and famous for its inescapability. Rain forests, found around the world near the Equator, are wet jungles characterized by incredibly dense flora…
D’Atri’s Cinema Paradiso, 10303 North Scottsdale Road (Windmill Plaza), Scottsdale, 480-348-0377. Hours: Lunch, Tuesday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.; Dinner, Tuesday through Saturday, 5 to 9 p.m.; closed Sunday and Monday. Isn’t it wonderful to live in a city teeming with cafes? Cafe life is so vibrant, just…
Mary Elaine’s, The Phoenician, 6000 East Camelback, Phoenix, 480-941-8200. Hours: Dinner, Monday through Thursday, 6 to 10 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 6 to 11 p.m. This is the time of year when many folks take stock and count their blessings. Right now, I imagine the executives at the opulent Phoenician…
Dong A, 4808 North 35th Avenue, Phoenix, 602-841-4152. Hours: Lunch, Monday, 10:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.; Lunch and Dinner, Tuesday through Friday, 10:30 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Saturday, 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Sunday, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. How much of an adventurer are you? Do you buy stocks…
Tomaso’s 2000, 16640 North Scottsdale Road, Scottsdale, 480-991-2000. Hours: Lunch, Monday through Friday, 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.; Dinner, 5 p.m. to 10, seven days a week. In the old days, when the West was being settled, development took a predictable course. First came the explorers. Then came the hunters…
Coronado Cafe, 2201 North Seventh Street, Phoenix, 602-258-5149. Hours: Lunch and Dinner, Tuesday through Friday, 11 a.m. to 8 p.m.; Lunch, Saturday, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Closed Sunday and Monday. “Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp,” wrote the poet, “or what’s a heaven for?” The proprietors…
Central Bistro, 5202 North Central, Phoenix, 602-234-2768. Hours: Lunch and Dinner, Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.; Friday, 11 a.m. to 11 p.m.; Saturday, 2 to 11 p.m. Closed Sunday. Real estate experts know that certain businesses and certain locations don’t mesh. You shouldn’t put a fine chinaware…
Madera Grille, 6601 West Bethany Home, Glendale, 623-847-1847. Hours: Lunch and Dinner, Monday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. The west-side restaurant scene could use some help. Fine dining? You’d have better luck scouring the avenues looking for the Loch Ness monster. Meanwhile, every chain restaurant on the planet…
Seasons Rotisserie & Grill, 10050 North Scottsdale Road, Scottsdale, 480-443-1300. Hours: Lunch, Monday through Friday, 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.; Dinner, Sunday through Thursday, 5:30 to 10 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 5:30 to 11 p.m. When a bunch of jocks get together and open a restaurant, you can usually count…
The man in the black fisherman’s cap reminds you at once of Timothy Leary in his later years — minus the drugs. Mind-altering substances, to be sure, do not define the life of Hans Traulsen. Rather, he marks his own 86-year-long “trip” with much more laudable escapes. The first, his…
I’m going to say something that goes against my own conscience and the warnings of the U.S. surgeon general. You single women out there: If you want to be a player in the Valley mating dance, you’d better be holding something like a Macanudo Petite between your fingers. I’ve recently…
Ten years is a long time. When I moved here from California a decade ago, I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. I was thrilled with the affordable housing. I was thrilled that my kids could walk to school unescorted. I was thrilled that my car insurance rates…
LEO the Delicatessen, 5101 North Scottsdale Road, Scottsdale, 480-941-4477. Hours: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner, Tuesday through Sunday, 6:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. Call me the Deli Lama. Like my Tibetan counterpart, I’ve spent a long time in exile, far from the native foods of the Brooklyn streets of my youth…
Edward’s of Scottsdale, 9619 North Hayden (Mountain View Plaza), Scottsdale, 480-9223567. Hours: Dinner, Monday through Saturday, 5 p.m. to close. “There is no new thing under the sun,” according to Ecclesiastes. So much for unerring Biblical certainty. Obviously, the man has never been to Scottsdale. How else can you explain…
Cafe Express, 2525 East Camelback (Shops at the Esplanade), Phoenix, 602-522-9199. Hours: Lunch and Dinner, 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., seven days a week. Self-service restaurants have never had much of a culinary reputation. Who can think of cafeterias without recalling the dreaded high school lunch hour? Remember reluctantly pushing…
Tequila Grill, 4363 North 75th Street, Scottsdale, 480-941-1800. Hours: Lunch and Dinner, 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., seven days a week; bar stays open until 1 a.m. Almost 500 years ago, Spanish explorer Francisco Coronado led an expedition through the American Southwest, searching for the legendary Seven Cities of Cibola…
In New York City, there are more Jews than in Tel Aviv and more Puerto Ricans than in San Juan. Guatemalans in Los Angeles outnumber those in every Guatemalan city except the capital. Count just L.A.’s Iranians, and the city’s population would still top Baltimore’s. Only Warsaw has more Poles…
Easterners come to live in the Valley for a variety of reasons. Indeed, the metro area is beginning to split at the seams, the air to curdle and the pavement to crack under the strain of all the people from the East, and elsewhere, who found so many good reasons…
Arisoo, 3002 North Arizona Avenue, Chandler, 4806325655. Hours: Lunch and Dinner, Monday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.; Sunday, noon to 10 p.m. I’m a Seoul man. Despite the explosion of Asian ethnic restaurants in the Valley, you can still count the number of Korean restaurants here on one…
Tal’s, 13610 North Scottsdale Road, Scottsdale, 480-348-0086. Hours: Dinner, Monday through Thursday, 5:30 to 9 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 5:30 to 10 p.m.; closed Sunday. When is disappointment the keenest? The moment you realize your wildest dreams will never come true? No. People get on with their lives even though…
