Ocotillo

Ocotillo Restaurant & Bar occupies a nearly one-acre corner lot in central Phoenix, a stylish food and drink compound with a strikingly modern desert design and a menu of New American cuisine, which here means food with a sense of place and seasonality. But co-chefs Walter Sterling and Sacha Levine also play with a whole globally-inspired palette of flavors and ingredients. Over the course of dinner, you might see wedges of pecan wood-smoked beets perched on herbed whipped ricotta, or perhaps a Japanese take on fish and chips, made with panko-fried white fish that comes on a mountain of seaweed-infused fries and a side of Yuzu sauce. The restaurant’s signature namesake dish, Ocotillo Chicken, a half of a roasted chicken glazed with local honey, chiles and fresh citrus, evokes Arizona in the most delicious way possible.