only move is to roll up with friends, order a host of small dishes, and split them all. Sure, you could come for an excellent Nea- politan-esque pizza whose crust Claudio Urciuoli has laboriously blended from many kinds of flour and blazed in a tiled, wood-fired oven. Sure, you could come for a sandwich, maybe impeccably sourced tuna on the headiest, airiest focaccia in the Valley. But to experience the full Italy- meets-Japan project of Pa’La 2.0, go small or go home. Jason Alford and Urciuoli plate inventive crudi, beef tataki, scallops with apple miso, anchovy-funked New York strip spiedini, squid and fregola, octo- pus and yuzu, burrata and tomatoes … the list goes forever on, changing with the sea- sons, high-end imports, and chefs’ imagi- nations. EEEEE Belly Kitchen & Bar 4971 North Seventh Avenue 602-296-4452 bellyphx.com Instrumental Hospitality’s Southeast Asian-inspired restaurant in Melrose hits best when you’re planted at the dark bar and a drink is plunked before you. The food at Belly can sing. Crab banh xeo has all the sea-sweet notes of the crustacean and the crisp goodness of the rice-flour crepe. Braised pork belly in a clay pot is richer than a pharaoh. Riffs on Southeast Asian tradition tend to be solid. Still, drinks kick up the experience several notches. Cock- tails lean strongly tropical and bright: mez- cal and rhum agricole, citrus, makrut lime leaf, intense aromatics. Try the Spicy Hy- dra, a margarita relative with pineapple and a tamarind salt rim, or the Because I Got High, which goes huge with mezcal, green chartreuse, matcha syrup, and coco- nut. EEEEE Durant’s 2611 North Central Avenue 602-264-5967 durantsaz.com 168 The photos on Durant’s website are mis- leading: Durant’s is dark. Really dark, like you need to wait for your eyes to adjust a bit dark. It adds a certain amount of flair and intrigue to your dining experience, as does the way you enter the restaurant through the back door. Once you’re inside, you can sit down and squint at the menu, which is composed of pricey-but-worth-it steakhouse classics like filet mignon, strip steak, and grilled scallops in herb cream sauce. Whatever you choose, don’t rush your meal; the food and the atmosphere in- vite you to linger in a subtle, classy dining room where you don’t have to see clearly to enjoy what’s on your plate. EEEEE Hillstone, we often see people who seem vaguely famous when we do. Like a local CEO, or a guitarist from a famous ’80s band who retired to Scottsdale, or a woman so beautiful she must be a model or the owner of a 500,000-follower Instagram influ- encer account. Maybe not the crowd you run with. But if you ain’t been to Hillstone, they know something you don’t. EEEEE Hillstone 2650 East Camelback Road 602-957-9700 hillstone.com You laugh. Isn’t Hillstone a chain? Yes, it’s a chain. And yes, if you glance at the menu, you’ll find a lot of straightforward dishes: wood-fired rotisserie, a French dip, a cheeseburger, some sushi rolls. If you like restaurants where you are afraid to pro- nounce a menu item, perhaps move along. But if you’re in the mood for the classics done exceptionally well, Hillstone is the spot. We have some recommendations for the (mildly) more adventurous eater, too. The Thai Tuna Roll, which contains maca- damia nuts, is one of our favorite things to eat in all of Phoenix. The Thai Noodle Salad, served cold with mango, mint, chopped peanuts, and basil (we swap out the chicken for steak), is an absolute explo- sion of flavor — the perfect thing to eat on a hot day. The margs, heavy on the Coin- treau, are $15 but somehow worth it. And, though we can’t usually afford to hang at Hush Public House 14202 North Scottsdale Road, #167, Scottsdale 480-758-5172 hushpublichouse.com Dom Ruggiero has one of the most diverse skill sets of any chef in the Valley. Beyond being a supremely gifted cook, he has grade-A chops in butchery, smoking food, and curing meat, yet also can rock out in- spired vegetable cookery. Ruggiero is an underappreciated, quiet master of pasta, too. At Hush, he can usually be seen in the open kitchen or out in the restaurant deliv- ering plates and chewing the fat with friends and regulars. There is a warmth to Hush that’s as pleasant as the food. It’s a place you want to return to again and again — and yes, it helps that Ruggiero’s oxtail Italian beef, chicken liver pâté, and date cake are already stone-cold Valley classics just a few years in. FnB 7125 East Fifth Avenue, #31, Scottsdale 480-284-4777 fnbrestaurant.com FnB could win this category on Charleen Badman’s imaginative modern Arizonan food alone. It also could win on nothing but Pavle Milic’s next-level drink program, highlighted by potable finds from up and down our varied state. Put the two to- gether and you get some black magic. Somehow, Badman seems to get better year after year, turning out stellar dishes like chilled melon soup, lamb ribs over fregola, and Peruvian spring rolls, melding the top, most unusual local produce with her array of global techniques. Milic is a library of knowledge on drinks reaching to the far corners of our state. He sources small- batch ciders from cooler heights where ap- ples grow and even bottles from, yes, Los Milics, his very own Sonoita vineyard. EEEEE The Pemberton PHX 1121 North Second Street pembertonphx.com What do you want? The Pemberton proba- bly has it. This Roosevelt Row entertain- ment hub, which debuted during the BEST OF PHOENIX 2021 | WWW.BESTOFPHOENIX2021.C0M | SEPTEMBER 30, 2021 f o o d & dr i nk A B O RIZ E NS A R T A U S E THENTIC A T UR A NT B B ES A T T THE B C PLA E A T R O B KIND E S EA T T LA GR O RES W-K A T EY E U R AT AN T E S RES T NEIGHB A T U ORHT AN O R OD B ES T HU B B ES IN THE D PLA T C AE RK T O EA T
