Best Foodie Cities USA- (a salvage thread) Top Three (or more)

Here are the best things i ever ate and the cities in which i had them....

Burger: Gott's Roadside. Napa CA  Double cheeseburger, garlic truffle fries and lemon cream shake...ridiculous meal

Steak: Windows on the Green at the Phoenician Resort.  Scottsdale, AZ.  Doesnt exist anymore but they have a steakhouse there now that is supposedly every bit as good. I havent tried it yet.


Chicken Kabob: Khyber Halal, Phoenix.   Unbelievable chicken boti with rice and cucumber tomato chopped salad.   This Afghani restaurant is a little known secret in phx.  If you ever are in phx, go here.  Awesome food.


BEST turkey sub sandwhich...Jackson Hole, WY.  Forgot the name of the place but its a store  and deli on the way out of town.   

Best Italian Beef sandwhich: Luke's Chicago deli Phoenix. 16th st and indian school.  Get it with provolone and the their home made rolls are awesome.  They have great hot dogs too.

Best pasta and meatballs with red sauce: Riazzis Italian Garden in Tempe, AZ.  Old school italian restaurant with excellent food

Best Chinese food: Desert Jade in Phoenix off of 32nd street.  CHEAP, CLEAN AND EXCELLENT .  shrimp amd scalllops with vegetables is amazing

Best Modern Mexican food: Barrio Cafe, 16th street and thomas.  Chicken with hollandaise sauce and crab doesnt sound mexican but it is and its incredible.


Best mexican. Seafood: Javiers in Laguna beach, CA.  Crab enchiladas are out of this world

BEST mexican grilled veggie plate: la sirena in laguna beach, ca.   Walk up counter, tiny space.  Incredible food.

Best pizza: Pizzeria Bianco.   My good friend Chris started a revolution 25yrs ago and hes the god of the pizza world.  

Best mexico city style mexican food: Restaurant Mexico in Tempe, AZ.   Authentic, simple not over the top spicy, very simple and simply great food.

Best Greek food: Greekfest in phoenix, az.   The owners are artists and make incredible leg of lamb.  

Best ahi tuna : Ocean Club at Kierland in Phoenix,  they say its in scottsdale but it is really on the phoenix side of scottsdale road

Best steak sandwhich: Chickie and Petes Philadelphia,  surn n turf steak and lobster is insane

Best Steak and Lobster combo (i know steak is above and seafood is above butbboth combined here is something i need to mention)   : la golondrina in Cabo San ;Lucas mexico and ranch raised beef cattle and lobsters caught 3 hours before you eat them is tough to beat

Best mussels..dock stand in victoria, canada.  Wow

Best pork chop: Mustards i. Napa, ca.   Mongolian pork chop with braised red cabbage and garlic mashpots.   

Best ham: canflora bakery in Bay View, WI. 

I probably could come up with a few more items but thinking back over my limited travel, and of the places i frequent at home, these pretty much hit it for me.  

Well @lousubcap i really have a photographic memory when it comes to great food i really enjoyed.  Ive never been to nyc but when i do, ill get a pastrami sandwhich, a steak at peter luger and eat some of the best food on the planet.  The cool thing about nyc is the unlimited variety of food close by....

But i can say that since discovering the big green egg, and tips on making sausage, bread and home made sauces/marinades picked up on this forum, eating at home has yielded better results than most restaurants can offer.   I can say that there are places we go to in order to enjoy their offerings. Places like bianco, lukes, riazzis, khyber halal, and restaurant mexico are just a few local examples.  I hit napa once a year and the burger at gotts is out of this world #1 for me.  It is that good and i need to hit it whenever i go.  Only been to victoria canada once and mussels with garlic and white wine sauce in a basket on the dock was maybe the best thing i ever ate.  They were ridiculous,  so the next time im up there that is a must do

San Francisco, NYC, LA, and prob Chicago have to be the top four in the us for food cities but certain things in certain cities are what im usually trying to find....i hope my humble list helps you and egg nation on future phoenix trips

@Ozzie_Isaac.  Thats great. Let me know how it goes....here are a few more:

Chelsea's Kitchen. 40th st and camelback.   Swordfish tacos, wood grilled burger and key lime pie are amazing

Postino winebar....one on central south of missouri and one on 40th st and campbell.   Turkey roasted red pepper sandwhich with goat cheese is out of this world, they have one out in gilbert too

La Grande Orange market (LGO)   its next to postino and their commuter breakfast sandwhich is sublime.  They have a great stacked turkey sammy thats good too.  Lotsa scenery here after yoga and pilates classes let out :-)

Adjacent to LGO the same owners have  pizza joint thats pretty good too, plus their green chile cheeseburger and grilled wings are among the top 5 ive ever had.

Bandera on scottsdale road and just south of indian school...rotisserie chicken is really good here, they have  location in newport beach CA, i think and last i checked one in chicago, but im pretty sure they started here..,,

TOMASOS on 32nd st and camelback,   higher end italian restaurant that is among the highest quality anywhere

There is a restaurant up in north scottsdale called the persian room.  Ive never been but family amd friends whonhave say its the best

Flaming kabob in tempe pretty close to ASU campus is really good, and the ahem scenery in Tempe is unbeatable

There are tons of places up in scottsdale Christos for italian, Drinkwater City Hall steakhouse and Mastros steakhouse...all are good and all are on upper end of ones dining budget

By far one of the best meals I've ever had was in Salerno.  We were with locals.  Always go with locals.  

Decent group of us.  Were told to follow down a dark alley just off the city center.  OK, not sure where things were going but when in Rome... There was no sign of anything, no indication there was any kind of eating establishment there whatsoever.  Leader knocked on what looked like the wall of the alley, but was actually a large hanging metal door.  It slid open, revealing maybe three or four wooden tables inside, just enough for our party.  

If there was a menu, we never saw it.  The woman who was the host/owner/cook just started bringing us food, paired with wine.  No questions were asked, no instructions given.  This is what she had and g-damnit we were going to eat it or insult her. 

It was amazing.  The clams diablo and carbonara, mother of God.  Limoncello to finish.  Perfect.  

Botch said:

@lousubcap , @westernbbq hit on something here.  Instead of a thread on the top 3 restaurant cities, maybe start a thread for everyone to list the Top Three (or more) restaurants in their hometown, that'd have a lot more weight and I'd bookmark a thread like that for sure!  

Go for it.  It’s a free country brother.

lousubcap said:

@Botch- I agree but I had no direct interest in the thread topic at the start other than to deflect some forum whizzing posts in the "what are you doing now" thread for preservation purposes.  FWIW-

Light it up.  Start the new thread on top 3 restraunts in your town.

Seems as legit as anything else I've read:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/style/2015/12/21/the-10-best-food-cities-in-america-ranked/?utm_term=.e777733bbafe

JohnInCarolina said:

By far one of the best meals I've ever had was in Salerno.  We were with locals.  Always go with locals.  

Decent group of us.  Were told to follow down a dark alley just off the city center.  OK, not sure where things were going but when in Rome... There was no sign of anything, no indication there was any kind of eating establishment there whatsoever.  Leader knocked on what looked like the wall of the alley, but was actually a large hanging metal door.  It slid open, revealing maybe three or four wooden tables inside, just enough for our party.  

If there was a menu, we never saw it.  The woman who was the host/owner/cook just started bringing us food, paired with wine.  No questions were asked, no instructions given.  This is what she had and g-damnit we were going to eat it or insult her. 

It was amazing.  The clams diablo and carbonara, mother of God.  Limoncello to finish.  Perfect.  

i had a similar experience in bostons north end maybe 30 years ago,  ally behind a bakery, around 2am, in back two guys standing next to the door and a dumpster, inside a table with old men in suits with a guy standing at each end of the table. sat down, just us and the other table, best food ive ever eaten in boston. pretty damn sure it was mob related.  the freaky part was the italian girl that brought me there was dark skin with blonde hair, ive never seen that before