If you ask me, anyone who thinks Tucson’s culinary successes are unlikely hasn’t been paying attention. Well, it seems as though some folks are taking note now.
Today, the New York Times published a story detailing a bit about our Sonoran cuisine under the headline “Tucson Becomes an Unlikely Food Star.” Here’s a snippet:
There are food deserts, those urban neighborhoods where finding healthful food is nearly impossible, and then there is Tucson.
When the rain comes down hard on a hot summer afternoon here, locals start acting like Cindy Lou Who on Christmas morning. They turn their faces to the sky and celebrate with prickly pear margaritas. When you get only 12 inches of rain a year, every drop matters.
Coaxing a vibrant food culture from this land of heat and cactuses an hour’s drive north of the Mexican border seems an exhausting and impossible quest. But it’s never a good idea to underestimate a desert rat. Tucson, it turns out, is a muscular food town.
Eight months ago it became the only place in the United States designated a City of Gastronomy by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, known by its acronym, Unesco.
Read the full piece, then call your friends and figure out which local eatery you’re heading to for dinner.
This article appears in Aug 18-24, 2016.
Also, support the small producers, projects, farmers and advocates that are working tirelessly to ensure that all Tucsonans have access to good nutrition. Culturally conscious farmers like the San Xavier Cooperative Farm are making crops and tradition accessible for all of us. Mission Garden is a literal walking tour of food production in the Tucson Basin for the last 4000 years. Community Organizers and organizations like Flowers and Bullets, Tierra y Libertad and the Community Food Bank are ensuring that everybody in our community has equal access to good and whole local foods. So many are a part of making the Designation meaningful.
Let’s ensure that in addition to supporting local restaurateurs we also are enacting policy that protects our Foodways for the generations to come.
-elh
But have you had my Tacos?
Excellent job by Edible Baja Arizona coordinating this visit by The New York Times!
Oh my! A mediocre writer for the NYT spends a few days in Tucson and feels she actually knows the place well enough to put forth the following assertions:
“…locals start acting like Cindy Lou Who on Christmas morning. They turn their faces to the sky and celebrate with prickly pear margaritas.” Say what?
“Coaxing a vibrant food culture from this land of heat and cactuses…” What – we’re not a modern city?
“…devoted eaters who will spend the day debating the best place to get a good raspado.” Oh, that one will give Phoenicians a chuckle or two.
“They’re O.K., but it’s not like cholla buds are going to take the country by storm,…” Well then, why even mention them, Mr. Wilder? This is the friggin NYT, fer gosh sakes!
“But Tucson will always be Tucson, a place people either love or hate.” That is just false. Many people like it well enough to visit during high season, and then sensibly go back to wherever to avoid the exquisite agonies of June and July here. If you can find any year-round resident who really hates it, that would be a great interview to publish. First question: “So why dont you GTFO, then?”
Maybe it’s just as well she didn’t mention LE BUZZ (Catalina Highway and Tanque Verde Rd.) which has their own roasted coffees from exotic places, but also their own bakery ……. croissants to die for. It’s getting much too crowded……just celebrated 20 years in Tucson. CONGRATULATIONS, MARGARET! WE
LOVE LE BUZZ! ( The LE is pronounced the French way).
Last Friday they had a nice little piece on the downtown Tucson food scene in USA Today.
@Nancy, someone’s revealed LeBuzz in the comments on the Times’ story 🙁
A few things stuck in my craw about this article.
First, “this land of heat and cactuses.” It’s *cacti*, dammit, *cacti*. You’re a New York Times writer, for heaven’s sake!
Second, the assumption that Tucson’s foodie reputation is not really “all about the restaurants.” Oh no? Then what do you make of El Minuto, Tavolino, the Grill at Hacienda Del Sol, Brooklyn Pizza Company, La Placita, or the simple pleasure of a well-crafted sandwich or sushi roll on the patio at AJ’s?
Last but not least, I need to repeat what a few commenters on the NYT article itself mentioned: Tucson is a fabulous place to grow your own produce year-round and has no shortage of truly fresh fruits and vegetables.
The article was halfway between being decent and damning with faint praise, if you ask me.
We have the very best food this side of the border. I have lived here since May of 1972. My husband and I drove 5 & 1/2 days, across the United States, from Rockford, Illinois. The temperatures were 22 below zero, the last February we were there! We looked at each other and said Let’s get the hell out of HERE! So we packed up a few of my Son’s toys, a few dishes, and clothes. Piled up in our year old pale blue 1971 FORD TORINO, my Son was teething, the entire trip, (no car seats back then I held him in my lap! ) and headed out West, and never looked back. The first food we had was Taco Bell. Lol over time my husband, self-taught Chef, made the most elaborate meals of Mexican cuisine! Every holiday was a feast. I became a Baker at a local hospital, between the two of us, as our Family expanded, the meals were shared with friends, from my Husband’s School where he taught Art. Everyone remembers the lavish meals we produced. Sheldon Lee Koester, was a teacher at Drachman Primary Magnet School and taught for 18 years before he passed away on Cinco De Mayo, 2000. We came here for his health, and I have NEVER regretted choosing Tucson over Phoenix. the Sonoran Desert is the most beautiful place in Arizona! Sheldon loved his new home here. he worked with all of his new found friends, through the parents, teachers and students in The BARRIO. We love the culture, and pleasant ways of all the people we love and Tucson is such a friendly place. not too long ago, I lived in Phoenix for 5 months, uh, it cannot hold a candle to us!!! My husband used to frequent the restaurants, bakeries around the downtown area, have lunch dates with all his fellow colleagues, and he is truly missed. NO, I would never trade our triple digits for that Chicago weather with it’s 40 degrees below zero with the wind chill factor, !!! Tucson is my permanent home!!!
Excellent! My pale blue Torino was a 1970! hahahaha
TW missed the point of the NYT article. It was not about Sonoran cuisine or restaurants. See here for more info http://tucson.com/business/local/unesco-de…
Weeeelllll…I think you’re both sort of right, JJ. Yes, the focus was very much on the UNESCO designation, but I thought there was a faintly patronizing air about the article, as if the writer were racking her brains wondering how on earth this utterly provincial little desert hamlet could ever have earned such an honor.
The article was about the UNESCO designation. The UNESCO designation has to with with the big picture of 4,000 years of food cultivation, the present relationships among producers and dining, food security and the work of the Community Food Bank. That’s why Severson, who is far from being a mediocre writer came here. It was a good piece and because of it Food and Wine had an article on their website. This all brings attention to Tucson’s culinary scene,