City Week
Big doings in Tucson this week.
Noshing Around
Dine for America On Oct. 5, restaurants all over the country, along with the National Restaurant Association, will unite to support Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. Each restaurant determines what percentage of the night’s proceeds will go to the American Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund. Go to the Web site, www.dineforamerica.org, to check out the dozens…
Best Hike
Sabino Canyon is beloved for both its beauty and proximity to town. Sabino’s got a bunch of “best hikes,” from a half-mile nature trail to mid-distance rambles like Seven Falls. (Warning to drunken college kids: Don’t try it. Seems like every year, somebody does a header from heights best left un-headered from.) There are longer,…
Best Musical Party Evening
Before the crash and resulting Great Depression, the rich would entertain their friends at home with evenings of bootleg liquor, cocktails, canapés and a singer or musical ensemble. Think Duke Ellington on the patio or Gershwin in the parlor. Today in Tucson, at homes perhaps worthy of Jay Gatsby, you may enjoy the Hausmusic series.…
Best Tortillas
There’s something heavenly about the tortillas at St. Mary’s. They have a fresh, chewy texture with just the slightest hint of scorching to give them flavor. While some fans like the thicker gorditos-style, we love the tissue-thin large tortillas, big enough to wrap an entire meal in, yet resilient enough to not make a mess.…
Best Annual Festival
The Fourth Avenue Street Fair has won this category for something like 17 of the last 19 years. Not bad for an event that is essentially a sprawling outdoor mall. Granted, it’s a mall where you can enjoy a gyro sandwich, barbecued chicken on a stick, lemonade or beer while listening to bands, watching jugglers…
Best Radio Talk Show (Host)
Amy Goodman’s daily balancing act as the host of the nationally syndicated Democracy Now! is one of the rare pleasures and highlights of modern radio. Her preternatural calm and even-handedness while examining different sides of an issue–even when her personal sentiments clearly lie on one side–mark her as a formable presence. She pointedly chips away…
Tucson Takes Flight
A silver speck appeared in the Tucson sky early on the afternoon of Sept. 23, 1927. Slowly approaching from the west, it circled downtown three times before heading southeast to land. Four months after crossing the Atlantic Ocean, youthful Charles Lindbergh came to town in the Spirit of St. Louis. With the eyes of the…
Best Urban Landscaping
The red-brick city at the center of town is also an impressive arboretum. It’s true: 500 individual species make up a one-of-a-kind collection of desert and semi-desert trees, many of them very large. Among the flourishing exotics: a baobab and fever tree from Africa, calabashes and rock figs, boojums and, of course, the ever-amazing, winter-blooming…
Best Late-Night Eats
Now that the bars close at 2 a.m., it seems downtown revelers get even hungrier after a night of hedonism–where else is there to go but Grill? With a menu featuring the kinds of greasy yet delicious comfort food one would crave late at night, Grill is a friend to all who need carbohydrates and…
Best Bulk Tea Selection
Seven Cups is too good for Tucson, but there it is, flourishing in the best place for it, the bosom of the Sam Hughes Neighborhood. Seven Cups serves tea and sells tea and tea paraphernalia out of an exquisitely decorated storefront directly across the street from Rincon Market and Bob Dobbs, both of which serve…
Best Retail Music Store
The nice thing about Zia Records, aside from the fact that they buy and sell used CDs, is that they mix all of their used discs in with the new ones, so you might just be able to find a cheaper copy of that album you’ve been dying to listen to but just couldn’t afford…
Best Resort Gift Shop
This quaint little gift shop–stocked with just the right amount of Arizona kitsch, newspapers, mini-cans of Pringles, soda, turquoise and clothing only a grandmother could love–is found within the tiny confines of the Arizona Inn resort. Don’t let the resort’s somewhat daunting luxury stop you from picking up a pack of gum or a copy…
Best Wine Bar
With the recent patio additions to Plush came a small wine bar, with a rotating selection of reds and whites, and we don’t just mean merlots and chardonnays. The wine bar is separate from Plush’s two main bars, but don’t let the size fool you–pull up a stool, and try that riesling. The bartenders are…
Danehy
Tom goes and gives yoga a shot–try not to picture it
Timeless Classic
‘A History of Violence’ deserves all the praise it can get
Amusing Experiment
The entertaining ‘Criminal Hearts’ unites a burglar and her victim in an act of revenge
Best Backpacking Trail
First, be warned: It is not easy to get into Aravaipa Canyon. Sometimes, it is not easy to get out. You might not want to be there if it is flooding. Water flows in the creek, which is part of the difficulty and part of the fun. It is a good, long hike in the…
Best Hope for Tucson Theater
Kevin Johnson’s taste in musical theater is dark, a little twisted and ultimately humane. Well, usually; there wasn’t much redeeming social value in Ruthless! last January, but there wasn’t supposed to be. Every once in a while, we need a show that’s just campy and mean. We don’t otherwise get that kind of theater on…
Best Bagels
Late one night, a bunch of rum runners were gathered together at a university-area speakeasy for a game of mahjongg. Things got a little messy, and shots were fired. The worst casualties were the bread rolls. Little did these fellows know that by the end of the 20th century, these holey rolls would be all…
Best Spectacle for Charity
Bit by the fashion bug, but can’t make it to the runways of Milan this year? We’ve got the antidote! Come on down to the Humane Society of Southern Arizona’s benefit extravaganza Puttin’ on the Dog. Here you, and Toto, too, can enjoy delicious hors d’oeuvres (both human and pet varieties), take in live entertainment,…
Best Local Web site
If you haven’t yet introduced yourself to the Tucson Weekly’s awesome Web site, you might still be considered an early adopter. This is just the second year this honor has stayed in-house, so no dynasty has been established. That timeline is a bit misleading, however, since the Tucson Weekly has been on the Web for…
Best Toy Store
In a world of super-duper, mega-huge stores like Wal-Mart, Target and Toys “R” Us, it seems like it would be hard to run a toy store any smaller than the state of Texas and still continue to thrive. However, Yikes! Toys manages to accomplish that feat with ease. Although it cannot compete with the big-box…
Best Bike Riding
You’re flying down the two-lane asphalt like a rocket-fueled ultralight, stopping for nothing and no one as you swoosh down the underpass beneath the evil highway, unfettered by the Hummers and hatchbacks above. You swerve to leave some space for occasional pedestrians, as well as the zebra-tailed and collared lizards and round-tailed squirrels that skitter…
Best Buffet
Back before everything was processed with chemicals and not genetically modified, people actually ate their fruits and vegetables. Sweet Tomatoes gives you the opportunity to glide through a dazzling array of all things green, orange, yellow and red for those glorious salad days once again. After veggies, the buffet continues with soups and chili, cornbread,…
Best-Spent $5 in the Foothills
There are some deals in the Foothills. The best $5 burger awaits, but only at the bar at the ritzy, art-filled Terra Cotta. Think top-quality ground beef grilled to perfection with a slab of melting stilton between a semi-soft crusty bun. Add a slice of tomato and red onion, plus a few hand-cut golden brown…
Best Women’s Fashions (locally owned)
Why, hello there, Ms. Smythe-Wampeter. It is I, Ramon, your “houseboy.” Let me drink you in. I see you are wearing Dior. Did I not see a similar item at Ms. Cele Peterson’s earlier this week? Why, it’s practically scandalous of you to expose your shoulder like that. Here, let me get some cocoa butter…
Best Cigars
Weary of a Kansas windbag droning on in the U.S. Senate about “What this country needs _____,” Vice President Thomas R. Marshall, a true cigar aficionado, leaned over to a clerk and whispered: “What this country needs is a good 5-cent cigar.” Forget that Marshall, a humble Hoosier who served under the stiff intellectual Woodrow…
Best Permanent Bar Fly
Sheila is a coyote. A lady coyote statue, that is, and she sits at Terra Cotta’s bar, enjoying the ambiance. Draped with a feather boa and cowboy boots, she can be quite terrifying to small children and people who don’t expect to see a giant lady coyote sitting at the bar at an upscale Foothills…
Tuttle
The best of all possible worlds: when Earth makes her comeback
Poor Planning
Jodie Foster’s return to the big screen doesn’t get off the ground
Playing With Perception
Forget the last-minute problems at Invisible Theatre: ‘Dead Certain’ is a fascinating delight
Best Campground
Whether escaping the “roar” of the ’20s or the slightly different roar of the current decade, Mount Lemmon has always beckoned from the north, a cool green getaway from those 100-degree days. Generations of Tucsonans, natives and newbies alike, have flocked to the mountain like pilgrims to camp and recharge their spiritual batteries. The recent…
Best Play That Few People Saw
Attendance reportedly dwindled by the week for one of ATC’s best offerings last season. (Maybe we’re not so intelligent and tolerant after all.) Thomas Gibbons’ Permanent Collection was a smart, impartial study of race relations in one of society’s upper echelons, an East Coast art museum. Robert Jason Jackson and Bob Sorenson brushed every stroke…
Best Burrito
Let’s face it–there are a ton of places to get a burrito in Tucson. But it’s the ones made by the fine folks at Nico’s that many of our readers swear by. The beauty of that is that a Nico’s is always open. Feel like a burrito breakfast, or looking to satisfy that gnawing hunger…
Best Park
It’s really quite amazing how much good stuff is crammed into the area between 22nd Street, Country Club Road, Randolph Way and Camino Campestre. You have the beautiful rose garden, the zoo (With elephants! At least for now!), an aquatic center, a dog park, a mildly disgusting pond, a kids’ playground, barbecue areas, soccer fields…
Best Gym
Muscles–everybody has them, right? Well, for except wimps and pencil-necked geeks (mad props to Freddie Blassie). Gold’s has long been associated with serious bodybuilding and much oiling down of pectorals, but it’s now actively reaching out to the unending supply of couch potatoes who will never be tempted by the sweet siren call of steroids.…
Best Clothing Store
Whether you’re ready to trade in Junior’s highchair for his first pair of soccer cleats or you need a bargain on a gently worn frock for your flower-girl-to-be, Buffalo Kids is the store for you. Featuring used (and some new) clothing for infants and children up to size 14 girls/16 boys, Buffalo Kids carries the…
Best Chinese
P.F. Chang’s has it all figured out: all of the flavor and style of China, with none of the weird dead ducks hanging in the windows. Despite the fact that it’s a chain, P.F. Chang’s offers fresh and flavorful Asian fare–particularly excellent are the crab wontons, the now-trendy lettuce wraps and the orange peel chicken.…
Best Vietnamese
In just a few short years, we’ve assimilated Vietnamese cuisine into the Old Pueblo, as our perception of the French-, Thai- and Indonesian-influenced dishes has gone from wildly exotic to familiar and friendly. This understanding of our inner phô will also lead you to treasure hu tieu (rice noodle soup) bo vien (rice noodle soup…
Best Parking Lot Docking
In this parched place called Tucson, the idea of fresh shrimp and cabrilla making a daily pilgrimage from Guaymas, Mexico is a rare treat. Yes, believe it, as there are two boats docked in the parking lot. But tasting is in the mouth of the diner as these two delicacies of the sea are so…
Best Antiques/Kitsch/Collectibles
Whether your style leans toward shabby chic, Victorian or just plain eclectic, you’ll likely find something that tickles your fancy at Annabell’s Attic. Just a short walk around the store yields both a plethora of memories (of your grandma’s house) and a bunch of ideas (for your own home). There are tons of lovely chandeliers…
Best Auto Repair
Back in the day, it was Packard, not Cadillac, that reigned as the luxury leader in wheels. Fill with ethyl, and tour the countryside! Packard, with entries like the elegant Town Car, was more popular than the other luxury makes. Henry Ford’s Model T rapidly rose in sales for everyman, and America was happy to…
Best Cocktail from the Roaring ’20s
On Jan. 17, 1920, the National Prohibition Act went into effect and ruled the land. Americans had to freshen the taste of some nasty bootleg liquor with juices. Cocktails were in speakeasy heaven. The sidecar, a Paris import, involves a hefty portion of Courvoisier paired with the orange of Cointreau and sparkled up with lemon…
Guest Commentary
This political season, please be kind to the wandering candidates and volunteers
Indie Watch
What’s happening in the world of independent film in Tucson.
Dance From Down Under
FUNHOUSE returns to Reid Park for its annual gratis outdoor show
Best Walkin’ Wadis
There are places listed in this issue to bike, hike, backpack and camp, but there’s no specific mention of outdoors, nature and lesser-known places to explore. Try a neighborhood wash. There are some 500 miles of watercourses that traverse the city in the form of washes, tributaries, channels and watersheds. “These washes or arroyos are…
Best Reason to Stay up Late
The shows don’t run all year, and they don’t start until 10:30 p.m. Those are the only downsides when the subject is the Etcetera series at Live Theatre Workshop, where the company does edgier drama and comedy than you’ll find in its mainstage presentations–or in most other mainstage presentations in town, for that matter. The…
Best Smoothie
While Ari Shapiro was living in San Francisco running his mountain-bike clothing company, he developed a fondness for those frozen-fruit drinks known as smoothies. There was no shortage of smoothie shops, but no matter how hard he looked, he couldn’t seem to find the smoothie he was looking for–one containing nothing but the highest-quality, freshest…
Best Contemporary Architecture
Who says this bridge doesn’t go anywhere? Start with the tail poking up whimsically from the concrete at its south end, then amble through its bowels over the speeding traffic, and you’ll emerge from its open mouth at a tiny amphitheater, perfect for the backyard play ready to move on to bigger things. From there,…
Best Bowling Alley
The venerable Lucky Strike lanes celebrates 50 years of business in 2005; yes, successive generations of Americans have been bowling here since Ike was president. The retro ambience has not been manufactured or altered for any contemporary chic; in fact, Lucky Strike isn’t really stylish at all, but solid, dependable and comfortable. This is one…
Best Playground
The appeal here has to be the acres of green, green grass and the tall, shady trees. Of course, you’ll find the usual playground equipment and some new-fangled stuff, but ball fields, a soccer field, a duck pond and, of course, the Reid Park Zoo are also a part of the park. First dedicated in…
Best Diner
OK, so the heyday of diners was in the ’50s rather than the Roaring ’20s, but either way, it’s a venerable American institution. And whether you call it “Grill,” “the Grill” or “that place downtown that’s always open,” this place is truly venerable, originally opening in the ’20s as the Minerva Café. Fat, sugar, caffeine…
Best Japanese
Yoshimatsu features healthy Japanese cuisine and has a vegetarian menu palatable for vegan diners to back it up. However, what may set this midtown favorite apart is the absolutely unique atmosphere found inside its walls. A plethora of Japanese pop art and other curios fill the room, and we mean more than just Hello Kitty.…
Best Bar Food
While there’s plenty of grand bar food in this town, the year-long mussel special at The Dish is definitely the best. It is so good that reservations are required to sit at the bar. For $10.95, you get a big bowl of fat mussels floating in a broth redolent of wine, butter and garlic–then bam!–the…
Best Resale Clothing
There’s nothing more satisfying than finding some high-end, low-rise denims for $15. Especially when they’re the very same perfect-fitting pair you spotted at the mall just the other day, but had to pass up because you needed the $60 to pay your overdue electric bill. Buffalo works for everyone–thrifty fashionistas effectively recycle their wardrobe by…
Retail Movement
Albert Steinfeld got his start in business in Tucson before the railroad arrived in 1880 and became a successful mine owner and banker. But he was best known for his downtown department store. The track-laying had brought many Chinese men to town, and it was more than three decades later that Gin Soo arrived. He…
Best Gelato Cocktails
The folks at the Monkey Box, in the old Pioneer Hotel building, have created something truly dangerous: cocktails with gelato. It’s dessert and a drink, all in one. The McManus has coffee liquor, Irish whiskey and vanilla gelato, and is almost too good to be drinking–you want to savor it with a spoon. The gelato…
End of a Journey
A note from the editor.
Silent Bob Speaks
Kevin Smith discusses his future on the heels of a new ‘Mallrats’ DVD release
Another Look
We revisit two popular Tucson eateries: Intermezzo and Chopped
Best In-Town Angling
It’s a bit difficult to move large bodies of water closer to town, but there are some smaller watering holes in and around Tucson to satisfy the need for a day at the lake. Swimming and wading are no-nos, but fishing at Southern Arizona’s four urban lakes attracts 16,000 anglers annually. “If people can’t get…
Best Pregnant Dancer
Talk about bellydancing. Tammy Rosen was six months pregnant when she took to the stage to dance the solo “Origins” in NEW ART’s January concert. Make that a sort-of solo. April Greengaard choreographed it as a duet for a new-mom dancer and her baby several years back, but Rosen danced it with her baby still…
Best Local Soup Mix
It’s a long, long way from Campbell’s chicken noodle. This mixture of five heirloom beans–including Anasazi, red scarlet runner, gold eye and rio zape beans–plus giant limas, red lentils, split peas, barley, Mexican oregano and a good-sized chile, cooks up with a few vegetables into a big slew of fragrant, deeply satisfying soup. It’ll feed…
Best Piece of Tucson History
Tucson’s oldest building is also its best. Thanks to a decades-long restoration effort, this graceful, late-18th century mélange of baroque, Moorish and Mexican renaissance styles stands as dazzlingly white and self-contained as ever among the dark hills south of town. Widely considered to be the most important example of mission architecture in the United States,…
Best Yoga Studio
A gentle yoga center is the readers’ choice for this year. Tucson Yoga’s mission is to make good health and well-being through yoga accessible to everyone in our community. Hatha, vinyasa, mindful hatha and gentle hatha classes are offered throughout the week. To accomplish their mission, they make getting started easy. Drop in 10 minutes…
Best Birthday Party Place
Little-known fact: Ricki Lee Jones wrote a 1979 classic in one of the first Chuck E. Cheese franchises. Some will tell you that the song “Chuck E.’s in Love” is about Chuck E. Weiss (no relation), but we have it on good authority it was written after she saw the 8:30 animatronic show at her…
Best Greek
George Fronimakis is from Crete, and he has brought part of his beautiful home, the largest Greek island, to Tucson at his restaurant. It is a Minoan palace, with art and the famous bull from Crete. Specialties here are moussaka and pastitsio, but there are many choices, including the American-Greek staples: gyros and souvlaki, plus…
Best Tucson Mexican Restaurant
You remember several years back when Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? was a smash hit? Then, ABC decided in its infinite wisdom that the show needed to be on something like nine nights per week, and in a couple of years, the prime-time version of the show was pretty much toast. Well, we’re hoping…
Best Deck
The drive from midtown to Ventana Canyon’s Flying V Bar and Grill is approximately 223.6 miles. OK, that’s an exaggeration; it just seems it’s that long of a drive, especially when one is anxiously anticipating the experience of sitting on the restaurant’s huge, outdoor deck, overlooking a gorgeous, gurgling fountain and the city’s lights while…
Best Art/Artisan Jewelry
This charming bohemian gallery in the Lost Barrio is aptly named. Spread out through several lopsided rooms in an old adobe, it shares its digs with Tooley’s (just say turkey) Café. You can eat a turkey taco and then browse its amazingly inexpensive art. Look for pottery, handmade jewelry and art clothing, along with honest-to-goodness…
Best-Tasting Local Brew
Nimbus’ beer is so good that people don’t mind driving all the way to its warehouse location near Alvernon Way and 44th Street. Although the individual brews get plenty of votes (their IPA, Monkeyshine and Nut Brown gathered the most), Nimbus wins on its brand name alone. Each brew is delicious, but the variety makes…
Best Nightclub to Just Not Give a Damn
There are a lot of things to love about bumpin’ nights at the Wildcat House. Yes, sometimes people spill their Long Islands all over the mammoth dance floor. And, yeah, guys occasionally miss the urine trough when taking a leak. But these things are part of its gritty charm. When you’re done cutting loose, you…
Mailbag
Howls of outrage and squeals of delight from our astonished fans.
Top Ten in Movies
Casa Video’s top rentals for the week
Historic Hedonism
A Tombstone author takes readers on a true-life tour of the vice-laden Wild West
Best Desert Oasis
Call it an island. Call it an oasis. Or correctly call it both, because Agua Caliente Park has an island in the middle of this outdoor oasis. Greenery abounds even in triple-digit temps, and the verdant habitat attracts an abundance of nature’s creatures. They fly in, walk in, hop in and, yes, they crawl in,…
Best Border Art
Petrovich’s stunning installation meshing video and computer imagery was the star of the show at this year’s Biennial. The artist used technological wizardry to make her piece a kind of giant computer game: Wielding a mouse, the viewer became a migrant struggling through a confusing–and dangerous–desert. On the scary soundscape, the buzzing of the cicadas…
Best Pancakes
They’re kind of like pancakes, kind of like crepes. They’re a little bit chewy, a little bit eggy, and they keep the faithful coming back for more. Flapjack lovers will be in heaven, and those who swear they don’t even like pancakes will be converted. B-Line’s crepe cakes are served with a delicious slab of…
Best Local Activist/Advocacy Group
Wingspan, in its brand-spanking-new location just east of Fourth Avenue, has come a long way from its humble beginnings more than 25 years ago. Originally a nameless, itinerant weekly youth support group, Wingspan found its name and its first real home in the late 1980s. Since then, the nonprofit organization has broadened its role to…
Best Florist
The creative minds at Roses and More have memorable ways of promoting their business. A recent television commercial by the florist featured a dog yowling to an off-key rendition of “You Are So Beautiful.” The three locations around town are painted with giant murals, and the delivery vans are adorned with drawings of flowers. But…
Best Reason to Lose the X-Box
It’s not your grandfather’s yo-yo any more. Brought to the United States from the Philippines in the ’20s, the yo-yo experienced a technological breakthrough in the mid-’90s; check some out yourself at Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle’s. By replacing wood with high-tech metals, and shifting weight to the outer edges, you can prevent a yo-yo from returning to…
Best Indian
No static from us: Gandhi is a humdinger. With their wide ranging but highly consistent take on mystic sub-continent cuisine, these folks really know their onions. Their standard fare, working from a list of basic sauces and preparations, lets you customize with chicken, beef and seafood (crayfish, fish or shrimp). There are also tandoori staples,…
Best South Tucson Mexican
Tucson is deeply proud of the restaurant known simply as Mi Nidito, or less accurately, Mi Nidito’s. This classic family-owned Sonoran-style place is the real deal. There’s often a wait (get a cerveza); the decorations are classic Mexican restaurant kitsch–a carne seca quesadilla just tastes better under plastic roses and twinkling lights–and the waitresses are…
Best Place to Pretend You’re Eating Healthy When You’re Not Necessarily Eating Healthy
At first glance, Chopped has to be a fine place to force one’s self to eat healthy. After all, the place serves one thing–salads, in their various permutations–and salads are healthy, right? That’s what we tell ourselves when we go to Chopped and order a salad with, say, ham, egg, cheddar cheese, croutons and a…
Best Commercial Jewelry
Just suppose you want to get that “special someone” a gift. Not just any gift though–a gift they’ll remember forever. What a better token than a present of jewelry, you think. But where to go? A chain jewelry store? A pawn shop? None of these options appeal to you. Then you remember a friend mentioning…
Best Sports Bar
Everything you’ve come to expect from any Famous Sam’s restaurant lies within its slogan: “Fun, food and spirits.” There’s bound to be a nearby location, no matter where you live in Tucson, so you can’t lose if you’re looking for sports-bar excitement. With countless big screens and table radios, Sam’s makes it hard for any…
Best Spirited Day Trip
When you’re in need of a great escape, but don’t have a lot of spare time, hit the road and head down Sonoita way. Just about an hour away from town, you’ll find Arizona wine country, where you can visit Domaines Ellam/Elgin Winery, Sonoita Vineyards and Callaghan Vineyards within four miles of each other. (There’s…
Optimism in Art
Eight central Tucson galleries kick off the new art season this Saturday, Oct. 1, with ‘Big Picture’
Nine Questions
Teresa Driver
Best Fine Art Gallery
As sleek and sophisticated as a Jazz Age joint, perennial winner Etherton brings a big-city cachet to downtown Tucson. Housed upstairs in the historic 1914 Oddfellows Building, the gallery is a former ballroom where dancers once no doubt danced the Lindy. Now, those pale hardwood floors and white walls play host to the best art…
Best Outdoor Date That Doesn’t Require Hiking Boots
Grab your date and a couple of folding lawn chairs, and head over to Pat’s Drive In (1202 W Niagara St.). Grab a family special (four spicy chili cheese dogs and a mammoth bag of fries) and a couple of drinks. Drive west on Speedway Boulevard to Gates Pass. Pop over to the other side,…
Best Fun Museum Shows (TIE)
Painter Margaret Evangeline shot first and painted later. Photographer Weegee shot first and then printed. These two artists, separated by the chasm of a half-century, were among the stars of the two most exuberant museum shows Tucson has seen in a while. Blockbusters by Tucson standards, Paint on Metal gathered together 70 wild works by…
Best Taco Stand
This open-air taco stand is the real thing. The carne asada is perfect, fresh off the grill, well-cooked, but still tender inside. Order it in a burrito or, for a special treat, in a caramelo (kind of like a meaty quesadilla). Now comes the real pleasure–head to the condiment bar for freshly sliced cucumber, blackened…
Best Day Spa
The Oxford English Dictionary defines gadabout as an “idle pleasure seeker.” Well, gird your loins, screw your courage to the sticking place and prepare to be idle to your bones. Gadabout salons, six of ’em in Tucson–one just for men–(goodbye, cowboy, hello, metrosexual!) redefines pleasure seeker, offering custom facials, manicures, pedicures, cleansings, exfoliations, hydrations and…
Best Dry Cleaner
Where are you going to take your white flannel trousers, teagowns, Charleston dresses and cute little cloches to be cleaned? If your outfits date from the 1920s, Sparkle Cleaners will give them a look and an opinion, and might even clean them if it is safe to do so. If you just bought a new…
Best Reason to Have a Working Mom
In the ’20s, kids were often stuck at home with mom all summer. BOR-ing! Now the lucky latchkey set can badger mom to enroll them in Pima for Kids Camps. Half-day or all-day sessions for 5- to 15-year-olds will “Bring out the Artist in You,” explore the “Wacky World of Science,” reveal how lizards and…
Best Italian
Our readers like Gavi. Once upon a time, there was only one. They didn’t take reservations there, and there was always a wait. Now, there are three at various locations, plus Piazza Gavi, which has a slightly bigger menu and a more casual atmosphere. And sometimes there’s still a wait. All are open for lunch…
Best Mexican Fast Food/Drive-Thru
There are four Nico’s in Tucson, many being here for more than a decade, making it one of the oldest Mexican fast-food chains in town. Nico’s offers good food at a quick rate. It’s also one of many local Mexican fast food places that stay open all day long, thanks to the location at 1855…
Best Fusion of Asia and South Tucson
Take a sushi roll with cucumber, avocado, spicy kani, jalapeno, masago (smelt egg), cream cheese and “crunch,” then top it with shrimp and a special sauce. The result is taste-bud heaven. The Sixth Avenue roll is the house special at Wok n’ Sushi, a gem of a sushi restaurant along–you guessed it–South Sixth Avenue. Much…
Best Home Furnishings
Forget the plaid recliner; this isn’t your grandmother’s furniture, unless your grandmother happens to be Annie Leibowitz. Leave it to those Scandinavians to design or collaborate with the Italians for the sexiest furniture on the planet: soft-as-butter leather couches the color of saffron, green glass table tops, sleek home office furniture to ignite creative fires,…
Best Nightclub
Club Congress is just so hip–the perfect place for the fashionable to see and be seen. Thanks to a rotating roster of music nights, the crowd is varied and colorful. Frequent live performances showcasing both local and regional talent grace the club’s stage; cheap drink specials get you drunk, and The Breakfast Club plays on…
Best Rocks
The mark of a civilized society is, according to some, ice. Ice preserves food, keeps swelling down and makes cocktails better. (OK, you neat drinkers, cut us some slack.) Reddy Ice makes and delivers those bags of ice that are found in grocery stores and convenience marts. They also, along with a distributor called the…
The New New Orleans
Tension, fear and danger accompany those who return to view the damage
Soundbites
GEARING UP TO CRAWL AND COVER First off, a couple of notes on the local tip. If you don’t have your wristband yet for Fall Club CrawlTM, which will take over downtown Tucson on Saturday, Oct. 8, what are you waiting for? There are plenty left for purchase at CD City, and if you get…
Best Mural
This mural scores for technology alone: Steve Farley invented a whole new art medium to create it. Featuring old photos he collected from the community, the work is as interesting for pedestrians as for the 30,000 or so automobile passengers that swoop by it daily. Up close, you can marvel at the photographic technique which,…
A Trip up the Mountain
A firestorm of controversy raged in Tucson throughout 1928. The Tucson Citizen, along with the Lions Club, wanted a “short road” built up to Mount Lemmon, while the Arizona Daily Star and the chairman of the Pima County Board of Supervisors opposed the idea. Thirty years after the first permanent settlement was established on top…
Best Caterer
Feast’s luscious catering menu offers something akin to “fancy comfort food.” Options include mascarpone-stuffed figs wrapped in prosciutto and drizzled in honey, smoked salmon sweet potato crisps with lemon aioli, a banana Caesar salad and brown sugar shortbread. But the most delicious thing is that the menu is just a starting point: The folks at…
Best Pizza
For the umpteenth year in a row (umpteenth being any number larger than a bunch but slightly less than a whole-bunch), Magpies, has been voted the best pizza in Tucson. They’ve got salads; they’ve got calzones; they’ve got exotic toppings like pine nuts, roasted eggplant and feta cheese. You can order off the menu, design…
Best Public Servant
When Raúl Grijalva’s lean, mean political machine sent him to Washington three years ago, many Tucsonans knew it was destiny. Raúl’s overwhelming support in a safe seat has allowed him to be aggressive, take some risks and show some leadership. He quickly rose to the second vice chair in the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and has…
Best Special Evening of Radio
Tuesday nights on KXCI feature the knockout triple-bill of Shorty Stubbs’ Country Fringe followed by Michael Hyatt’s Route 66 and The Roze Lady’s Rosie’s Rhythm Room. This combo gives listeners six solid hours of really good country music–a little bit of everything, from Mother Maybelle Carter to Buck Owens to Neko Case. It’s like a…
Best Hair Salon
At The Coyote Wore Sideburns you’ll see lavish tattoos and purple-streaked hair among the staffers, but this salon happily caters to anybody, fashion-forward or not, who needs a smart hairdo at a reasonable price. Make an appointment with Signe, the co-owner–she draws all of the salon’s ads herself–and it won’t take you long to discover…
Best Middle Eastern
Nestled in the Geronimo Plaza on University, Sinbad’s serves up an authentic variety of Middle Eastern cuisine–it’s no wonder it’s frequented by a large population of Arabs living in Tucson. The vegan lentil soup is legendary; the baba ghanouj the best you’ll ever taste, and the fattoush salad (with toasted pita bread mixed in) is…
Best Salsa
Brimming bowls of sparkling red salsa and fresh chips awaited us during a recent trip to Rosa’s. “The chips are still warm, and the salsa is tangy,” immediately exclaimed our out-of-town companions. “They must be homemade!” Our server confirmed that guess, also informing us that both could be purchased as take-home items. He kept bringing…
Best Use of Corn
It’s saying something that in a green-corn-tamale capital like Tucson, the best idea any local cook has about corn comes without a shuck. Galo’s plump, succulent, crisp-edged corn cakes showcase the milky sweetness of this most delicious of vegetables like nothing else we’ve ever tried. Half corn pudding, half fritter, tender and steaming hot, these…
Best Plant Nursery
With development in Tucson approaching the Brobdingnagian, it’s a relief to find 17 acres of commercial property devoted to greenery. And it’s the plants, not the land, that are for sale. The selection at Mesquite Valley Growers is truly tremendous–trees, bedding plants, drought-tolerant shrubs, roses, houseplants and more, in lush rows that seem to go…
Best Gay/Lesbian Bar
In the 1920s, most everything gay was underground. Today, however, people at gay bars like IBT’s have no reason to hide. Take popular drag queen Janee Star, who performs there regularly. At well more than 6 feet tall, there’s no hiding her even if you tried. Star demands attention as she performs, kicking high and…
Best Place to Drink Beer and Wine While Watching Films
One more thing that makes the Loft Cinema unique: You can drink there. And by drink, we mean there’s beer and wine that you can buy at the concession stand. And by beer and wine, we mean Nimbus beer and decent wine. Never mind that they serve the wine in easy-to-spill plastic cups (extra dangerous…
Roadkill Blues
Park byways have become a bloody mess
No Fixed Parameters
Like 45-minute-long songs? Then go check out Acid Mothers Temple
Best Art Museum
Who’d have thunk it? The conflicts wracking this museum of regional and Hispanic art have all the drama of a 1920s gangland shootout in Chicago. But the museum’s fans are hoping the brand-new director, Robert Knight, will have the street cred of an old-time federal marshal, and will whip the place into shape. Through the…
Best Breakfast
Perhaps the best aspect of the Blue Willow breakfast experience is the restaurant’s thrilling disregard for the apparent international orange juice embargo. At the Blue Willow, a large orange juice, expensive though it might be, is actually large. Not a thimble full. Not a sippy cup. Large and freshly squeezed. That fact alone makes it…
Tucson, the Home-City
“The great buildings of the world have been, almost without exception, temples and churches,” proclaimed a 1920 publication by Tucson’s Chamber of Commerce. “One would hardly believe that one of them–a great church–is on the American continent, in the desert of Arizona. It is the Mission San Xavier del Bac.” Having been restored and improved…
Best Fresh-Baked Bread
Shelby and Randie Collier brought a little idea from Madison, Wis., about seven years ago and turned it into a great big deal. They wanted a sleepy little bakery, but what Tucson got goes way beyond the bread: dozens of hot and cold sandwiches, soups and salads, as well as a cornucopia of pastries, including…
Best Mischief-Maker
Kromko may have gone from gangsta to pranksta, but our readers still love the irascible former lawmaker. During his stint in the Legislature, Kromko was an effective foil for the Maricopa gang. And he’s picked up enough tricks from no-new-taxes Republicans to be a factor in beating those transportation taxes down here, too. He hasn’t…
Best Outdoor Urban Workout
Tired of the soulless gym vibe, but gotta stay in shape? Looking to enrich your social life but find the local bars a little sketchy? You may find what you’re looking for in Ultimate Frisbee. It’s kind of like soccer, football and basketball combined, but without all the pesky, confusing rules, and with a whole…
Best Sex Shop
Sex used to be under wraps, behind closed doors; if you got lucky, you’d be doing the-you-know-what in your father’s rumble seat. Fast-forward several decades, where sex is more in your face (pun intended) and louder, as in battery-operated. Voluptuous vibrators of every color, size and texture tantalize the fairer sex and their admirers. Since…
Best Nouvelle Cuisine
Nouvelle cuisine–meaning new cooking–is no longer nouvelle. The style originated in the ’70s (older than many Weekly readers) and described a lighter style of French cooking. Let’s shove nouvelle off a cliff, yet celebrate Pastiche as an American bistro with global influences. Dapper Pat Connors has always been ahead of his time, with local artists’…
Best Vegetarian
Eating at Govinda’s is a multi-sensory experience. Outside, there’s much to feast your eyes on: a beautiful setting with two aviaries, macaws, doves, a fountain and a koi pond. Inside, there’s a delicious buffet with entrées like tamale pie and vegetarian lasagna. The all-you-can-eat buffet menu changes daily and also includes Indian and vegan specialties.…
Best Place to Eat a Chile Relleno By Yourself
Eating a meal at a restaurant should be an enjoyable experience, as everyone knows. However, any person who has ever decided to get supper solo knows that getting good service when you are dining sans companion can be tough territory to traverse. That’s why it’s such a nice surprise to be treated just like any…
Best Sporting Goods
Tucson in the Roaring ’20s had nothing on today’s booming metropolis when it comes to sports. There’s Wildcat basketball, for example (LUTE! LUTE! LUTE!), baseball spring training, El Tour de Tucson, and of course, cable. Sure, dance marathons and flagpole sitting were fun in their day, but now we have virtually all sports 24/7, whether…
Best Upscale Bar Ambiance
Ambiance. That’s ahm-bee-ahnts to you, and NoRTH, a busy, upscale bar and restaurant at the eastern edge of La Encantada, has it. It’s got that used-brick, exposed-duct, wood-floor thing going that lets you imagine you’re in a converted factory in lower Manhattan–if there were a third of the space and twice the people, anyway–and a…
Best Off-the-Beaten Path Bar
Charlie’s is on Dodge, just north of Fort Lowell Road, and if you didn’t know it was there, we’ll forgive you, because you can’t see it from any major road that we all normally drive down. But it’s there, just south of the good ol’ Rillito, and it’s worth stopping by just for the atmosphere…
Assistance-Dogs’ Abode
After 32 years, Handi-Dogs finally has a permanent home
Literary Roots
Two boys from San Francisco make music inspired by the South
Best Public Art
Pedestrian safety corridor? Municipal art installation? A way to frighten faint-hearted tourists? Yes! Simon Donovan’s Rattlesnake Bridge is all three and much more. At first glance, it is merely a giant rattlesnake sinuously crossing Broadway Boulevard. For proud Tucsonans, however, the statuesque serpent symbolizes a harmonious marriage of art and nature, plus a nod to…
Best Classical Music Performance
If you add up all the votes for various Tucson Symphony Orchestra performances–the Beethoven’s Ninth concert was especially popular–the home team would have won handily in this category. But the single event that got the most mentions featured a pair of out-of-towners: cellist Yo-Yo Ma and pianist Emanuel Ax. You’d expect a spectacular performance from…
Best Specialty Shop
AJ’s is a long way from the push-cart vendor selling fresh produce and pots and pans. AJ’s (Bashas’ bon vivant cousin) is the Neiman Marcus of grocers. Weave your way into the store through a tropical abyss of flowers, then beyond to the produce aisles, where bountiful displays resemble vibrant pop art paintings. Attentive butchers…
Best Ice Cream
Ice cream has come a long way. The possibilities are such that we needed a helpful Cold Stone staff person to explain the process. First, we choose the ice cream, yogurt or sorbet that is the basis of the concoction. Samples are offered. Then, we choose from a large selection of nuts, candies and fruits…
Best Local TV Newscast (TIE)
Them folks at Eyewitness News give you the straight skinny. Mugs like Tom McNamara, Kristi Tedesco and Martha Vasquez, they have the dope on what’s going on, and they’re on the level, the real deal. Sure, that beef with Patti Weiss cost ’em plenty, but that’s water over the dam. Jimmy Stewart is a regular…
Best 90-Percent Effort
No longer will what happened to Bugs Moran’s boys on St. Valentine’s Day of 1929 be known as the biggest massacre in the history of Chicago. Henceforth, it will be what the Fighting Illini did to the University of Arizona men’s basketball team during the last few minutes of the quarterfinal round of March Madness.…
Best Catered-to-Kids Restaurant
Children love Chuck E. Cheese for various reasons. Some kids like all the video games they can play, while others are more interested in the other amusements available to them at the kid-centric restaurant. However, no matter which diversion children choose to enjoy when they are lucky enough to get taken there, one thing requires…
Best Seafood
Wonderfully fresh oysters are just one of the reasons Kingfisher keeps winning this title. Most nights, the menu has at least four or five different oysters to choose from. Some come from the Northwest; others are culled off Eastern shores or Mexico. Of course, plenty of other seafood can be found, all prepared with imagination…
Best Veggie Burger
In the not-too-distant past, veggie burgers were blah replicas of their ground-round counterparts. While some restaurants stay on the safe side and serve the well-branded Gardenburger, Bentley’s veggie burger rises up and speaks to the meatless masses. Although the ingredients are a secret, minced mushrooms and grains with just the right spices stand on their…
Best Tiramisu
Tiramisu is a delicious, yet much-abused, dessert. It can be ruined in myriad ways, from an over-long sponge cake coffee soak to strangely disgusting holiday themes with red-and-green decoration gels. However, when it’s done right, it can be one of the few sweets in the world that is truly as sigh-inducing as a great back…
Best Outdoor Recreation Store
Summit Hut is a store unique in our experience: You walk in, and you want everything. The goods are of the highest quality–you’re dangling off El Cap, so you don’t want an off-brand rope, now do you?–and even if you have no idea what you’d do with them, or even what they’re for, they call…
Best Lowbrow Bar Ambiance
“You can’t go in there if you’re not thin,” the old guy warned as we walked across the parking lot. The joint was packed and rockin’. At The Buffet, you can speak easy; you just can’t hear easy. You won’t find a friendlier bar in Tucson. The gentleman to the left of us recommended the…
Good Times
Tucson was quite wet during the dry years of Prohibition. And it was the quality of the liquor, not its availability, that worried people. Yndia Smalley Moore recalled that when she dated during that era, her father insisted she take a flask of whiskey with her. If the young couple was going to visit a…
The Skinny
FINANCE CHARGES The state’s Clean Elections program, narrowly approved by voters in 2000, has gotten mighty messy in recent weeks. In the most high-profile story to hit the wires, the Citizens Clean Elections Commission is facing a major test: Can members order an elected official to forfeit office? They’ve told state Rep. David Burnell Smith…
Live
Big AZ Music Fest, Various Locations, Saturday, Sept. 24
Best Local Visual Artist (TIE)
To determine who comes out on top, maybe we could stage an old-time dance marathon between these two very different artists, along the lines of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? Simon Donovan is a big-time public artist (the Rattlesnake Bridge is his) who brings sterling craft, impeccable aesthetics and mischievous humor to every project. His…
Best Indoor Venue
“I Ain’t Got Nobody” was the Rialto’s lament through years of disuse. Now in the throes of a remodeling to compete with/complement the Fox Theatre at the other end of Congress, this former vaudeville venue from the 1920s is now singing “I Want to Be Loved by You.” Thanks to sound experts, whose tune was…
Best Delicatessen
A Tucson institution for more than 60 years, this popular kosher deli serves authentic New York-style fare and much more. Old-world favorites, including pickled tongue, come on a choice of Feig’s own baked breads. If tongue doesn’t tickle your palate, corned beef (extra lean is available), pastrami and chopped liver are among the choices. Lox,…
Best Toasted Sandwiches
Located in a building that’s old enough to have been a speakeasy back in the day, this place has killer toasted sandwiches in 4- , 8- and 12-inch sizes. Chicken, meatball and even veggie sandwiches are all magnificent in size and taste. Alas, the inside of the place looks like it was decorated by a…
Best Country Music Station
Sure, this is a lead-pipe cinch for KIIM, the only viable candidate in this category. But in the real world, KIIM competes against all formats for listeners, and of late, the country music industry has deepened its audience to a uniform conservative red, with no attempt to broaden its appeal. KIIM’s dominance in the ratings…
Best Local Coaching Job
It wasn’t the greatest sports year in Tucson history, but it wasn’t bad, either. There weren’t any Button Salmon “Bear Down” moments like in 1926 or “Win one for the Gipper” c. 1920, but local high school and college teams did Tucson proud. Ferguson (who is often overshadowed by the legendary Dick McConnell of Sahuaro,…
Best Fun for the Whole Family
It’s tough raising a family. You’ve got to feed the kids at least three squares a day, make sure they are properly attired for whatever activities they might pursue and provide a decent place for them to grow up. Sometimes, it can seem like taking care of the kids is just another chore on the…
Best Steakhouse
Sure, the steak is great. You’ll find one just the right size to slightly exceed your appetite, cooked to perfection and seasoned with exactly that combination of ingredients you never seem to get right for the home grill. But, hey! What about that atmosphere? It’s enough to make you want to put on a tie.…
Best Vegan
As a vegetarian, your choices when you go out to eat are often limited to salad and pasta. Luckily, there’s an oasis in the desert for those wishing to eschew animal products. Casbah has what seems like a multitude of choices. Here, you can eat select from shepherd’s pie, spanikopita, veggie burritos, fajitas, tempeh burgers…
Best Tortilla Soup to be Enjoyed in Small Doses
It’s hard to decide on a meal at Claim Jumper. There are tons and tons of options, and they all tend to sound delicious (even though it is a chain). However, if there is one item that you need to try while there, it’s Claim Jumper’s sublime tortilla soup. Unlike other broth-based versions, this one…
Best Bike Shop
When you walk up to the repair bay at the Ordinary Bike Shop and see Doug Horner standing there in his smock, with those goofy plastic-rimmed glasses and curls and a big goofy smile, you would be forgiven for thinking you’ve walked into a sepia-toned photographic artifact dating back 80 years. And that’s the way…
Best Cocktail Menu
Nothing fits the bill better if you’re looking for a mainline to a hangover, with a stopover at “your place or mine.” Fruity, colorful and loaded with two to five boozes each, Kon Tiki’s eye-catching treats are guaranteed to turn you into a party animal, 48 ways. Pick your poison with paper umbrellas, tiki faces…
Best of Tucson™ 2005
The issue you’re reading right now is the end result of a 10 1/2-month-long process. It all started last November, when we ran some ads challenging Tucson’s talented artists to pitch a Best of Tucson™ theme. It was a contest: We’d award the artist who had the best idea/art with a $100 gift certificate; if…
The Range
A recap of last week’s news
Rhythm & Views
There is something beautiful and elemental about listening to music in a language you don’t understand–you become less focused on linguistic meaning and more attuned to the emotional texture of the sounds. The interesting thing about Iceland’s Sigur Rós, though, is even if you do understand Icelandic, you can’t help but focus on the emotional…
Best Local Performing Artist
Boy, does Tucson ever love Lisa Otey. She is a member of the Tucson Music Hall of Fame and the Arizona Blues Hall of Fame, and you voted her 2005 TAMMIES winner for Female Vocalist. Whether she’s performing solo, with her band, as musical director for theater shows, or on a Caribbean cruise with the…
Best Outdoor Venue
Three years in a row must mean something. Anselmo Valencia Tori Amphitheater is again our readers’ choice in this category. One concert there will tell you why: The sound system is great! Seating is, too. Whether you’re in the comfy, more-expensive seats or stretching out on the laidback lawn, everyone has a great view. Ticket…
Best Desserts
When your sweet tooth calls, Something Sweet is the place to be. It’s set up like a regular restaurant, and you can easily pretend that you’re not there just for the more than 40 desserts. Located adjacent to Live Theatre Workshop, Something Sweet does a brisk trade after the shows. But it’s a great place…
Best Foul
Mashed fava beans, garlic and olive oil are the basic ingredients in foul (pronounced “fool”), a Middle Eastern delicacy billed as an appetizer on the menu at Shish Kebab House. Though the ingredients are few, the flavors are complex: pungent, subtly smoky, hints of hot. Served with warm pita bread, the foul, along with the…
Best Pop Music Station
KRQ has been at it for almost as many years as the age of its core demographic, currently giving us our daily fix of dance-club beats and the most popular of the Top 40 hits. (It also was the home for Jimmy Kimmel, now a big star, during the mid-’90s.) 93.7 KRQQ-FM is where rap…
Best Bus Route
Stretching along 22nd Street from downtown all the way to Harrison Road, then turning south toward Golf Links Road, route No. 7 offers a real slice of Tucson life. Riders range from smartly dressed business people to rambunctious school kids, the homeless to mothers with babies in strollers. Like those who rode Tucson’s trolley back…
Best Haunting
If real ghosts frolic at Valley of the Moon, no one’s saying, but it’s hard to imagine a place they’d be happier. George Phar Legler started this fantasy land in 1927, in a bid simply to make the world a kinder, more peaceful place. Eventually, he covered almost three acres with handmade magic towers, spooky…
Best Sushi
For a dusty desert burg, Tucson has a pretty competitive sushi scene. And for the fifth year in a row, this hallowed Japanese restaurant takes the top honor for raw fish. It’s not only sushi and sashimi that win over the devoted clientele of in-the-know foodies. Cooked foods such as teriyaki and tempura also receive…
Best Baristas
There is a definite art to pulling a perfect shot of espresso–some gigantic corporate coffee shops that will remain unmentioned leave it to an automated machine. At Raging Sage, they have an old-style espresso machine, and the baristas know how to get the grinds just right so that your espresso is perfectly full-bodied. With a…
Restaurant Rivalries
Tucson saw a royal battle between two downtown Mexican restaurants in 1921. The Chile Queen served not only excellent food, but also catered banquets and provided home meals for families. The competition, the Chile King, offered a special Sunday menu while urging people not to confuse it with its like-named competitor. A similar name game…
Best Musical Instrument Store
The Chicago Store may seem all balled up, but a banner high on the wall promises, “We know where everything is.” This downtown tradition has everything from handy African djembe drums to massive mariachi guitarróns, stage lighting and amplifiers, from practice to stadium-sized. Another sign encourages customers to make an offer on anything. Anything here…
Best Happy Hour
There’s nothing that bar patrons love more than cheap drinks. If you’re looking to get drunk and somewhat fed with mere pocket change, then look no further than Applebee’s. With the best happy hour concept to draw more business to a chain restaurant, Applebee’s offers half-priced drinks and appetizers during its magic hours. What could…
Media Watch
When Readers Write
Rhythm & Views
Churning up just enough sludge for a good stomp and wallow, The Giraffes affably re-create the post-psychedelic proto-metal of classic ’70s groups such as Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Blue Oyster Cult and Steppenwolf. Here is music that can pummel you as hard as today’s hardcore and death-metal acts, but it’s melodic, danceable, a tad oversexed…
Best Dance Production
The city’s professional ballet company pushed its beloved Nutcracker up more than a couple notches this year. Live musicians played the lovely Tchaikovsky score, and flesh-and-blood singers from the Tucson Boys Chorus warbled the AH-ah-AH-ah-ahs in the Snow Scene. Even better, the troupe deployed its fine new professional dancers, along with scores of well-trained kids.…
Best Movie Theater
A giant silver screen fronting a huge auditorium decorated with pleated golden curtains greets patrons of the Loft. Upstairs, in a much more intimate setting, a couch is even available for viewing films on a smaller screen. Similar to Tucson’s downtown movie palaces of the 1920s, the Loft shows a wide variety of films, ranging…
Best Custom Cakes
Our readers leave little doubt–and also leave little on the plate–when it comes to Maribelle’s cakes. Phooey on boring Duncan Hines knock-offs with bland white frosting and about as much oomph as a limp baguette. When it comes to your wedding, Maribelle’s nuptial noshes include tiramisu, white chocolate, a lethal orange butter cake and Maribelle’s…
Best Cheesesteak
Transplanted Pennsylvanians from the City of Brotherly Love are salivating over the cheesesteaks at Daglio’s, a somewhat recent addition to the Campbell Avenue corridor. The restaurant boasts authentic Philadelphia amoroso rolls, along with certified, aged Angus beef, and cheeses and cold cuts imported from Italy. Easterners hankering for Wise potato chips can find them at…
Best Tourist Attraction
When in Rome, do as the Romans do: Tourists come to Tucson to see and learn about the Sonoran Desert. Drive west through Starr Pass, where saluting saguaros beckon as a portent of things to come. This giant botanical garden/zoo/natural history museum fascinates people of all ages. Meander or move along with a mission, but…
Best Cultural Colloquium
American views of the Middle East are often terribly misinformed, based more on Arabian Nights than reality. But this series of lectures and other events seeks to change that. Including everything from well-attended panel discussions on the Iraq war to topical Iranian movies, these programs in the past have offered up a wide variety of…
Best Place to Show Your Kids an Authentic 1920s Automobile
While the majority of the exhibits at this museum predate the Roaring ’20s, there is one item that will draw oohs and aahs from the little ones–a 1923 Studebaker! The shiny black auto, once used by the Sheriff’s Department, is a classic with suicide doors, an immense steering wheel and the coolest headlights! The museum…
Best Thai
A Thai altar greets guests entering Char’s Thai restaurant, replete with golden offerings and faux roses. The tables are one-of-a-kind creations, topped by glass-covered photos of tigers, huskies, more roses and celebs such as Celine Dion, Jamie Lee Curtis and J-Lo in evening gowns. Delightfully, there is no apparent organizing principle. But the most colorful…
Best House-Blend Coffee
No ordinary joe, the Raging Sage House Blend wisely eschews the current trend toward overly dark roasts that are really designed to mask the flaws of the beans under the guise of Euro-hipness. To balance out coffee’s natural acidity, Raging Sage uses a secret formula for the optimal combination of light to medium roasts with…
Best New Bookstore
Our readers like Barnes and Noble. If you’re a volume reader and plow through page turners, Barnes and Noble is the place for you. If you want to read everything Steven Hunter or Ruth Rendell has ever written, it’s on the shelves of Barnes and Noble. If you’re dying to know all about Kurt Cobain,…
Best Place to Spend a Fortune on Wine
The mantra at this new, swanky, high-end, full-service establishment is “sip, shop and store.” They feature a cozy bar with 58 different wines to sample, plus an assortment of gourmet beers (it isn’t an oxymoron). The store portion is easily navigable with sections of various imported and domestic vintages divided by varietal type such as…
Best Place to Dance
You may not be able to do the Charleston to techno or ’80s dance music, but fear not; there might be a moment during The Optimist Club when you can shake your knees. Any of Club Congress’ dance nights are the place to be when you’re stepping out on the town in your best. Retro-Lution…
T Q&A
Tucson Q&A with Rattlesnake Bridge
Rhythm & Views
In the spirit of Groucho Marx, who remarked that he’d never want to join a club that would consider him as a member, Howe Gelb has dubbed his latest project, Arizona Amp and Alternator, a “band (that) has no members.” But because it’s not a Gelb solo album, somebody had to play the music on…
Best Theatrical Performance
In its inaugural season, Broadway in Tucson proved itself to be an overwhelming success with a wide variety of straight-from-Broadway (hence the name!) productions like Thoroughly Modern Millie and Twyla Tharp’s Billy Joel ballet, Movin’ Out. But the best of these productions–and the best of all of the year’s theatrical productions in Tucson–according to you,…
Best Book by a Local Author
Sleeping With Schubert is a possession story. It’s not exactly that kind of possession or that kind of sleeping. It’s more of a transcentury collaboration. Liza, the heroine, is a Brooklyn attorney who is musically possessed by none other than the composer and pianist Franz Schubert. The fun starts when she is shopping at Nordstrom’s…
Best Burger
Five is the magic number at Fuddruckers. For the delicious, cooked-to-order original hamburger, there are five cheeses and five gourmet toppings to select from. The 2/3-pound burger even costs $5.35. Five is also the number of Fudd meals, the variety of grilled-chicken specialty sandwiches and the selection of $3.65 kids’ meals. Among the restaurant’s decorative…
Best Coffee Comeback
Coffee Etc. won numerous Best of TucsonTM awards in its heyday. But then it closed. Now, Coffee Etc. is back. Granted, it’s a bit different in menu, décor and neighborhood, but the coffee is the same, and that’s what counts. Eric Sahner, a roaster at the previous incarnation, bought the machines and started wholesaling the…
Best Radio Station for News
Back in those idyllic days before television, the voices on the radio could encourage wonder and comfort in the hearts of listeners, even if they were just reading the news. More commonly referred to as “our NPR station,” KUAT/KUAZ is where you can stay informed with the voices of local reporters Robert Rappaport, Julie Bierach,…
Best Farmers’ Market
Coming from across Southern Arizona, the two dozen vendors at St. Philip’s offer a cornucopia of items. In season, there is produce like tomatoes, corn and beans from a grower who drives up from Cochise, where he farms 40 irrigated acres. Rod’s KC Barbecue offers delicious chickens and smoked salmon, while a knife sharpener tools…
Best Cheap Family Thrills
The Roaring ’20s was the golden era of trolley car travel in Tucson. The final run of car No. 10 was on Dec. 30, 1930. Fortunately, a group of folks got together to bring the trolley back to life in Tucson. Kids will dig it! The rumble of the trolley, the clang, clang, clang of…
Best Upscale Dining
In Roaring ’20s Manhattan, the chic set dined at Sardi’s. In Snoring 2000s Tucson, our equivalent is Anthony’s in the Catalinas, which is about as good but with views of the valley instead of celebrity caricatures on the walls. True, the constantly hovering staff can block those spectacular views, but that’s part of the experience…
Best Café Hangout
Walk into Epic Café on any given day, and you’ll see people–tons of people–sharing tables, staring at laptops, reading books, talking, laughing, listening to music, writing or contemplating the art on the wall. Wi-Fi access makes it even more attractive to academics, bloggers and general computer addicts. It’s a rare coffee shop that can be…
Best Video Store
Want to learn something about the Lost Generation or the history of the Tommy gun during the fast times of the Prohibition era? Chances are Casa Video has an obscure documentary about it. That’s the great thing about this perennial favorite: They carry so much more than the latest from Lindsay Lohan. In fact, they’ve…
Best Place to Find the Perfect Tool
Looking for a gear puller for your flivver? Kent’s Tools will have one in just the right size. Hygienic, plastic-wrapped tools are for gentlemen who use them for 15 minutes and then wash up. Kent’s is a delight of dusty chaos, filled with ordinary and exotic gizmos and gadgets for real people who use them…
Best Beer Selection on Tap
Old Chicago is a national chain that serves up staples such as pasta and pizza along with 110 different brews. The Old Chicago on Campbell Avenue features more than 25 beers on tap, including ones you might not expect, like Arrogant Bastard Ale, a brew with 7.2 percent alcohol. Local-favorite Nimbus also is on tap.…
Police Dispatch
Ouch UA Area , Sept. 20, 10:07 p.m. Two vehicles pinned a woman’s leg between them during a fender-bender, a University of Arizona Police Department report said. The woman was reportedly sitting in the back of a sport-utility vehicle with its hatch door open. The vehicle was backing out of a parking lot at the…
Top Ten in Music
CD City’s top sales for the week
Best Public Garden
Tucked away just south of a giant Fry’s on Alvernon, Tucson Botanical Gardens never fails to astonish. Driving by, you may have noticed blooming crepe myrtle, but that’s the barest hint at what lies behind the big walls. Sixteen individual-themed gardens, ranging from a shady, old-fashioned rose garden to austerely xeric landscapes, give way one…
Best Urban Arts for an Anxious Age
The best-kept secret of urban art is hidden away in the new housing complex at the UA. It is a large stone table surrounded by 11 large stone chairs. They’re perfect for a picnic or a pre-game dinner, and you can avoid the crowds and hubbub on the mall. The kicker to this piece of…
Best Barbecue
Our readers should be forgiven for this chain choice, because Famous Dave’s has damn good barbecue. Whether your preferences run toward the sweet Southeastern pork, big Texas spicy beef or the smoky ribs of Kansas City, you’ll find it at Dave’s. The pit crew, as the folks there are known, rub, smoke, grill and sauce…
Best Antipasto
Everything at Torino’s is delicious. But to start your meal right, the antipasto plate is a sure winner. The dish is pleasing to the eye and palate. Try a bite of salami or prosciutto wrapped around a slice of provolone cheese. Or drizzle the accompanying balsamic vinegar over the baby greens, a bite of roasted…
Best Rock Music Station
Here’s the definitive place to hear bands such as Tool, System of a Down and, most likely on the lunchtime ’90s hour, Blind Melon. KFMA has been beaming alternative rock to Tucson from its station in Green Valley for more than a decade now, much to the appreciation of those who cringe at the Top…
Best Place to Act Like a Homeless Hacker
Have you noticed this latest mini-trend? We know desperate types who have taken to sitting outside the downtown branch of the Tucson-Pima Public Library with their laptops and tapping into the wireless ether. In fact, they gleefully brag about this bizarre behavior, as if they’re getting away with something really cherry. Huh? The Wi-Fi’s free…
Best Kids’ Newspaper
Bear Essential News has been entertaining and teaching school kids in Tucson since 1920. Just kidding about the date, folks, but with an assortment of current events, games, puzzles, contests and coupons, Bear Essential News offers kids the chance to learn and have fun at the same time. The Young Reporters program gives kids an…
Best Casual Dining
The B-Line might be a descendant of the luncheonettes that became popular in the ’20s. It’s comfortable. The menu features Tucson comfort food. The terrific quesadilla has a dipping sauce that emphasizes complex flavors and some heat. Dinner salads with tender steak or moist salmon come with innovative dressing choices. Burros are made with the…
Best Local Coffee Roaster
Is that joe roasting in the little house on the west side of Campbell Avenue? It surely is. This coffee house has a devoted following because of its warm ambiance and its on-site roasted coffee. You know they roast their own because the aroma wafts up and down Campbell Avenue. Raging Sage is a family-run…
Best Used Books
For many years, we’ve loved the Bookman’s location on Grant Road, where one can regularly buy and trade CDs, vinyl albums, magazines, DVDs, video games and, yes, even books, with the aid of a friendly and helpful staff. But have you checked out the location on Speedway? There, a recent score was a killer cassette…
Best Place to Special Order a CD
The seemingly never-ending aisles of CD City can cause any true music buff to foam at the mouth. It’s hard not to walk into the store and not feel obligated to purchase a CD or 10. But sometimes, just sometimes, CD City, or even another music store in town, can be out of stock of…
Best Martini
Sullivan’s deserves the award for getting in the spirit of Best of TucsonTM. The bar is in the ’20s style, with a jazz ensemble that plays Ellington tunes. Sullivan’s signature martini is the Knockout, one of the countless great-grandchildren of the original martini. Picture this–a very large jar sitting on a light on the bar,…
Pick
Chords of Connection
Top Ten in Books
Reader’s Oasis best-sellers for the week
Best Recreation Area in Southern Arizona
Sabino Canyon, tucked at the end of Sabino Canyon Road, once sheltered a remount station for the U.S. Cavalry. But even when Tucson was only a cluster of bright lights 12 miles off, Sabino Canyon was one of the top destinations for hiking, birding, picnicking and cooling off. Sabino Creek, which runs nearly year-round, bisects…
Best 1920s Cabaret
Cabaret. A crowded table in a crowded room, a bottle of champagne to share, tipsy conversation and a sexy singer to entertain. Nothing is more 1920s than a cabaret, and we are most fortunate to have one for the hot summer nights in Tucson. The Invisible Theater puts on the Sizzling Summer Sounds at the…
Best Sandwich
There’s many a fine sandwich to be had around town, but Beyond Bread is in a category all its own. First, BB has the Bread. They make it there. It’s their original product, and all 35 kinds, at last count, are extremely good. Second, the size of the sandwiches is just silly–if you can eat…
Old-Fashioned Fogies
Before she became Tucson’s first policewoman in the late ’20s, Nora Nugent ran the Palms Cafe downtown, “Where You Eat Better for Less.” It served inexpensive meals along with fountain drinks. Nugent opened the business after her husband died, leaving her with three sons to raise on her own. Eventually, she closed it in order…
Best Radio Personality
Since we don’t tend to listen to “morning zoo” programs, we were counting on a show entitled The World Famous Frank Show to have some sort of Web presence. Frank is online, if you count “Under Construction: guess you’ll have to go back to searching for porn” as such. Regardless, Frank, world famous or no,…
Best Place to Pretend You’re Living in Phoenix
Drive home from work up Oracle Road, past the rolling waves of red roofs and stucco flotsam coating our beautiful Sonoran Desert. Drive, drive and keep driving, past the faux-adobe McDonald’s, the neon strips of cloned commerce, the golf greens and gargantuan Depots and Marts. Wait through one, two, three lights to turn left toward…
Football Follies
To help solve 1922 Christmas buying worries, “Polly the Shopper” offered Tucson Citizen readers her advice. Polly suggested that parents buy children books for 65 cents and handbags for $1. “If you cannot come to the stores, I’ll gladly shop for you without charge,” Polly wrote. One downtown retailer had a giant pre-Christmas, year-end sale,…
Best Outdoor Seating
Most of us love to dine outdoors on occasion–assuming it’s a nice, temperate day outside. This means that during about a third of the year, we Tucsonans do NOT want to dine outside, period, because it’s really damn hot. And, we hate to say it, but those mister things kinda suck. This explains why Blue…
Best Tea Service
High-speed Internet and high-priced, high-octane coffee are now available on every trendy corner in Tucson. Seven Cups is another world entirely, with not only the best tea, but the best ch’i in town. Serene, elegantly simple and dedicated to the refined exploration of a beverage that’s had entire rituals devoted to it, Seven Cups is…
Best Men’s Fashions (locally owned)
Please don’t ask Rosco, the resident canine at Franklin’s, if their store is the cat’s pajamas. They are, however, the bees’ knees in business wear. This is the place to shop for a perfect-fitting Armani suit, something by Hugo Boss or Tommy Bahama. They have the best selection of colorful ties in town, including that…
Best Head Shop
The “water pipe” purveyors at Puff-N-Stuff II have learned well that eternal maxim of real estate: location, location, location. Located as it is in the Tucson metro epicenter of smoking-related activity, P&S II, it can be argued, is shooting fish in a barrel. Or blowing smoke up the ass of the earthy denizens of the…
Best Margarita
It’s doubtful that Monica Flin served margaritas when she first opened El Charro in the early 1920s. But times change, and today, margaritas are all part of the scene at this world-famous restaurant. The Court Street site is a great place to take out-of-town guests. The patio at Toma!, El Charro’s bar, is enchanting. The…
