This Phoenix Mexican restaurant is on Esquire's list of best new restaurants in America
Andi Berlin
An intimate one-room space serving mesquite smoked Sonoran food, Bacanora has racked up local praise since the restaurant opened on Grand Avenue in February 2021.
Chef Rene Andrade, the former chef at Ghost Ranch, opened Bacanora, his first restaurant, in the historic building that formerly held Barrio Cafe Gran Reserva. With walls painted bright pink and a small menu built around dishes made on a rustic Sonoran grill, people took notice immediately. I named the restaurant an "instant Phoenix classic" in one of my first pieces as The Arizona Republic's new dining critic. And now, a national lifestyle publication is taking notice, too.
Love at first bite:Why this Grand Avenue restaurant is an instant Phoenix classic
Esquire dropped its list of Best New Restaurants in America, 2021 on Nov. 18, which includes the Phoenix restaurant among 40 other notable spots from New York to Chicago.
To compile the list, Esquire employed four different writers who traveled around the country and dined at hundreds of restaurants. Bacanora appears prominently in the article's introduction, where Esquire's Lifestyle and Culture Director Kevin Sintumuang notes that the magazine was drawn this year to "food made with raw, elemental fire and charcoal."
Number 21 on the list, food writer Omar Mamoon describes the uniquely Southwestern experience Bacanora offers.
National acclaim:This Phoenix restaurant made the New York Times list of 'America's favorite restaurants'
"Grab a bar seat close to the kitchen and watch Sonoran-born chef/owner Rene Andrade and his team play with literal fire as they command the flame from the massive custom-built grill," he writes. "At any given moment, you’ll find elote blackening, homemade flour tortillas warming, spatchcocked chickens charring, and massive bone-in rib-eye steaks searing, all above burning mesquite. Don’t snooze on the small-plate specials—Andrade will often do cold crudos and acidic aguachiles that help balance the menu."
Though the menu and space are tiny, this Phoenix restaurant's impact is already proving to be far reaching.
Andrade told The Republic he plans to expand his offerings as he goes, drawing inspiration from Nogales, Baviácora and around the Sonoran region.
"That’s what this restaurant is all about," he said. "If you come to eat at my house, this is what you’re going to eat. This is the food I’ve cooked my whole life and I happened to open a restaurant just to get other people to enjoy it as well."
Details: Bacanora, 1301 Grand Ave., Unit 1, Phoenix. 602-612-4018, bacanoraphx.com.
Reach dining critic Andi Berlin at amberlin@azcentral.com or 602-444-8533. Follow her on Facebook @andiberlin, Instagram @andiberlin or Twitter @andiberlin.