Award-nominated Phoenix chefs open swanky new Mexican restaurant. What to expect at Santo
James Beard Award semifinalists Roberto Centeno of Espiritu and Armando Hernandez and Nadia Holguin of Cocina Chiwas, have teamed up to bring the best of their individual menus to a Santo Arcadia, a 7,500-square-foot restaurant that soft-opened in December 2023 at the corner of 44th Street and Osborn Road.
The open space features subtle floral wallpaper, tables and booths topped with white flowers and candles and a private dining room with its own fireplace. By 6:30 p.m. on a typical evening, most tables will have filled up. Songs by Spanish and Mexican pop artists play at high decibels, making swaying in one’s seat easy, but conversations slightly more challenging. Bartenders chat with guests while servers bustle about with trays of food and drinks. Hernandez can usually be found checking on tables and greeting familiar faces.
Behind the scenes, Centeno runs the fire-licked kitchen while Holguin prepares desserts, which change frequently.
What's on the menu at Santo Arcadia
The menu is broken down into primeros, soups and salads, seguno, carne and desserts.
Highlights of the primeros section include Frijol con Tomato, seasonal ceviche and chorizo costra, made with house-made chorizo, menonita and Oaxaca cheeses and pico served with house-made corn tortillas.
Soups and salads include options like coal-roasted yams tossed in piloncillo vinaigrette with warm croutons, seasonal greens and queso fresco.
For segundo, find braised dinosaur short rib prepared with tamarindo beef jus glaze, roasted jalapeno vinaigrette and roasted vegetables.
The carne section features massive K4 T-bone steaks and dry-aged short bone ribeyes served with tortillas, beans, fried potatoes and salsas.
Dessert at Santo is more of a surprise, but a recent example is a tres leches cake. The restaurant also offers a rotating selection of ice creams from Cream of the Crop.
What's on the bar menu at Santo Arcadia?
Cocktails are divided Famosos y Familiares and Exclusivos.
Famosos y Familiares include cocktails like Margarita del Barrio and a Michelada. Exclusivos get a little more creative with drinks like the El Chinito, made with Baijuu, mezcal, lavender and rosemary vodka, butterfly pea and almond orgeat, fresh lemon juice and barrel-smoked bitters all topped with ginger beer. If nothing tickles your fancy, then go with the choose your own adventure option. Give the bartender your likes and dislikes and leave the rest up to them.
The drinks come with an ordering guide that notes if a cocktail is acid-driven, sweet, boozy, bitter, spicy or, mysteriously, nacho’s pick. The wine menu offers similar tasting notes on dry, floral, fruity minerality, oaked, light-bodied, medium-bodied, full-bodied, bubbles, sweet and, again, nacho's pick.
The cocktails we tried from the Famosos y Familiares section were Santo Paloma, made with citrus-infused sotol and tequila, fresh lime juice, fresh grapefruit juice, agave nectar, shaken and topped with grapefruit soda, served with a tajin rim and grapefruit juice. The second drink was Sangria por Sangria, a mix of sake, prickly pear brandy, grapefruit juice, simple syrup and cap corse rouge steeped with a house spice blend and topped with tepache. While tasty and bright, neither affected this lightweight much and made me wonder if I should have ordered from the booze-forward section.
Early favorites from the Santo menu
As a fan of variety, my dining companion and I ordered a selection of dishes from the primeros section, including the frijol con tomato, lobster tostada, birria dumplings and a horchata tres leches cake from the dessert section. Eaten in that order, they were like a perfect storm, Centeno's flavors cascading from a light shower to a downpour.
The soul-satisfying frijoles puercos (essentially pork and beans) was presented topped with confit blistered tomato over a scattering of herbs and clouds of fresh cotija and goat cheese. Different regions of Mexico prepare this dip differently. Centeno takes the Northern Mexican approach, using lard and Iberico chorizo. Though Santo now serves the dish with flatbread, at the time of my visit, a fluffy rich brioche made the perfect vessel for the savory beans and tart goat cheese.
Next, we ate the lobster tostada. Chopped buttered lobster, charcoal fennel and cabbage slaw, coriander crema and chile arbol macha crowned a delicate tostada, which magically remained crispy to the end. Each mouthful of light, bright seafood ended with a tickle of spice.
The birria dumplings sounded good, and I'd heard nothing but good things. Still, I braced myself for the disappointment that often follows high expectations. An unassuming yellow bowl of dumplings in red sauce, sprinkled with herbs and sesame seeds arrived at the table. Succulent beef cheeks melted in my mouth with every bite. The dish tasted even better than I could have imagined. Centeno later told me that the tenderness of the filling came not just from slow cooking, but from the meat itself, which had a degree of fat marbling graded between K4 and wagyu.
The attention to detail in sourcing the ingredients that go into deceptively simple-sounding dishes is what makes Santo a restaurant to watch, and one to which I can't wait to return to try even more.
As for the tres leches cake, my companion was still craving it the next day.
Visit Santo Arcadia
This restaurant delivers on the promise of casual fine dining. While the dishes are elevated, the vibe is much more relaxed than a traditional fine dining restaurant. Reservations are recommended.
Prices: $12-$32 for primeros, $16 for soups and salads, $35- $95 for segundo, $65-$95 for carne and $12 for dessert.
Hours: 5-10 p.m., Tuesday to Saturday.
Details: 4418 E. Osborn Road, Phoenix. 480-272-6799, santoarcadia.com.
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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Phoenix Mexican restaurant Santo Arcadia is now open. What to try
