One of the things that I missed the last time I was in Scottsdale was the Old Town and all of its restaurants and shops. That’s the trouble with work trips; I often don’t get to leave the hotel property!
On this trip, we had group dinners on the second night of the sales and marketing meetings, and our group went to Cowboy Ciao. I was immediately excited when I found out about this as I saw their massive wine list.
We had a big group and were seated at a bunch of tables arranged to form a square so that we were all able to see each other. It made for a fun and boisterous evening!
When we arrived, our company’s owner ordered several bottles of Nicholas Feuillatte brut champagne. Its bubbly, yeasty nose and smooth, crisp taste made it the perfect bubbly to toast with.
We also started with several appetizers:
Exotic mushroom pan fry
mucho mushrooms (including cremini, button, oyster, cepe, lobster, black trumpet, shiitake, morel, yellow foot) in ancho cream over double-cooked polenta, topped
with grilled portabellini, avocado, tomato and cotija cheese … our signature dish
Dungeness crab stack
mixture of crab and avocado, shaved fennel, lemon/tarragon vinaigrette, grape tomatoes
Yummy bruschetta
Our waiter also brought out a few dishes of their famous chopped salad to try. It combines all sorts of stuff like smoked salmon and trail mix! The flavor and texture combo was incredible and provided salty/sweet/crunchy/creamy goodness. Next time I would totally get this salad!
With our dinner, we drank Roth Cabernet Sauvignon. This fruit forward, delightfully satisfying wine, went well with my entree, a meaty halibut with coconut sweet potatoes! Sweet potatoes and coconut make the most decadent flavor combination in the world. I enjoyed the halibut immensely, but I definitely ate more of the potatoes. NOM.
By the time dessert time came around, I was stuffed but able to have a bite or two of my colleague’s bread pudding. Yum.
If you are ever in Scottsdale and want an interesting and delicious dinner, I would definitely recommend Cowboy Ciao.
Does your company have group dinners? Any favorite places?
Tags: Arizona, Food, restaurant
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Your post brought back good memories – I lived in Phoenix for a few months and brought my family to Cowboy Ciao – LOVED the mushroom fry and their wine list was great =)
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Oh that sounds sooo good! ha, unfortunately in the social work world my workplace does potlucks 🙂 I do enjoy them though so no complaining here 🙂
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Yum! My company doesn’t really do dinners but we’ve had some great nibbles at our holiday parties.
BTW your photos aren’t loading 🙁
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I’m so excited you told me about that restaurant- I’d love to try it when I’m in Scottsdale. I also want to check out that hike you went on- beautiful!
I don’t really get “company” dinners haha…but it would be nice!
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My company doesn’t do group dinners. A few times we went to the Cheesecake Factory – that’s about it. These days it’s just pizza delivery. Bleh.
Love that you’re making donations based on the number of blog comments!! 😀 -
The Dungeness crab stack sounds like just the right appetizer for a warm night. Very refreshing and satisfying.
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I’ve barely had the time to catch up on any of my post readings but I saw your tweet and felt it was a good time to catch up on at least one of them and to make a comment.
Nice way to help out Haiti!
Glad you had a good trip!
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no company dinners here, sadly! that’s the bad part about working for a state agency 🙂 it’s the complete opposite of working for a private company.
the mushroom dish sounds amazing!
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There’s an Italian restaurant right up the road from the college where I work, and the VP of marketing takes us there sometimes. But it’s a small school and we have a small budget, so for the most part we just have pot lucks!
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Debby was married in Scottsdale I think…funny…I forget where, but it was a really lovely place. With very good food I think too…and her rehearsal dinner was delicious too. I’ll have to find out what those places were in case you have to go back.
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