In early December I flew out to the Phoenix area as part of a trip to go backpacking in the Grand Canyon, but had a few days before and after the trip to visit with friends and family in the Phoenix area. Like many of my Arizona trips, I met up with my friend Allyson for lunch, and this time we decided to go to Old Town Scottsdale. Old Town Scottsdale is mostly “fake Old West” and “fake Native American Trading Post” shops on the tackier-end of the scale, but there are a few gems hiding amongst the various “Trading Posts”. One of the them is The Frybread Lounge, an Indigenous-owned restaurant serving up Indigenous staples, primarily focusing on frybread.
It’s worth noting that frybread as a food comes with more than a bit of cultural baggage. First, while it differs somewhat in name and sometimes in preparation, most every Southwestern indigenous tribe has a variation of it as a staple. It’s common on reservations and in tribal restaurants, it is always around on special occasions, powwows, and large family gatherings. But it’s also problematic. As one Indigenous chef I know stated, “the recipe is simple, it’s basically flour, water, baking soda, lard, and more than a bit of colonialism.” The entire reason frybread exists is because indigenous peoples were removed from their land and their traditional agricultural and foraging practices, and had to replace their diets focusing mostly on game meat, maize, bean, corn, and foraged foods with a subsistence diet primarily made from Government-provided lard and flour. People didn’t eat frybread because they wanted to, but because they had to.
It’s also particularly unhealthy, having all the nutritional value of carnival food. Frybread is almost the perfect poster child for “empty calories” and diabetes-inducing diets. But it’s also a food of resilience. It represents survival through perseverance, pain, ingenuity and creativity, and it’s a symbolic food linking one generation with the next. It’s easy to understand why many indigenous chefs eschew frybread altogether, in favor of modern foods that incorporate healthier ingredients based upon traditional indigenous foods. And I’m highly supportive of that. But I’m also supportive of a place like The Frybread Lounge that focuses on a classic comfort staple done well, and leans into the concept.
With that in mind… walking into The Frybread Lounge, the overall ambiance is “old school Coffee Shop”, and that’s essentially what the place is, offering up a lunch menu that’s primarily appetizers and sandwiches, albeit featuring more than a little frybread and other indigenous foods. There’s a fair bit of modern decoration as well, and a handful of indigenous art pieces scattered about. But really, it’s like walking into a coffee shop, and a nicer one at that.
But the “lounge” part does come into play: The Frybread Lounge has a liquor license and a full bar, and with that, a nicely-crafted set of house cocktails. Both Allyson and I got the “Desert Rose” cocktail: Casa Noble tequila, Ramazotti Rosato liqueur, lime, agave nectar, rose water, and prickly pear salt. This was, essentially, a rosewater margarita, and pretty tasty. The prickly pear salt added a nice finish, and really helped to match the cocktail flavors with the rest of the meal
The Frybread Lounge obviously focuses on frybread, and one major way they do that is with a Frybread Flight. Three “miniature” (although these were substantial) frybreads, served with four different toppings: sugar, honey, a tepary bean hummus, and a wojapi berry sauce.
This was excellent frybread, and the accompanying berry sauce and bean hummus were great toppings that weren’t just piling sugar on top of starch. And the frybread here is particularly good: hand-mixed and kneaded to just the perfect level of gluten generation to make a springy and chew bread that still crisps up perfectly without becoming dense.
For the main course, we both opted for nother traditional Southwest indigenous staple: a “Rez Burger”, a burger served up with frybread instead of a bun. For a nice added note, the version at The Frybread Lounge uses a bison-based burger, with chipotle aioli, lettuce, tomato, and red onion. An excellent sandwich, but I was in serious carb overload between this and the frybread flight.
Overall, I really enjoyed The Frybread Lounge. It’s good to see a place shooting for some high quality in Old Town Scottsdale, and leveraging local suppliers to make some top notch food items. And the frybread is just about perfect. I’d love to come back and try out some of the rest of the menu, but unless I’m in a larger group, I will be abstaining from frybread for a while. This was an almost insane amount of calories.
