Chicago Transplant Finding New Culinary Home in Scottsdale

SCOTTSDALE, AZ – St. Charles, IL might as well be the boonies when it comes to culinary innovation. A few years ago, Pete Balodimas and his family tried to change all that with Fahrenheit, a cutting edge restaurant some 40 miles from downtown Chicago. But the restaurant didn’t last, and Balodimas soon moved up and over to Evanston, where he was the chef at Quince. Then he just disappeared. But oddly enough, I ran into him two weeks ago in Scottsdale, Arizona, of all places, working for the Jose Garces Restaurant Group.

There, inside the swanky Saguaro Hotel, Balodimas oversees the Mexico City street food-inspired Distrito. I loved just about everything I ate there, and was able to talk with Pete on my way out the door about the differences (beyond the weather) between Chicago and Scottsdale. (By the way, big thanks to the folks at De Cero in Chicago for tweeting me about Distrito, or I would have never found out about them!)