While many of the Valley’s restaurants boast of using local ingredients—both flora and fauna—in their creations, the new Scottsdale rooftop restaurant Cielito has a more unusual offering: rattlesnake.
The restaurant, an intimate 50-seat locale atop the new AC Hotel Scottsdale offering bold Northwest Mexico-inspired flavor paired with creative cocktails, is helmed by award-winning chef Shon Foster, the Tempe native known for his work at the ultra-luxe Amangiri.
The rattlesnake entree pairs it with rabbit, as well as mezcal-cream, nopales, lacinato kale, chochoyotes, garlic, cotija, and salsa fresca.
Other menu items include the appetizers Sinaloa Wings (grilled wings, morita-honey, pickled jalapeño, and cielito rub) and Agua Chile (tataki scallops, avocado, cilantro, garlic, serrano, salsa seca, and garlic herb bread); salads such as the Salpicon (U-12 Mexican white shrimp, tomato, red onion, garlic, basil, mint, cilantro, avocado oil lime juice, queso fresca, and garlic herb bread) and Pork Belly (valencia + mandarin oranges, grapefruit, pineapple, red onion, cilantro, green onion, and bitter orange chiltepin-piloncillo vinaigrette); and entrees including the Lamb + Wild Mushrooms (stewed lamb, foraged mushroom, poblano, ancho, corn, tomato, mezcal, chiltepin, and tortillas).
The concept is the first to come from The Wayfaring Group (TWG): a hospitality consultancy that approaches menu development through ethnographic research, such as studying the communities and cultures of a region before a single dish hits the table.
Cielito, 7117 E. Third Ave., Scottsdale, AZ 85251
