Matt Carter has lived in McCormick Ranch for 17 years. For about a decade he has driven past the same storefront on Hayden Road several times a week. He told the Phoenix Business Journal, via ABC15, that he spent that time "wishing our community had a real neighborhood joint."
He's now building one himself. Dash, at 9619 N. Hayden Road, #101, is the first new concept in ten years from Carter and his longtime partner Brian Raab. Their group, Broken Plate Hospitality, already runs Zinc Bistro, The Mission and Fat Ox. Farther south on the same road, Vecina from Arcadia opened its second location on Sept. 18. Its chef says McCormick Ranch "kind of feels like Arcadia."
That order matters for the neighborhood. The large, much-publicized project at The Lakefront at Scottsdale broke ground in September and is targeting its first restaurant openings for next November. So for the next year, new dining along Hayden is being shaped by restaurateurs who see McCormick Ranch as their own neighborhood or one much like it. They're building places to eat a few times a week, sized for the people who live nearby.
A Chef Who Wanted to Eat in His Own Neighborhood
Carter is open about his motive. "It's also all these things that I either wanted to cook for myself or I wanted to eat in my neighborhood," he told Phoenix New Times. That explains why the menu reads less like a single cuisine and more like one household's day of eating. Here's how New Times describes the plan:
- Morning: coffee and croissants from Fat Ox pastry chef Lisa Graf, breakfast bowls and sandwiches, fresh-squeezed orange juice, matcha, and pour-overs with house syrups made from local seasonal ingredients like fig leaves and dates.
- Midday: Carter's take on a BLT with Nueske's bacon and a salt-cured tomato, deli-style chopped sandwiches, a folded chicken Caesar flatbread, salads, rice bowls and Roman-style pizza.
- Evening: Portuguese-style chicken cooked on a custom charcoal grill, with charcoal-roasted potatoes.
- Any time: soft serve made from a dried Hokkaido milk base, plus a vegan version made from fava beans.
- To take home: a market stocked with Dash dishes and favorites from the partners' other restaurants, including Zinc's mac and cheese, Fat Ox's polenta and The Mission's chips and guacamole.
The bar will start with beer and wine and add batched cocktails later. Dash will also make its own sodas, including a mushroom-infused cola. Raab called it "the ultimate neighborhood hang to grab a morning coffee, catch up over lunch or share a bottle of wine at sunset and then take one home with you," in a press release quoted by Phoenix New Times.
Dash has a 12-seat dining room and a 40-seat patio, along with online ordering and curbside pickup. With that few seats indoors, most of its business has to come from people who stop in, pick up an order, or eat outside on a mild evening, which describes most evenings from now until spring. Raab and Carter told New Times they picture it as the kind of local place where people bring their kids, and those kids come back as adults.
The team still hasn't announced an opening date. As of Oct. 15, Forking Scottsdale reported they were "moving toward a November opening," and the restaurant's own site still read "Coming Fall 2026."
Vecina Moved Into the Z'Tejas Building
Vecina, Spanish for "neighbor," made its name on Indian School Road. It opened there in 2019 and was a James Beard Award semifinalist for Best New Restaurant in 2020. Owners James and Raenee Fox had considered a second location for several years. They decided on this one after walking into the former Z'Tejas near Hayden Road and Via de Ventura. That chain closed all of its Arizona locations in June 2025. The address is 8300 N. Hayden Road, Suite D-101, in Mercado del Lago.
"It's a really good extension of what we do in Arcadia," Raenee Fox told Phoenix New Times. James Fox described the area the same way: "It kind of feels like Arcadia. I think we'll fit in with our neighborhood vibe."
Here the Foxes are working at a different scale from Dash. The Scottsdale restaurant is nearly three times the size of the original. It has a lakeside patio and more room for large parties and private dining. The kitchen still cooks over mesquite, as the Arcadia original does, and the well-known dishes are on the menu here too. Those include the 16-ounce carne asada ribeye and the Faroe Island salmon tacos with yuzu kosho aioli, Cara Cara oranges, grapefruit and pink peppercorns. Beverage director Sloane Van Zanen runs the cocktail program. Axios Phoenix reported a frozen cocktail on the menu as a nod to the building's Z'Tejas years.
Right now Vecina is still a dinner restaurant. In mid-October, Forking Scottsdale reported that the restaurant's site listed hours of 4 to 9 p.m. daily. The extra space is meant to make room for lunch and brunch alongside happy hour and dinner. Fox plans to add lunch in the coming months, along with more dishes from the wood-fired grill and raw items such as oysters.
Taken together, the two Hayden Road openings fit each other well. Dash is built for morning coffee and dinner to go. Vecina covers the sit-down evening and the larger table. Neither one depends on visitors from outside the neighborhood.
A Neighborhood Room Has to Stay Busy on Tuesdays
Wanting to be a neighborhood place doesn't guarantee it will work. Chef Christopher Collins opened Saint Urban, his McCormick Ranch wine bar, less than two years ago. As of Sept. 28, according to a statement reported by Phoenix New Times, it became the Saint Urban Private Dining Room, an event venue.
That gives useful context for how Dash and Vecina are set up. Each has more than one way to bring in revenue. Dash has a market, curbside pickup and three meals a day, all in a space small enough to fill on a slow weeknight. Vecina has private dining and large-party space plus an established reputation from Arcadia. With that much flexibility, a quiet evening is easier to absorb.
The Lakefront Is a Different Kind of Project
The project that has drawn the most attention in McCormick Ranch this fall sits near Scottsdale Road and McCormick Parkway, at 7501 E. McCormick Parkway. Scottsdale developer Diversified Partners closed on the former Forever Corporate Plaza for $25.5 million in late May and is putting $70 million into The Lakefront at Scottsdale. That's a redevelopment of more than 100,000 square feet with restaurants, retail, wellness concepts and Class A office space, according to KTAR. The building has anchored McCormick Ranch since 1978.
"It's kind of been this crown jewel that no one had access to because it was a corporate office," Diversified Partners CEO Walt Brown Jr. told ABC15 at the September groundbreaking. "We think it's putting the heartbeat in the heart of Scottsdale."
Its tenants are names known well beyond the neighborhood. ABC15 reported three restaurants announced at the groundbreaking: La La Land Kind Cafe, V Modern Italian and SUSHISAMBA. KTAR's list of signed leases also includes Frost Gelato, with one more concept to be announced. The Business Journal reported that three of the restaurants will have patios of 3,000 to 4,000 square feet, as cited by KTAR. Dash's whole dining room holds 12 seats.
The developer says it is working with residents and the homeowners' association on the final design.
The Hayden Road Calendar, From Now to 2027
- Open now: Vecina, 8300 N. Hayden Road, Suite D-101, serving dinner since Sept. 18, with lunch planned.
- Targeting November 2026: Dash, 9619 N. Hayden Road, #101, with no date announced as of mid-October.
- Converted to events: Saint Urban, which has operated as a private dining room and event space since Sept. 28.
- Targeting Nov. 1, 2027: the first restaurants at The Lakefront at Scottsdale, where interior demolition started in late September.
If you live near Hayden and want to know how this new run of restaurants could affect the value of your own home, Kapanicas Group is glad to walk through it with you. Schedule a free market consultation, and Mick and Melissa will tell you what they're seeing around McCormick Ranch this fall.
