Grassroots Kitchen & Tap

BY KYLEY WARREN

OOne of Scottsdale’s most underrated restaurant gems is Grassroots Kitchen & Tap—a family-owned and -operated eatery that serves an expansive menu of lunch and dinner options daily.

Photos courtesy Grassroots Kitchen & Tap

Grassroots tempts with a from-scratch menu of classic Southern-influenced American cuisine, polished service-first style, and a friends and family-focused vibe. The casually upscale eatery prioritizes farm-fresh, organic fare with quality ingredients that you can taste.

Christopher Collins—the Grassroots Kitchen & Tap chef—is a fourth-generation restaurateur, and the founder of Grassroots and Twisted Grove Parlor & Bar. After graduating from Boston University with a degree in hospitality management, Collins was recruited right out of school to join Hillstone. Collins' passion for food led him to launch Grassroots Kitchen & Tap, which was officially founded in 2011. His extensive industry experience has helped him to garner an unparalleled reputation in food and hospitality, as well as an impressive instinct for cultivating spaces built on flavorsome dishes served in an authentic environment. Grassroots has adapted its restaurant to honor CDC guidelines, including required masks from guests upon entry, daily wellness checks for all employees, and limited inside seating, which restricts reservations for groups of 10 or more.

For more information, visit www.grassrootsaz.com.

Beyond the food, visitors can also enjoy an extensive menu of craft beers and wines—which are available on tap—and signature cocktails that are served in a distinctive atmosphere that’s complemented by colorful Americana artwork and expansive dining patios. The eatery offers a daily Social Hour from 3-6 p.m., which features signature cocktails and appetizing bites like Common Ground Burrata and Pork Belly PB&J at affordable prices.

Feed a Bee in Your Own Backyard

BY JACOB T. KERR

IIn 2015, Bayer made a commitment to help save pollinators with its Feed a Bee campaign. In the first year, they pledged to fund 50 million plants, which they exceeded. Since then, Bayer has continued to support projects every year and has funded projects in all 50 states.

This year, one of the recipients is the Tucson Audubon

Society, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to “inspire people to enjoy and protect birds through recreation, education, conservation, and restoration of the environment upon which we all depend.” With the award, they have created more educational programs for Tucson homeowners.

Employees at Tucson Audubon Society mainly work in the field restoring native habitats, surveying local land and building nest boxes for local species. Before the outbreak of COVID-19, they would also be hosting field trips and other educational programs. After plans were thrown off-track, the entire organization shifted to an online format, hosting educational programs such as the

“Habitat at Home” project led by Kimberly Matsushino.

“Habitat at Home is a program developed in response to

Tucson's rapid growth and urban sprawl,” Matsushino says. “We recognize that critical habitat for birds was being destroyed at an alarming rate as southeast

Arizona's population exponentially increased. Knowing that there's not a lot we can do to prevent homes from being built, we decided to work with homeowners.” Although the program has been around since 2015, Bayer’s Feed a Bee grant helped get the Habitat at Home initiative off the ground—providing funds to educate the public about native bees and pollinators, teach homeowners how to provide for these pollinators, and to expand their existing gardens to incorporate pollinator plants. “We were able to add more native, bee-loving plants to our demonstration gardens, as well as botanical signs that both identify the plant as well as its benefit to pollinators,” Matsushino says. “We were also able to hold native bee nest-making workshops that were free and open to the public. The funding allowed participants to take home the nests they made. Since then, the interest in native bees has grown immensely.” With the increase of requests for pollinator habitats, Matsushino now makes native bee nesting blocks herself and sells them at Tucson Audubon Society’s Nature Shop, where they put all the proceeds toward the Habitat at Home program. They have also added a pollinator section in their Habitat at Home manual and hope to create an entirely new manual with a large focus on pollinators later in 2020, giving homeowners a step-by-step guide to providing pollinators a habitat. To learn more about the Habitat at Home program visit www.tucsonaudubon.org/habitat. This story brought to you by the Bayer Marana Greenhouse team.