Buck & Rider – Gilbert, Arizona

If you believe you can’t find great seafood in Phoenix because it’s landlocked and nine months out of the year its temperature rivals that of the sun, you would be mistaken.  As my friend Steve Coleman reminded me recently, 200 years ago, passenger trains in England made fish and chips possible throughout the country by facilitating the transport of fish to interior cities.  Similarly, advances in air travel and refrigeration have made seafood much more available to those of us whose only fresh seafood is the Rio Grande minnow.  Sure, you can catch some fish in the rivers and canals throughout Arizona, but you won’t find lobster, crabs, oysters, mussels, stone crab and other “real” seafood.

For years, my dear friends the Plata Brothers Bruce and Loren have been singing the praises of Buck & Rider. Though the name sounds like a children’s cowboy cartoon, Buck & Rider offers a soiree of fresh fish and seafood sourced daily from coastal regions.  Those coastal regions aren’t solely within the fruited plain, but even New Zealand where fresh hamachi comes straight from the net to shipping containers designed to preserve its freshness.  There are three Buck & Rider restaurants in the Valley of the Sun:  one in Phoenix, one in Scottsdale and one in Gilbert.  Another location is coming soon to Naples, Florida.  Considering acres of green grass throughout Gilbert, you might think there’s no shortage of water in the area and that surely there has to be good fishing in the area.  Such is not the case.

Buck & Rider’s Gilbert location is at the Epicenter at Agritopia where hand-curated restaurants and retailers occupy the bottom floor of the illimitable complex while elevated loft living occupies several floors.  In the parlance of the young urbanite, it’s a walkable urban setting.  They might also call it a mixed-use residential and retail center.  Among the other restaurants on the complex, by the way, is James Beard Foundation award-nominated restaurant Source, where you’ll find some of the most delicious bread in the state.  Buck & Rider occupies the westernmost spot in the complex.  Weather-permitting, al fresco dining is a very popular option.  Sun-shielding umbrellas protect diners from blinding rays.  Both tiki torches and stand-up heaters are positioned throughout the patio.

Buck & Rider takes a mindful approach to sourcing, buying directly from small producers around the world who engage in sustainable fishing and oyster farming practices. The restaurant flies fresh catch into its kitchens every day. That means hand-picked Maryland blue crab for the best crab cakes outside of Baltimore. The daily raw bar menu is time-stamped and continuously updated to reflect the freshness of our seafood and market vegetable selections.  The daily catch leaves the airport in a Buck & Rider refrigerated van, headed straight for its restaurants’ kitchens and raw bars.  In 2025, Buck & Rider’s oyster bar was rated among the very best oyster bars in the country.  Pretty amazing considering its desert home.

When we stepped into Buck & Rider, we immediately caught sight of a New York stock exchange-like board that listed some off-the-menu specials that offer a veritable netful of seafood variety.  The Catalina (depicted above) approaches two-hundred dollars, but will feed a small family.  Periodically the board changes to wish a guest a happy birthday or some other well wishes.  The restaurant is sprawling with multitudinous seating that accommodates many happy guests.  Service is spot-on.  Our server, the lovely Elizabeth gave us several recommendation, all of which I heeded in that we have very similar tastes.  Servers are nattily attired in blue jeans and white shirts.

We arrived at Buck & Rider just after 2PM on a Saturday when both the lunch menu and a brunch menu were available.  In most cases, you can also order off the dinner menu.  The “Rise and Shine” brunch menu lists some ten items, not all of them seafood-centric.  We probably would not have ordered the housemade biscuits with rosemary and whipped honey butter had we not seen an order being ferried to a nearby table.  The biscuits are skyscraper tall and as thick as any two biscuits you’ll find elsewhere.   Frankly an order of three biscuits is akin to getting a half-dozen biscuits anywhere else.  Cut them in half, slather them in butter and you risk getting full before your entrees arrive.

The delightful Elizabeth also recommended the crispy calamari served with a Thai dipping sauce and a “killer” Louie dressing.  Crispy ringlets and tentacles of calamari were plated with a thinly sliced zucchini and deep-fried serrano peppers.  The Thai dipping sauce is rather thin, but has a potent punch for those of us with asbestos-lined taste buds.  The Louie dressing is a creamy, tangy, pinkish-orange salad dressing, similar to Thousand Island, but with a spicier kick. It’s traditionally served with seafood salads such as Crab Louie or Shrimp Louie. It certainly elevates the flavor of crispy calamari, too.

Elizabeth’s favorite seafood entree turned out to be exactly what I had been craving–fresh blue crab cakes.  She confirmed from the chef that the crab was indeed Maryland blue crab (despite the online menu indicating they’re from Louisiana), the best in the universe.  My first experience with Maryland blue crab cakes was actually in Virginia Beach, Virginia.  I couldn’t get enough of them, but have never managed to get back to the Maryland area for more.  Floating casinos along the Mississippi Gulf Coast also served crab cakes, but they paled in comparison to crab cakes from Maryland.  Buck & Rider’s dinner portion (two colossal crab cakes) are exemplars of the Maryland style.  Timbale-shaped, each of the two crab cakes has absolutely no filler.  It’s just pure, unadulterated deliciousness from the Chesapeake Bay.

The crab cakes are placed delicately over pommery mustard, a traditional French whole-grain mustard known for its coarse texture with intact seeds, nutty flavor, and mild spice.  Rather than dilute or diffuse the flavor of the sweet, buttery, and rich crab with its slightly salty, briny ocean flavor. Rather, it complements the delicate, flaky meat and its hint of sweetness. There is, in my humble estimation, no better crab in the universe. The crab is accompanied by a market vegetable. My choice was the baby carrots, resplendent with a sweetness that will make you forget you hated carrots as a kid.

No matter how much I tried to sell my Kim on the fish and chips (highly recommended by the Hermanos Plata), she loathes matchstick fries.  My bride lived in England and knows “chips” are meant to be thick and unbattered so they can easily absorb malt vinegar.  After deliberating other seafood options, she revered to her carnivorous bent.  That meant a B&R Reserve steak salad (filet mignon, mixed greens, goat cheese, cauliflower, enoki mushrooms, chervil vinaigrette).  Buck & Rider sources its steak through its Reserve program, featuring grain-fed, Black Angus beef from Midwestern producers, specially selected, aged (25-35 days), USDA-certified, and cut in-house for maximum flavor.

While the steak was indeed of very high quality with intense marbeling and superb flavor, my Kim was most impressed by the enoki mushrooms known for their long, white, string-like stems, mild flavor, and crunchy texture. We’ve had them in hot pot soups before. Enjoying them raw was a new experience. The mixed greens were fresh and crisp, punctuated with small bits of cauliflower. The chervil (a delicate, feathery-leafed herb from the parsley family, often called “French parsley,” known for its subtle, sweet flavor with hints of anise or licorice) vinaigrette was outstanding.

There are several dessert options on the menu.  Bruce Plata raves about the lemon meringue pie.  Though I’m very fond of tart flavors, I can never pass on banana cream pie.  Not surprisingly it was Elizabeth’s favorite (we could be twins though she’s much, much better looking).  Gilligan’s girth would have equaled that of the Skipper had MaryAnn baked a banana cream pie this good.  It may be the very best banana cream pie I’ve ever had.  It’s not quite a deconstructed pie though at first glance it does appear the pie was strewn together like some impressionist work of art.

Caramel is drizzled in an elliptical shape around the pie.  Though a Graham cracker crust is at the foundation of the pie, you can’t really see it until you’ve dredged up and enjoyed sweet, ripe bananas, chocolate nips and whipped cream.  The essence of an outstanding banana cream pie is sweet, fresh bananas, rich vanilla custard, and light, fluffy whipped cream, all brought together in a buttery, flaky pie crust.  This pie hits all the marks!

In the event you’re wondering, the term Buck & Rider references an old marine term for intertwined crabs.  Picture intertwined Maryland blue crabs destined for my table and you’ll see why we enjoyed this seafood fantasy so much.

Buck & Rider
3150 E Ray Road
Gilbert, Arizona
(480) 536-9494
Website | Facebook Page
LATEST VISIT: 3 January 2025
# OF VISITS: 1
RATING: N/R
COST: $$$$$
BEST BET: Jumbo Lump Crab Cakes, Banana Cream Pie, Housemade Biscuits, Crispy Calamari, Steak Salad
REVIEW #1509