“But when it comes to our annual Best of the Valley issue, which is gloriously celebrating its silver anniversary in 2025 with this out-of-control freight train of an issue, maybe the criticism is valid.”
By Craig Outhier | Photo by Mirelle Inglefield
It was probably the most withering critique I’ve ever received during my time editing PHOENIX.
“That magazine is just everything you like,” this person, who I might even call a friend, cattily told me.
The words did sting, because 1) I’m just one in a team of people who like to cram the magazine with things they like… for instance, the Oaxacan placemats on page 108, which are adorable, but certainly nothing I’m putting on my personal Christmas list; and 2) very often, we’re putting things in the magazine that we don’t like at all, such as local censorship in the arts, which writer Robrt L. Pela examines on page 240.
It’s called “being a journalist.” Good stuff and bad stuff. So, meh.
But when it comes to our annual Best of the Valley issue, which is gloriously celebrating its silver anniversary in 2025 with this out-of-control freight train of an issue, maybe the criticism is valid – this is stuff we like, to the clear detriment of stuff we don’t.
With a laser-focused obsession on local, the PHOENIX team of editors, designers, photographers and writers give the pedestal treatment to everything from Indian cuisine to resort spas to pickleball courts in this 296-page monster. And it’s not just about our preferences: The issue also includes the most mountainous pile of Readers’ Picks we’ve ever published, democratically compiled during a monthlong online vote in late spring.
It even has legendary Valley health advocate Dr. Art Mollen, pictured on this page, whose new marathon is a BOV honoree. Did he get a little handsy at the photo shoot? Yes, but I mean, this man gave me my first prostate exam. No secrets between us.
When I joined the magazine in 2011, BOV was a big issue, but nothing like it is today. We moved it around from month to month, tinkered with it, never really committed to it. Today, it’s become such a multidimensional entity – including a Best Fest party, coming in early fall – that the name itself has achieved zero derivation, sliding freely between multiple parts of speech. We use it as a noun (“That’s his third BOV”), an adjective (“It was a BOV-like performance”), a verb (“We BOV’d that burrito”), a gerund (“We’re just BOV-ing here”) and so on.
We haven’t used it as an adverb, yet, to my knowledge. Saving that for its 50th.
