What it is
Buck & Rider is a seafood house, in the full American sense: a raw bar with shuckers and a chalkboard of oysters by coast, a sushi counter doing hand rolls and nigiri, and a kitchen plating whole fish, crab cakes and a snapper Veracruz, with a steak program for the one person at the table who came for beef. It opened in 2015 on the south side of Camelback Road between 40th and 44th streets, on a corner the LGO restaurant group cleared of two long-running Arcadia rooms, and it was built big, about two hundred seats, with a long bar and a patio that faces north to Camelback Mountain.
The fish is flown in every day from the East, West and Gulf coasts and beyond, and the menu says so, by name and port. The steaks come from a house program of Midwestern Black Angus aged 25 to 35 days. The cocktails are serious, the wine list is built for fish, and the happy hour, 3 to 7 every day with $2.50 oysters and $11 drinks and small plates, is what turned a neighborhood seafood restaurant into the neighborhood’s after-work room.
Why leave Scottsdale for it
Because Scottsdale’s good seafood is either very expensive or very casual, and this is the middle, done well. Our what to eat note sends people to Chula for the counter version and to the resort rooms for the white-tablecloth version; Buck & Rider is the sit-down seafood dinner at a sensible price with a mountain in the window, eleven minutes from Old Town and five from the Camelback resorts. The oyster happy hour alone justifies the drive on a weekday.
The practical version
Eleven minutes from Old Town, west on Camelback Road. Dinner nightly, happy hour 3 to 7 daily. Reserve for weekend dinners and cool-season patio tables; walk in for the bars. Parking in the lot. There are branches in North Scottsdale and Gilbert that share the menu; this is the original with the view.
When to go
Weekday happy hour, 3 to 7, is the room at its best value and its most local: the raw bar fills with Arcadia people straight from work, the oysters are $2.50, and the light on Camelback comes through the patio at the end of it. Weekend dinner is the full seafood-house experience and needs a reservation. Sunday evening is the quiet night, and the kitchen is the same.
The patio faces the mountain and is the seat from November through April. In summer the raw bar, which is air conditioned and lit like a stage, is where the regulars sit.
What to order
Start at the raw bar: a dozen oysters, mixed by coast, and the shrimp cocktail if the table is large. From the sushi side, a couple of hand rolls or the nigiri of the day. Then a plated fish: the snapper Veracruz has been on the menu since opening night, the whole fish of the day is the move for two, and the crab cakes are the safe bet. The roasted chicken and the B&R Reserve steaks exist for the non-fish eaters and are good. Cocktails are the strength of the bar; the wine list is chosen for the fish.
With kids
Early dinner on a weeknight works: the sushi side solves the picky eater, the roasted chicken solves the other one, and the patio is large. Happy hour at the bar is for adults.
The neighborhood
Two blocks east is 44th and Camelback, with The Henry and Steak 44. A few blocks southwest is the 40th Street row with La Grande Orange, Postino and Ingo’s, its sister burger counter. The Camelback corridor resorts begin a mile east, and the Echo Canyon trailhead is five minutes north on 44th. Our happy hour guide covers the Scottsdale side of the 3-to-7 window.
The story
The corner of Camelback Road just west of 44th Street had held Arcadia restaurants for decades, most recently a pair of long-running neighborhood rooms, when the LGO group bought the property in 2015 and knocked both buildings down. LGO Hospitality had grown from La Grande Orange, the corner store at 40th and Campbell, into Chelsea’s Kitchen and the Ingo’s burger counter, and the missing piece in the neighborhood was fish: a seafood house in the East Coast sense, with a raw bar and a room big enough for the whole neighborhood on a Friday. Buck & Rider opened that fall with about two hundred seats, a menu divided into raw bar, rolled sushi and plated provisions, and a daily happy hour that made the raw bar Arcadia’s default meeting place.
Today Buck & Rider, Ingo’s and Pinyon in Old Town Scottsdale are run by Hi Noon Hospitality, a Scottsdale-based group, while La Grande Orange and Chelsea’s Kitchen remain with LGO Hospitality. Under Hi Noon the seafood house became the flagship of a small chain: North Scottsdale at the end of 2022, Gilbert in 2023, and a Naples, Florida room announced for late 2026, the first outside Arizona. The Camelback original is the one with the mountain in the window and the neighborhood at the bar.
The Scottsdale connection
Hi Noon is a Scottsdale company, Pinyon in Old Town is its newest room, and the North Scottsdale Buck & Rider puts the Arcadia menu within five minutes of Kierland. But the Camelback room is the one Scottsdale people drive to, because the Camelback-corridor resorts are five minutes east and the raw bar at 4 on a weekday is the Valley’s best seafood deal. It is also the restaurant the resort concierges name when a guest asks for fish without a resort price.
Getting there
Camelback Road west from Scottsdale Road, a little over three miles; Buck & Rider is on the south side between 44th and 40th streets, with parking in the lot. From the Camelback corridor, west on Camelback for a mile past 44th Street. From North Scottsdale, the branch there is the sensible choice. Rideshare from Old Town is a short fare, and sensible after the cocktail list.