Wild Cuisine

By Angie Johnson-Schmit

Chef Brett Vibber has two great loves when it comes to food: Arizona’s bounty of indigenous ingredients and “wild” foods, and the stories behind the food he puts on plates. Well-known in the pop-up restaurant and wine communities, the chef has been delighting his fine dining guests with foraged and wild harvested dishes through his Wild Arizona Cuisine company for several years. His new position as head chef at Mortimer Farms allows Vibber to connect people with the stories behind their food in a new venue.

Vibber’s relationship with Mortimer Farms goes back several years. While the chef is best known for foraging wild Arizona foods and using those ingredients in his dishes, he has also been a regular visitor and customer of Mortimer Farms. The farm is located on one of his favorite foraging loops, and Vibber visited it almost weekly during foraging season. “What’s really cool about being at the farm is how much wild food grows just on the farm,” said Vibber. “Lambsquarters, wild amaranth…tons of Arizona Walnut trees,” he said.

Photo credit: Blushing Cactus Photography

While he loves cooking with indigenous ingredients and wild foods, there is a need for additional items for his dishes. “I’d been buying stuff from Sharla and Gary for years and years, whether it was produce or meats or eggs or milk,” said Vibber.

The story behind his farm-sourced ingredients is important to Vibber. He considers it vital to know how the produce is grown and how the farm animals are raised, cared for and processed. The farming techniques Mortimer Farms uses and the care given to both the crops and animals they raise check all the boxes for Vibber. “More chefs should be using them and more chefs should be sourcing things from them,” he said.

In fall of 2020, Vibber was approached by the Mortimers to see if he would be interested in helping with the farm’s annual Pumpkin Festival and Corn Maze. “Mortimer’s didn’t know how busy their pumpkin festival would be last year,” said Vibber. “And it turned out to be extremely busy.” It was good timing for Vibber, who had closed his Cartwrights restaurant in Cave Creek, Arizona in December of 2019. He had planned to open a new restaurant in December of 2020, but the prospect of working with one of his favorite farms was a big draw.

The Mortimers were thrilled when Vibber said yes. “We have such similar visions in connecting people to their food,” said Ashlee Mortimer. “He hasn’t left since, and hopefully he never will,” she added. After the Pumpkin Festival, Vibber and his people agreed to come on board full-time, and the farm asked if he had a wish list of produce and berries he’d like the farm to grow. After talking with his staff, Vibber handed them a list of about 150 items. The Mortimers didn’t blink. “There wasn’t anything crazy,” said Vibber. “It might just have been a different species or a different kind,” he said.

Both the Mortimers and Vibber are looking to build a longterm relationship. They already have plans in the works to expand the existing restaurant and turn it into a full time, seven days a week operation. “The building that we’re in right now is 15 feet by 53 feet. We’re going to expand it to 60 by 80,” said Vibber. The expansion will provide more cooking and dining space for the Windmill Kitchen.

Through his Wild Arizona Cuisine business, Vibber offers private dining, pop-up restaurant events, collaborations, and his interactive, educational Wild Camp Chef events. Wild Camp Chef trips are typically based at an Arizona vineyard, where participants spend their time hiking, foraging, and tasting wines. All of the meals are prepared by Vibber and his crew, with foraged and wild foods taking starring roles in the dishes he creates.

Mortimer Farms and Vibber are currently working on a collaboration with Arizona Wilderness Brewing Company in Gilbert, Arizona. The brewery makes a blackberry beer every year, and this is the first year they’ll be getting their blackberries – 500 lbs. worth – from Mortimer Farms. “We’ll pick them for them. We’ll deliver them to them,” said Vibber. He is excited that those who purchase the blackberry beer will “get to see which farms provided the berries on those bottles.”

The Tempe, Arizona native credits growing up in an outdoorsy family and his time as a Boy Scout with his lifelong love of Arizona’s wild cuisine. His interest in food and cooking also started in childhood. “I had the reputation in our family of not watching cartoons or anything, but watching Julia Child and Ming Tsai,” he said. He put that passion into action and began cooking professionally at 14 years old. “Cooking’s the only job I’ve ever had, and it’s taken me to Italy and Panama and LA and Chicago.”

From sushi to Italian cuisine, Vibber dove into the restaurant world. Ever attentive to how his ingredients are sourced, Vibber initially focused on “the highest end ingredients that you could get in the world… your blue fin tunas and your white truffles from Italy.” However, he remained fascinated with ingredients native to Arizona.

“Arizona has a vast uniquity of ingredients from saguaro fruits to blackberries and raspberries,” said Vibber.

After spending four years in Chicago, Vibber decided it was time to head home to Arizona and put his love of foraging, indigenous ingredients and wild foods onto plates. “I like embracing all that Arizona cuisine has to offer,” said Vibber. “It was always the plan to come back to Arizona.” Mortimer Farms is glad he did, and so are their Windmill Kitchen guests.

I had the reputation in our family of not watching cartoons or anything, but watching Julia Child and Ming Tsai.

- Brett Vibber