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The Harmony Gala Culinary Experience

Photo of a gorup of people in formal wear surrounding a candle lit hightop table at a past S'edav Va'aki Museum fundraiser gala.

April 09, 2026

S'edav Va'aki Museum

The Sedav Vaaki Museum Foundation is serving up an unprecedented Indigenous Sonoran Desert dining experience with Harmony: Balancing Past and Present, created for Phoenix-area food lovers who follow chef-driven, ingredient-focused cuisine. Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community President Martin Harvier and Gila River Indian Community Governor Stephen Roe Lewis serve as co-honorary chairs, underscoring Harmony as a regionally rooted event that connects metro Phoenix diners to the original foodways of this land.

Culinary Chair Brandy Button (Akimel O’Odham) of Ramona Farms will lead the chef team, supplying Ramona Farms’ renowned heritage crops—including tepary beans and other ancestral O’Odham ingredients—that have become staples in forward-looking Arizona kitchens. Working side by side, Button and the featured chefs will build a small-plate tasting journey that feels both of-the-moment and deeply traditional, designed for guests who seek storytelling on the plate as much as flavor. Our Culinary Sponsor is Desert Diamond Casino West Valley, where they create unforgettable culinary experiences with renowned chefs who masterfully create craft dishes.

Harmony: Balancing Past and Present takes place Saturday, April 18, 2026, from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. at Sedav Vaaki Museum, located on Phoenix’s only publicly accessible ancestral village site. Under the desert sky, guests will move through stations that highlight more than a thousand years of Ancestral O’Odham (Huhugam) presence in the Valley, expressed through modern dishes built on mesquite, tepary beans, prickly pear, Chiltepin, and other Indigenous ingredients.

 

James Beard–nominated chef Brett Vibber, a Food Network–featured Arizona talent and co-founder of WILD Arizona Cuisine, is known to Phoenix diners for his foraged, hyper-local style and deep collaboration with Indigenous and regional producers. Drawing on fine-dining technique and experience in Michelin-starred Japanese kitchens, he will present seasonal, wild-driven plates that spotlight Ramona Farms crops and Sonoran botanicals in ways that feel both refined and distinctly of this place.
Chef Jarren Bates, owner and pitmaster of Hot Iron BBQ and co-partner in WILD Arizona Cuisine, brings a 2023 James Beard Award semifinalist pedigree and a fire-forward approach to Harmony. Raised on the Navajo Nation in northwestern New Mexico, Bates translates his love of smoke, wild ingredients, and Native food traditions into dishes that resonate with Phoenix’s growing appetite for serious barbecue and Indigenous flavor profiles.
Chef Justin J. Pioche (Diné), Chef/Owner of the Pioche Food Group and an Arizona Culinary Institute graduate, adds another layer of chef-driven storytelling to the lineup. Influenced by mentors such as Grant Achatz, René Redzepi, Sean Sherman, and others, Pioche approaches each plate as an expression of Diné culture and the belief that food is more than sustenance, offering Phoenix diners a rare chance to experience his work in an intimate, one-night-only format.
Executive Chef Tamara Stanger of Shift Kitchen & Bar in Flagstaff is a familiar name to Valley diners who followed her twenty-year career in the Phoenix metro area, including her acclaimed tenure at Cotton & Copper in Tempe. A pioneer of deeply rooted Arizona cuisine, Stanger’s long relationship with Ramona Farms and her commitment to foraging, farming, and accessibility will translate into dishes that feel like the next chapter of the Arizona food story many local diners already love.
Executive Chef Tamara Stanger of Shift Kitchen & Bar in Flagstaff is a familiar name to Valley diners who followed her twenty-year career in the Phoenix metro area, including her acclaimed tenure at Cotton & Copper in Tempe. A pioneer of deeply rooted Arizona cuisine, Stanger’s long relationship with Ramona Farms and her commitment to foraging, farming, and accessibility will translate into dishes that feel like the next chapter of the Arizona food story many local diners already love.

Phoenix’s Harmony lineup will also feature culinary teams from Desert Diamond Casino’s signature dining program of the Tohono O’odham Nation and Ko’Sin Restaurant at Sheraton Grand at Wild Horse Pass in the Gila River Indian Community. Desert Diamond’s restaurants highlight Sonoran and O’odham-inspired flavors in approachable, contemporary menus for locals and casino guests, while Ko’Sin (Akimel O’odham for “kitchen”) offers seasonally driven dishes that weave together Indigenous ingredients, desert game, and regional produce along the Gila River.

Together, these chefs and partners will offer Phoenix’s food community a curated tasting designed for the city’s adventurous diners—those who seek out chef pop-ups, follow James Beard news, and care where their ingredients come from. Through food, art, and conversation, Harmony will connect guests to the Akimel O’Odham and Piipaash communities whose irrigation canals and fields still shape the land behind the museum, reframing “local” to include millennia of Indigenous presence at the heart of modern Phoenix.

Proceeds from Harmony will support a new permanent gallery exhibition at Sedav Vaaki Museum that interprets the ancestral site, celebrates Ancestral O’Odham accomplishments, and connects visitors to their descendants—an investment in cultural infrastructure that will enrich Phoenix’s civic and culinary landscape for years to come.

For sponsorship, ticket, and donation information, contact the Sedav Vaaki Museum Foundation with the subject line “Harmony Sponsorship/Donation," or visit their website for event details and updates.