Pho-Sco: Star wattage

Tucson has never produced a culinary superstar like James Beard award–winner Chris Bianco: His Pizzeria Bianco pies (pictured) have been praised by everyone from Monday Night Football announcer Joe Theismann to media goddess Oprah Winfrey, who slapped the title of Best Pizza in America on his thin-crust masterpieces. Of the 9 Arizonans to win the Best Southwest Chef award, 8 have hailed from here, including French-revivalist Christopher Gross of Christopher’s and the incomparable Nobuo Fukuda.

Score: 8

About the scoring: We weighed each writer’s argument against Sunset’s collective food IQ and then scored. Cities earned up to 10 points in each category except “smug factor,” where they lost points.