While today Dean Waziry is a successful lifestyle entrepreneur and restaurateur here in the Valley, his journey began in a vastly different desert. Waziry grew up in Cairo as one of six children in a middle-class family. Even as a young child, he gravitated toward creativity, color, and design, but before he was 10, another interest began bubbling up. Food.
Before he was even a teenager, Waziry would wake early, visit the local market, and return home to prepare breakfast for his family. He loved experimenting with ingredients and flavors, though he never imagined food would become his life’s work.
After studying business in college, Waziry moved to New York City in 1987 at age 21. “I did not speak one word of English, but to me, New York was the most dynamic city in the world,” says Waziry. “I wanted to be part of it and did not let language get in my way.”
He found work as a prep cook and butcher at a Michelin-starred French restaurant, despite knowing neither English nor classical French cuisine. Surrounded by highly skilled chefs, Waziry threw himself into learning, initially picking up so much French that he mistakenly thought he was learning English. His work ethic caught the attention of the executive chef, who offered to mentor him. “It changed my life,” says Waziry.
Waziry would collaborate with the chef twice in New York while continuing to advance through high-end kitchens across the city. In 1994, however, he decided to broaden his expertise beyond cooking and joined what would become a nearly 30-year career with the world’s largest hospitality company. Over the ensuing decades, he rose to executive chef and held leadership positions in food and beverage and hotel operations. He also traveled throughout the United States and Europe developing restaurant concepts for resorts and troubleshooting operations.
That career eventually brought him to Arizona in 2022, where he led restaurant operations at a downtown Phoenix hotel. By then, however, Waziry was thinking about life differently. Working as many as 18 hours a day, seven days a week, he found himself increasingly focused on conversations with colleagues struggling with health problems, stress, and other challenges. He also spent his limited free time researching the environment, health and the human condition.
“I realized so many of us simply go through the phases of life, letting the chapters write themselves versus us writing our own stories,” says Waziry. “I do not believe in letting life decide. Create a life map. Have a strategy. Create the life you want.”
That philosophy became the foundation for Urban Fraîche, which Waziry established in 2023 with the mission of inspiring people to live better through everything from the food they consume to the goals they set.
Even the name carries meaning. “Urban” speaks to community, local connections, and the environment, while the French “fraîche” connects freshness and quality to Waziry’s French culinary background and the Mediterranean shores of southern France that inspire him.
Urban Fraîche Lifestyle came first, opening about a half mile from what would eventually become his restaurant. The multifaceted center brings together many pieces of Waziry’s philosophy, including a hair salon, yoga and dance studio, wood shop, art gallery, jewelry, nursery, and floral design. Across the street, Urban Fraîche/Omar Spa and Wellness features three treatment rooms.
There is food here, too. Urban Fraîche Café serves medicinal teas, fresh juices, healthy snacks, Turkish coffee, wine and Champagne by the glass, cheeses and pâtés in a European café setting. Many of the businesses are named for members of Waziry’s family, including his wife and three sons. But for a man whose fascination with food began in a Cairo market decades earlier, a full restaurant was inevitable.
Urban Fraîche Restaurant opened in June 2025 in the approximately 4,000-square-foot former St. Francis space in Uptown Phoenix. Beyond the walls, however, little remains recognizable. Waziry transformed the property with lush plants, Mediterranean colors, and hundreds of pieces from his Egyptian art collection, many of museum quality. Furniture, glassware, and even the plants were chosen to support the experience.
“People tell us they feel like they left the United States without getting on a plane when visiting,” says Waziry. The same attention goes into the kitchen. Whenever possible, ingredients are organic and locally sourced. Seafood is wild-caught, meats are natural, and fruits and vegetables are selected according to what is best at the moment. No seed oils or processed sugars are used anywhere in the building, and even cleaning products follow the same philosophy.
Originally, Waziry planned to print an entirely new menu each day based on available ingredients. Then diners started driving from across Arizona, and even flying in from California, hoping to revisit favorite dishes. So, he adapted.
Today, about half the menu remains consistent while the other half changes daily, allowing Waziry to highlight freshly sourced ingredients without disappointing someone who traveled hundreds of miles craving a particular plate. Those signatures include Moroccan-style dishes, Beef Wellington, lobster raviolo, braised lamb shank and enormous prawns that Waziry jokingly describes as nearly the size of an arm.
Waziry remains hands-on with the ingredients, but he is just as likely to appear in the dining room, sometimes dancing or gathering guests for a grand toast. Through the Urban Fraîche family of businesses, Waziry hopes to encourage others to stop simply moving through life. For the boy who once found joy walking through Cairo markets and cooking breakfast for his family, food remains one unbelievably delicious way to start.
written by: alison bailin batz
photographed by: luke irvin
𖡡 111 east camelback road, phoenix, az 85012
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