Celebrity Chef Scott Conant Found a New Pace in Arizona—and Bottled a Piece of His Past
We spoke to celebrity chef and newfound Arizonan Scott Conant about his newest venture, which has everything to do with his past.
After nearly four decades in professional kitchens, celebrity chef Scott Conant isn’t chasing the next opening-night rush or trying to prove anything to New York.
Instead, he’s building something quieter, more personal—and doing it from Scottsdale.
Conant, known nationally for his Italian cooking, restaurants, and television work, relocated to Arizona after years based in New York City. The move didn’t dramatically change how much he works—he still travels constantly—but it shifted how he thinks about success, family, and what kind of food he wants to put into the world next.
“Like most New Yorkers, you tend to feel NYC is the be-all and end-all—the center of the world,” Conant told us. “But there’s a big world outside NYC.”
In Arizona, that realization came with an unexpected sense of ease. “Every time I come home from my travels, I feel like I live in a resort,” he said. “Which I guess I kind of do.”
That recalibration set the stage for his latest venture: Martone Street, a premium line of tomato sauces that will be available nationwide at Sprouts Farmers Market this month.
A sauce rooted in family, not trends
Martone Street isn’t a celebrity cash grab or a trendy pantry product designed for social media. For Conant, it’s the culmination of food memories that began long before Michelin stars or television sets—on a quiet street in Connecticut where his grandparents settled after immigrating from Southern Italy.
“When I taste the sauces, it’s less about the flavors themselves,” he said. “It’s about sitting at the table, connecting with family. Watching my grandfather get excited because he was about to eat pasta—or ‘macaron,’ as he called it.”
Those memories—Sunday meals, shared curiosity about food, the ritual of cooking together—are what Conant wanted to translate into a jar. Not nostalgia for nostalgia’s sake, but a way for other families to create those moments at home.
“There’s never a wrong moment to push yourself outside your comfort zone,” he said. “I’m inherently entrepreneurial, and this felt like the right time to do something different.”
The process wasn’t fast. Martone Street took more than three years to develop, with Conant insisting the product reflect exactly how he cooks at home.
“What I would cook for you in my house or my restaurants should be what’s in the jar,” he said. “No citric acid. No added sugar. No seed oils. Non-GMO ingredients. Just great tomatoes, good olive oil, and a straightforward ingredient list.”
The result is four sauces—Signature Pomodoro, Arrabbiata, Campagna Marinara, and Mediterranean Style—designed to stand on their own or act as a flexible base for home cooks.
Why Sprouts made sense
While Martone Street is launching nationally, Conant says choosing Sprouts Farmers Market as its first retail partner felt natural—especially given the company’s Scottsdale headquarters.
“Being able to sit with the team here and talk about what Martone Street represents made it feel right,” he said. “There’s a dynamic energy behind what Sprouts is doing that aligns with what we’re building.”
For Conant, the partnership wasn’t about chasing the biggest shelf footprint possible, but about shared values around ingredient quality and growth.
“Sprouts is a growing company, and Martone Street is new,” he said. “That alignment matters.”
Cooking at home—with no special orders
Despite his professional pedigree, Conant doesn’t run a restaurant-style kitchen at home—especially with two daughters who, like many kids, can be picky eaters.
“I don’t give them options,” he said flatly. “This is what’s for dinner. If you don’t want to eat it, I don’t know what to tell you.”
That philosophy reflects his broader approach to home cooking: keep it honest, uncomplicated, and flexible. Martone Street’s jars include QR codes linking to recipes he actually cooks—from simple pasta pomodoro to eggs in purgatory—meant to show home cooks how to use the sauce without overthinking it.
For holidays, especially Italian traditions like the Feast of the Seven Fishes, he’s equally pragmatic.
“Don’t overwhelm yourself,” he said. “It doesn’t have to be seven courses. If you want to do fewer fish or combine them into one dish, that’s perfectly fine.”
One of his go-to shortcuts: simmering fish or shellfish directly in the Mediterranean-style sauce. “With or without pasta, it’s going to be delicious,” he said. “Don’t put pressure on yourself for no reason.”
Coaching instead of commanding
Conant’s perspective on hospitality has evolved, too. He recently opened Leola at Baha Mar in the Bahamas, but he hasn’t been on the line in years.
“I think of myself more as a coach now,” he said.
To him, hospitality isn’t about perfection—it’s about warmth. “It’s anticipating needs. It’s a figurative hug when guests walk in,” he said. “From the reservation call to the server interaction, it’s about creating a soulful moment.”
That mindset extends beyond restaurants to how he’s shaping this chapter of his career. While he had plans to open an Italian sandwich shop and deli in Arizona called Ponte, those plans are now paused.
“It has to wait,” he said. “Right now, the focus is Martone Street, Leola, and the YouTube channel we just launched.”
For a chef once defined by relentless momentum, that kind of clarity marks a shift.
Arizona didn’t slow Scott Conant down. It helped him decide what’s worth building next—and what can wait.
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