Los Compadres, Phoenix Favorite, Offers Free Food Before Closure

PHOENIX, AZ — The owners of Los Compadres say they plan to close their family restaurant on July 31 to concentrate on catering and off-premise dining service. David and Annie Valdivia, the current owners of the popular Mexican restaurant at 2350 W. Northern Ave., have served up family recipes in Phoenix for 34 years.

To thank their customers, the Valdivia family is offering a free order of sopapillas per table through the end of the month.

“As a family we want to express our gratitude for the many years of love and support you have shown us,” the family wrote in a Facebook post announcing the closure. “We have been so blessed with the privilege and joy of operating our family's business in this location for the past 34 years.”

The owners said Los Compadres has thrived because of the people who have supported it — “our family, our family of employees and our customers.”

Three generations of the family have owned Los Compadres, according to an account by the news outlet AZFamily. Founder Josephine Picazo, who opened her first restaurant in Miami in 1938, passed the business on to her daughters, Lucia Valdivia and Maria Estle Gama, who worked with their father, Anselmo Valdivia, to open the first Los Compadres in Phoenix on Seventh Avenue in 1958. That location closed last fall.

Lucia Valdivia and her five children opened the restaurant on Northern Avenue in 1985.