There will be no James Beard Foundation awards going to Arizona restaurateurs this year.

The finalists for the restaurant industry awards, announced March 15, do not include any of the four semifinalists from metro Phoenix.

The local semifinalists, announced last month, included Sam Fox of Fox Restaurant Concepts, who was nominated for Outstanding Restaurateur, and Pizzeria Bianco for Outstanding Restaurant. 

Kevin Binkley of Binkley’s in Cave Creek and Charleen Badman of FnB in Scottsdale were nominated as best chefs in the Southwest. 

The finalists in that category include two Houston chefs and one each from Austin, Denver and San Antonio. 

The James Beard Foundation awards are roughly similar to the Academy Awards for the film industry. 

It has been nine years since an Arizona chef, Nobuo Fukuda of the former See Saw restaurant in Scottsdale, was honored as the top chef in the Southwest, according to the Arizona Republic.

The semifinalists were selected from among 20,000 entries by a panel of more than 600 judges. 

The winners will be selected May 2 in Chicago.