Two months ago my husband and I were madly in love. Eight weeks later we’ve lost the romance. The brief affair was with mangoes. Our new house used to be part of a mango plantation, and we have a veritable grove of the fruit trees. Eleven, to be exact. Not…

What do locals call a restaurant that has a floor composed of live grass, screens the movie Kama Sutra almost constantly, and labels its cuisine “aphrodisiac?” An eatery where prices for main courses hover around the $40 mark? Where patrons dance in the aisles and get jiggy with it atop…

Here are the rumors: Bicoastal celebrity chef Nobu Matsuhisa may be bringing his pan-Asian talents to Miami — there’s talk of the Shore Club location. Top toque Jean-Georges Vongerichten could be doing the same. And the Big Apple’s Keith McNally, whose Balthazar, which publishes one phone number but keeps a…

South Beachites, don’t panic. Despite Chrysanthemum’s darkened quarters and restaurant-for-sale sign on the front door, the Beach’s finest flower has not dropped its petals. Rather the gourmet Chinese eatery has moved to Coconut Grove. Despite a very successful run on Washington Avenue, the owners chose not to renew their lease…

I was watching The Newlywed Game. So sue me for bad taste. But to be honest, I wasn’t really paying attention until the bonus round, when after four questions that centered on sexual innuendo, host Bob Eubanks asked the wives: “Of the three traffic-light colors of bell peppers, which one…

I was reading Italian Fever, author Valerie Martin’s delicious little ghost story of a novel set in Tuscany, and I was getting hungry. Perhaps this isn’t surprising, given that I’m starving all the time these days. But I was stirred by Martin’s exaltations over the fare her protagonist Lucy was…

In order to protect his/her anonymity, any ethical restaurant critic plays by the unwritten rules: Don’t make a reservation under your own name. Don’t scribble notes on top of the table. And never, ever allow your picture to be taken. Once your identity is blown, how can you have an…

At first glance it looks as though this year’s season claimed more than its share of restaurant victims. Of the places that went out of business in recent months, several of them appeared to be high-end, well-funded untouchables: Mayya, Thoa’s on Ponce, Petrossian, Jada. But out of all of them,…

You’ve just been served a glistening tray of sushi. The salmon practically quivers with freshness and vitality; the yellowtail snapper looks like velvet, laid out over the rice; and the tuna is the most tempting of all, the rich, ruby redness beckoning your first bite. You decide to eat the…

The prodigal chef returns. Hang on to your Caribbean Cowboy hats, boys and girls — Johnny Vinczencz has reclaimed his place in the kitchen at Astor Place. The chef decided to sign on again when he and his investor couldn’t find an appropriate South Beach location for their dream eatery…

Ah, the banana. If you’ve looked around our markets lately, you might have noticed the several varieties from which you can make your selection. You can choose the short and chunky dwarf, finger, or red banana. You can check out the bananas that taste like other fruit — the Manzano…

Thus far in my lifetime, I’ve vowed never again to do three things: be pregnant, board a boat, or drink tequila. All three, you see, turn my rather weak stomach as easily as a hurricane upsets a kayak. So it was with no minor trepidation that I, four months in…

Mayya has made a lot of changes in its lineup recently, but the most startling is the release of executive chef Guillermo Tellez. Ever polite, the Charlie Trotter protégé says he was let go because of a “difference of opinion.” Word on the street is slightly grittier. Tellez, who apparently…

Every morning John Rossetti braises a brisket. He roasts a pork loin, a chicken or two, mixes a meat loaf. He caramelizes onions and grills vegetables like zucchini and eggplant. Then he piles them all, in various combinations, on three different homemade bâtarde breads he bakes himself. What he doesn’t…

It was bound to happen. After nearly a decade of regional this and local that, restaurateurs and chefs have tired of self-imposed provincial restrictions. Suddenly it seems instead of promoting products from our back-yard growers and purveyors, some of our better area restaurants are featuring luxury foodstuffs that come from…

No longer coping: Seems Frank Copestick, executive chef of Red Square, has gone the way of perestroika and fizzled. There’s no official word on why he left his position, but he didn’t go directly to another job, and substance abuse is rumored. Frank, tell us you’re not just another executive-chef…

I confess I didn’t know I had done something immoral until my editor informed me. “You ate shark’s fin soup?” he cried over the phone. “Don’t you know what they do to those poor sharks?” “They,” as it turned out, meant fishermen, and what they “do” is relieve the sharks…

This may come as a surprise, but it’s not all Elian all the time on the radio. Sometimes there’s even talk of food, for instance on Linda Gassenheimer’s WLRN-FM (91.3) show, Food News and Views, on which I was a guest the other day. That’s when a young woman called…

March is not Black History Month. March is not Women’s History Month, Breast Cancer Month, Secretaries’ Month, or Grandparents’ Month. It’s not even Spring Break Month, not really. It can’t be, because March is Miami Media Blitz Month. Take a look at March’s reading and viewing material: Travel & Leisure…

When it comes to Oggi Caffe in North Bay Village, we just can’t get enough. Fortunately for us, proprietors Alex Portela and Eloy Roy, who also run Caffe Da Vinci in Bay Harbor Islands, agree. They’re currently in the process of opening a second Oggi, at 7921 NW Second St…

If you’ve ever wondered what kosher really means, check out the following joke, in which Moses speaks to God from atop Mount Sinai: God: And remember, Moses, in the laws of keeping kosher, never cook a calf in its mother’s milk. It is cruel. Moses: Ohhhhhh! So you’re saying we…

You’ve inquired about it. You’ve begged for it. You’ve demanded it. And now you’ve got it: our first-ever Ethiopian restaurant. A Taste of Ethiopia has opened at 1072 NE 167th St., in North Miami Beach, a culinary mecca that has become the most ethnically diverse in the area. Co-proprietors Celia…