Terry Watts started selling food on Liberty City street corners nearly two decades ago. After years of developing a rub (he won’t divulge the recipe) and hosting cookouts for friends, the pleas to turn his hobby into a business grew relentless. “Everyone said ‘you need to be on the corner,’”…
Renato Viola’s signature pizzas aren’t suited for delivery or take out. Here’s the problem. You order the vegetarian Star Michele ($14.90) or spicy salami flecked Star Luca ($14.90) and by the time the celestial-shaped beauty hits your kitchen table its delicate crunch is lost. The hassle of parking and finding…
When Alfredo Patino opened Bin No. 18 (1800 Biscayne Blvd., Miami; 786-235-7575) on the boundary between downtown Miami and Edgewater in late 2006, nightfall was a warning sign. “It was prostitutes and crackheads,” he says. But the condo buildings now towering over Biscayne Boulevard were already approved. The writing was…
Anyone could be sitting in the dim recesses of Pinch Kitchen. One recent night, six older women in country-club-ready sweatsuits gather around wine and clay bowls piled with bitter brassicas with a fresh snowfall of salty ricotta salata. Nearby, a young couple on what seems to be a first date…
For years developer Scott Robins and his half brother Craig Robins, along with others like the late Tony Goldman and Mark Soyka, elped lift South Beach out of abject obscurity. They played a big role in making it the crowded tourist mecca it is today. Lately his longtime business partner turned…
Few restaurants are stone-cold stunners or total disappointments. Like life itself, even seemingly simple meals are intensely nuanced. An impeccable dish can be bogged down by an aloof server. Your fish might be overcooked while your companion’s steak is a textbook case of sear and seasoning. Today, Miami’s culinary ecosystem…
Dining trends come and go. Only bacon seems sacred. In recent years we’ve seen the eschewal of small plates, foams, and cupcakes. But in their place came a column of oyster bars and the wholesale scapegoating of gluten. Doughnuts seem to be finally making their way to Miami, even as…
For almost three decades the Persad family ran a Trinidadian catering outfit in Rochester, New York. Then, earlier this year they decided they’d had enough of the cold and relocated their business to South Beach to open the first of its kind on the falafel-and-pizza-drenched island. “There was demand for…
A lush banana leaf arrives wrapped up like a Christmas present. A small dish of vinegar and oil topped with parsley shreds is tinted rose thanks to red onion slivers. As you peel open the package, a puff of steam flutters out. It’s followed by the deep, earthy scent of…
Aside from a handful of dearly departed closures (think Kris Wessel’s Oolite) 2015 was a banner year for dining in Miami-Dade. Blood began pumping through the burgeoning MiMo District as The Vagabond opened its doors and Cake Thai Kitchen became a fast favorite. The beach continued to flood with celebrity…
It begins with inky slugs of homemade blood sausage. They’re filled with pork blood, rice, onion, and smoky pimiento, then plunked into a boil with hunks of heart, tongue, and feet. Over time, the bubbling chocolate-colored broth leeches out the best of each ingredient and becomes rich, porky, and free…
It’s just after sunset Thursday night in Coconut Grove and Ergon Greek Deli + Cuisine (2982 Grand Ave., 305-442-9280) seems almost abandoned. A teenage cashier twiddles on a cell phone. Flies buzz under glass shielding a grapefruit-size bread loaf studded with olives and salty feta cubes ($3). One bite, and…
Two months after parting ways with Michael Schwartz’s Cypress Room Tavern, Roel Alcudia is now leading the small blue-and-white kitchen that feeds Mandolin Aegean Bistro’s perpetually packed patio. He’ll also oversee the Mandolin inside Soho Beach House, which opened earlier this year. Alcudia said Mandolin owners Anastasia Koutsioukis and Ahmet Erkaya…
For six years Embarek Alibay has toiled away in a nondescript North Miami Beach warehouse pumping out baguettes, brioche and sourdoughs in the dead of night. His wares can be found at Michael Schwartz’s places, Blue Collar, DB Bistro Moderne, and Buena Vista Bistro. Yet early next year the towering…
It’s too late to sample the treasure chest of delights Kevin Cory has offered for more than a year at Brickell Key’s N by Naoe. The soft-spoken chef has switched the meal from a quasi-kaiseki concept presented in a lavish bento box to shabu shabu. It “is a very lightly…
The faded-yellow house with windows covered by rusty black bars could be a squat for vagrants or drug addicts. Inside, rooms are stripped down to cinder blocks and wooden beams. After passing through a ragged hole punched into a concrete wall, hundreds of people enter the place, pluck a small…
Damn, damn, damn. Michael’s Genuine is booked. MC Kitchen too. The Bazaar laughed you off, and 27 Restaurant cooly said, “We’ll try man, but, you know, it’s Basel.” The fairs are only a week away and hotels and restaurants are already filling to the brim. Unless you’re a millionaire, it…
After months of teasing and planning, Grant Achatz and Nick Kokonas’ Michelin three-star Chicago temple of gastronomy will begin serving February 17 at the Faena Hotel Miami Beach (3201 Collins Ave.) within developer Alan Faena’s burgeoning arts district. Tickets will go on sale December 3 at 11 a.m. An 18-course…
No one knew what to make of Alex Chang when he arrived in Miami more than a year ago to lead the restaurant tucked inside the revamped Vagabond Hotel. Some knew the 25-year-old from Paladar, a booze-soaked documentary detailing his unlikely start cooking dozens of dinners in his apartment near…
The Miami Heat just got a bit cheesier. Justise Winslow, the 19-year-old who joined the squad as a first-round draft pick this year, has partnered up with Ms. Cheezious’ Brian and Fatima Mullins to serve as a “brand ambassador.” He joins the fledgling grilled cheese outfit as its roster has now…
British-born Andy Bates and partner Frenchy Mingo (who first met over a Ms. Cheezious’ sandwich) bested six competitors Thursday night during a cook off on Florida International University’s Biscayne Boulevard campus to decide who would win a free restaurant space for a year. The pair will open in their British…
Until a year ago, Oliver Freuen was playing soccer in Germany’s regional fourth league. he was on a path toward professional football in the Bundesliga, but it wasn’t meant to be. “My dream was over,” the long-haired 27-year-old says, “I had to find a new plan.” The new plan was…
