Talk about your cross-cultural referencing. For a textbook example of good ol’ American capitalism in action, look no further than the local Italian restaurant scene. Approximately a dozen new caffes and trattorias open here each year, more than half of which somehow survive. The competition is keen, which in general…
I’ve learned not to take too seriously anything that comes my way via the Internet. Petitions, virus hoaxes, chain letters — not only are they not worth reading, but I would never, as suggested, mail the garbage to everyone I know. But then there’s the “Neiman-Marcus cookie” story, about a…
Alejandro Garcia, co-owner of the six-week-old Mexican restaurant Divina, understands that a menu should be more than a utilitarian way to convey information. He realizes that a menu’s look, its presentation, its feel contribute significantly to a patron’s first impression. As a result, each item on Garcia’s oversize, raffia-tied menu…
Thank El Nino for providing us with an all-purpose scapegoat. The unusually potent storms associated with the weather phenomenon have wreaked havoc all over the country, handing us a ready excuse for just about everything. Late to work again? It’s El Nino’s fault for knocking out the electricity and rendering…
“There’s no such thing as Dutch food,” an acquaintance informed me when I mentioned I was on my way to Kendall’s Goodies from Holland Cafe, a Dutch market and restaurant. “Holland’s got beer and cheese — that’s it. All I do when I go there on business is lie on…
Newly licensed drivers are accidents waiting to happen. At least that’s how insurance companies think of them. In theory, the fewer miles a driver has logged, the more likely he or she is to err on the road and damage persons or property. So companies are probably justified in charging…
A funny thing happened on my way to becoming a restaurant critic — friends stopped inviting me over for dinner. It didn’t happen gradually or politely. One day I was a welcome guest who always brought a bottle of wine; the next I was persona non grata. A case of…
My office mail has been especially interesting lately. In a letter that he penned completely in French, a chef by the name of Charles Salliou recommended a Sunny Isles restaurant called Cafe Vicko. Salliou had no way of knowing, though he might have surmised from having read my columns, that…
Sedate. Restrained. Understated. Hardly terms one usually uses when describing a South Beach restaurant. And certainly not adjectives you’d normally associate with chef Geoffrey Murray, who for the past six months has been quietly impressing diners at the Tiger Oak Room in the Raleigh Hotel on Collins Avenue. When chef-proprietor…
My wife turns to me and notes that we are walking on grass, noteworthy, I suppose, because we’re inside a restaurant. “If the menu has a Hee Haw theme, we’re outta here,” I tell her. But as the words leave my mouth I start taking in the room and see…
In an effort to create the quintessential bistro, the owners of La Fontaine, the newest addition to Coconut Grove’s Streets of Mayfair theme-restaurant conspiracy, have attempted to cram virtually every element from every known bistro into one place. Proprietors Craig Liman (a Johnson & Wales grad and former China Grill…
I confess to a liking for all things Russian: the elaborate, gilded art and domed architecture; the language from which springs my last name, meaning “royal carriage-maker”; ice-clear vodka, my liquor of choice; and the food. Especially the food. It must be my Russian heritage that makes me crave beef-filled…
Seems I couldn’t give away a free meal recently. At first a friend would agree to dine with me and then he or she would ask, “What’re we eating?” “Cuban food,” I’d answer. Each potential guest immediately came up with an excuse why he or she couldn’t make it. One…
New Yorkers seem to understand: Cigarette smoking in restaurants should be discouraged. Disallowed. Okay, banned. I really should be more prudent when it comes to using the b-word, because I believe that U.S. citizens have the right — as long as cigarettes are legal — to light up. Our city…
Fine dining in the Keys has always been somewhat problematic for me. Seems as if any time I read or hear about a supposedly great, upscale restaurant down there and then visit it, more often than not I find the reputation has been inflated. Usually turns out that the view…
When I reach with my pinkie to type the ampersand in Smith & Wollensky, the steak house that opened in December on the edge of South Pointe Park in Miami Beach, I frequently wind up writing Smith $ Wollensky instead. A psychologist might account for this slip as a manifestation…
Let the naysayers natter: They declared the redevelopment of Las Olas Boulevard in Fort Lauderdale a lost cause, Atlantic Avenue in Delray Beach a waste of time, and South Beach an unsalvageable ghost town. (They’re the same ones who now lament the dearth of parking spaces, the jacked-up rents, and…
I’ll travel out of my way for good barbecue. I’ll also go the distance, as it turns out, for bad barbecue. Miami is woefully deficient in the slow-cooked rib arena. We’ve got a couple of places I’ll settle for, one or two I like well enough, but nothing that’s exceptional…
After I read the latest article to extol Miami’s New World restaurants — a spread in the November issue of Gourmet magazine — I thought (and not for the last time, I suspect): Nice piece. But what about Fort Lauderdale? Long before local voters resolved to change Dade’s name to…
I remember standing in front of an open refrigerator, scanning the packed contents and yelling, “Mom, there’s nothing to eat in here!” “What are you talking about?” my mother invariably replied. “I just went shopping.” It wasn’t that there was no food, of course. Just no appealing food. Nothing interesting…
Wander down Ocean Drive, stop for a bite at the Terrace, the outdoor cafe at the Tides, and you’ll be treated to an experience much like any other on the strip: You’ll stand for long minutes at the host station waiting to be noticed, you’ll be seated at an out-of-the-way…
‘Tis the season to start dreading the holidays. Commercial warfare is on, tinsel and tacky lights are up, and hollow good cheer abounds, soon to be followed by the inevitable extra pounds. But those aren’t the reasons I’m miserable. I actually kind of like the round of social events and…
