The South Beach Wine & Food Festival turns 13 in 2014, and Lee Brian Schrager, creator of the festival and vice president of corporate communications and national events at Southern Wine & Spirits of America Inc., knew exactly how he wanted to celebrate: a good old-fashioned bar mitzvah. “I wanted…
Long before South Beach’s popular pork-centric restaurant Pubbelly was even a thought, a 17-year-old kid named Jose Mendin announced he wanted to be a chef and went to Paris with his father. “My dad took me to a three-star Michelin restaurant, and I think I had the best meal of…
Ah, mole, the sauce as personal and versatile as curry. It can come in an array of delicious colors: red, green, yellow or brown and most are said to have upwards of twenty ingredients. Discovering your perfect sauce is like finding your soulmate. At Los Magueyes they offer up two…
Sam Gorenstein began with breakfast. As a kid in Barranquilla, Colombia, the chef and owner of My Ceviche would step into the kitchen every weekend morning and cook omelets and frittatas for his entire family. “From the moment I was tall enough to reach the knobs on the stove, I…
For Dena Marino, everything changed after her first home economics class. It was in that unlikely place — in a football-crazed high school in a middling city near the Jersey shore — that the petite blonde had an epiphany. She wanted to become a chef. It didn’t come as a…
Frozen yogurt is something like the perfect food. It’s creamy, rich, and cold, yet lower in fat and better for you than most treats. Plus, you can actually make the darn thing into a meal by adding fresh fruit and granola. As long as you can stay away from the…
Tenderloins are the cookies of the beef world. They’re selfish, ideal for one patron to consume in just a few mouthfuls. But larger steaks, such as porterhouses and rib eyes, are like layer cakes: generous, indulgent, and meant to be shared. Because these cuts usually cost more than filets, we’ve…
A few days ago, something strange happened. It was a sunless Monday, and the humdrum of lunch filled Wolfgang’s Steakhouse downtown. Three guys chatted over steak salads, real estate tycoon Jorge Perez perused a lengthy report while sipping Diet Coke, and waiters scraped breadcrumbs off my white-tablecloth-topped table. Favoring silk…
A restaurant opening in Miami is about as commonplace as a bad driver. The District Miami, whose website is “cooking soon,” is merging local history with pan-American flavors for a taste of the Americas in the Magic City. It is the brainchild of managing partner Alexander Ringleb (Casa Tua and…
Some of you may be familiar with POC American Fusion Buffet & Sushi in Coral Gables. Considered by many. a step above your average Asian all-you-can-eat joint, POC does offer superior quality, service, d�cor, and yes, food. Now it all also offers the perfect place to watch the game and…
A few days ago, something strange happened. It was a sunless Monday, and the humdrum of lunch filled Wolfgang’s Steakhouse downtown. Three guys chatted over steak salads, real estate tycoon Jorge Perez perused a lengthy report while sipping Diet Coke, and waiters scraped breadcrumbs off my white-tablecloth-topped table. Favoring silk…
Many people — even dyed-in-the-wool carnivores — don’t choose a meat-laden lunch. Maybe it’s because of the fear of an afternoon torpor that stunts any creative work time; maybe it’s the thought of a decadent over-the-top dinner that leads people to eat a vegetarian midday meal. In any event, a…
As the Dolphins prepare to play the Atlanta Falcons in their most suspenseful home opener in years, it looks like Coconut Grove has gained unofficial status as the Miami-Dade capital of sports bars with the opening of Duffy’s Sports Grill at Cocowalk today. This is the second Miami-Dade location for…
Good news, brunch buffs. Following the success of its now-shuttered lunch pop-up, Macchialina will debut brunch this Sunday, September 22…
James Beard Foundation’s Taste America national tour kicks off in Miami Friday, and with it come big names like internationally renowned culinary pioneer Norman Van Aken, favorite TV personality Ted Allen, and West Coast pastry chef Yigit Pura of Top Chef Just Desserts fame. Raised in Turkey and now residing…
Eating clean ain’t easy. And what with the limited number of hours in the day and convenience of fast food, it’s no wonder you opt for McDonald’s more often that not. Ain’t nobody got time for preparing a week’s worth of meals from Whole Foods. But with the addition of…
Piyarat Arreeratn is not in the kitchen. Tonight, the boyish chef with spiky hair roams the dining room at his family-run restaurant, Oishi Thai. He pats a blond kid on the head, wipes down an empty table, and bounces around asking guests if everything is all right. Chef Bee, as…
A neighbor new to Miami from California recently stopped me and excitedly asked, “Do you know Trader Joe’s is opening just a few miles away?” Giddy with the thought of once again roaming the bamboo aisles and purchasing inexpensive wine, he confessed he’d written several letters to the Monrovia, California-based…
Experiential dining can mean many, many things. The term includes kitschy interactive dinner theater where your wait staff may sing or get murdered as you scarf down catering-style rubber chicken, Or it can take the form of a meal in which the presentation and mere act of dining is entertainment…
Oh the weather outside is frightful and if you are looking for soup that is delightful, pay a visit to Green Papaya in Miami Lakes. Between the rain and everyone seeming to have the start of a sore throat, come lunchtime we have been looking for one thing: soup as…
It’s one of the very last vestiges of Old Florida. The Uncle Tom’s Barbecue sign has shown hungry travelers on the Tamiami Trail the way to smoked meat since it opened around 1948 with a name that probably wasn’t so ironic back in the day. The walls of the restaurant…
“Is that real?” we caught ourselves thinking aloud while the lady behind the counter at Ms. Cheezious patiently waited for us to answer our own question. Jesus, it is real. Like kids waiting their turn for the ice-cream man to take their order, a small queue was forming behind us…
