I was sipping a glass of Australian Shiraz at Vin Amante, a new wine bar on Española Way, marveling at just how many crummy dining establishments could be crammed into one short stretch of this quaintly sweet street. On the night of our visit Vin Amante’s tiny dining room contained…
Early one morning several years ago, speed-reading through the e-mail that had accumulated overnight, I found a long letter that appeared to be from a friend. It started like a continued conversation among people who knew each other well enough to totally dispense with formalities: “Here’s a story.” Though I…
It’s that time of year when the annual horde of houseguests descends from the north yet again, demanding to be schlepped out to the Everglades yet again. What they claim they want is to experience our region’s great natural wonders. What they really want is one of our region’s great…
In 1991 Hectór Rolotti opened a modest little café in New York City called Novecento Soho. A few years later he instituted a more extensive bistro menu there, and since that time has added four more Novecentos in Argentina and Uruguay. Two months ago the sixth branch premiered on Alton…
To think of restaurant reviewing as an Xtreme Sport may at first seem overly dramatic to readers who are more accustomed to thinking of the genre in terms of, say, rock climbing without ropes, or racing down ice-coated mountains in unprotected vehicles that have no brakes and are the size…
As the original supervising architect of Coral Gables, Phineas Paist established a board of review whose approval was required for any new construction or remodeling. That board is still in place today, but somehow The Village of Merrick Park shopping complex slipped past Paist’s precept, and sprawls luxuriously across quite…
It takes more than some gallons of blue paint and some gallons of white to make a Greek restaurant look authentic; you also need murals on the walls, preferably of white sun-bleached domes against blue ocean waters. A little of that tinkly Greek music doesn’t hurt either. Ouzo’s Greek Taverna…
After a weekend afternoon in the park with the family, there is nothing like ice cream. So it’s just as well that Tasti D-Lite Café isn’t open on weekends, because Tasti D-Lite “ice cream” is nothing like ice cream. Unlike its competitors in the field of low-fat desserts that attempt…
Restaurant reviewers and spies have a lot in common. We work covertly, report our findings, and get to attend the occasional cocktail party. True, the life of a spy is more important, exciting, and rewarding, but, on the other hand, we eat better. This past week I spied on the…
At the start of a new year everyone makes resolutions, 99 percent of which involve losing weight. Who makes these resolutions? Skinny people, like Miami’s models. Curse them! Because who needs these resolutions? Miami’s restaurant reviewers. Not that I’m complaining. Getting paid for eating out at least once a week…
There are highs and lows in the restaurant-reviewing world — a low, for example, being the week I got food-poisoned twice at the same South Beach joint. A high was the day I discovered Raja’s. Because even though Miami has many Indian restaurants, the cuisine is almost invariably Northern Indian/Bengali…
When Michael Schwartz jumped ship from Nemo last summer, this town’s foodies practically choked on their sushi in shock. After all, as co-owner and executive chef, Schwartz helped make that establishment a modern-day dining landmark on the Beach, while also successfully steering nearby sisters Shoji Sushi and Big Pink. Local…
As my companions and I walked through the front door at Madame’s Restaurant, three things happened in quick succession. First, the rather stern older woman at the maitre d’s desk, pointedly noting that we’d arrived at 7:45 for a 7:30 reservation, chided us discreetly yet firmly for our lateness –…
Chicagoans overwork their hot dogs with relish, onions, tomatoes, peppers, pickles, mustard, and celery salt. New Yorkers are more circumspect in sticking to mustard and either sauerkraut or sautéed onions. Those in Salt Lake no doubt prefer their frankfurters with mayo, but we won’t go there. Ever. Point is, our…
The 1990s were a heady time for the culinary stars in this town, as the creative talents of New Worlders, Pacific Rimmers, Nuevo Latinos, Mango Gangers, et al., catapulted South Florida onto the nation’s culinary map. Champagne corks flew, flashbulbs popped, puffy personality pieces appeared, heralding the unique fusion of…
“This is why we moved to South Beach in the first place!” exclaimed my companion. It’s something we used to say to each other frequently when we came from New York City almost a decade ago. It almost always involved a “shirtsleeve experience,” like lunching in lushly planted tropical patios…
There are three key components to Christine’s Roti Shop: 1) Christine. As you enter the small shop you may see a woman busily rolling out balls of roti dough. This is Christine Gouveia, from British Guyana. She is perpetually amicable, always eager to chat, and judging from all the people…
When Tango Beef Café folded last spring it was surprising that the closure was even noticed. The parrillada had featured an unusually varied selection of grilled meats, but it’s not as though North Beach doesn’t have a glut of other good Argentine grills, especially when, about three months ago, Tango…
The bright, minimalist, metallic-cool interior of Café 71 stands out in this grim, brown Biscayne block like a comic strip plunked smack-dab in the middle of a James Joyce book. Motorists going by the corner of 71st Street look over at the contemporary cafe with disbelief in their eyes: What’s…
It was not for food that I first, about a year ago, went to Wah Shing Chinese restaurant. It was for karaoke, which had suddenly become hugely hip among my younger friends. I’d never done this singing-to-vocally-zapped-recordings thang myself, maybe because I spent a young adulthood playing in actual live…
South Beach’s favorite (and only) Austrian/German pub and eatery, formerly a teeny, cavernous room on Alton Road and Ninth Street, is now housed in a far roomier space two blocks north, just up the street from Wild Oats Market. Most everything else about Dab Haus remains the same — the…
Those who know of Barton Gerald Weiss’s reputation as the event impresario with an inclination for multisensory, over-the-top theatrics will probably be surprised by the subtle brown and bronze earth tones that swathe the tasteful, relatively restrained décor of Barton G the Restaurant. I say “relatively” because the 155-seat dining…
