Tonino Doino grew up in Italy, quite poor, yet as the story goes, he would become the first person to resign from the waitstaff of Bice in New York City. The reason that no waiter before him had ever considered quitting is probably because each was earning roughly $100,000 per…
In terms of cultural crossovers, few cities have got anything over Miami. There is, of course, the music, which often mixes Latin, Afro-Caribbean, and rock roots. And the city’s two primary tongues, which for better or worse have produced hybrids such as lunchear (to meet for lunch) and faxear (to…
The “mall experience,” for me, is pretty much defined by the quality of my trudge from parking lot to movie theater and back out again. Even from this admittedly limited perspective, though, I’ve been able to glean the obvious: To succeed as a mall restaurateur, you must either be part…
Tuscan steak. The very words bring back memories of a weekly carnivorous ritual during my couple of deliciously decadent decades in Italy. Living in Rome had its pluses and minuses, to be sure, but dining almost daily around the city, with its more than 3000 restaurants, became a passionate pastime…
About a year and a half ago, Andrea Meza decided to turn her Meza Fine Art Gallery in Coral Gables into a gallery café that would feature fine art, fine music, and fine “global” food. A fine idea. The handsome gallery/dining room of Meza Fine Art gallerycafé, which seats about…
In Coconut Grove, where commerce and nature have wrestled over square footage for decades, The Last Carrot juice bar remains a tribute to hipper, or hippier, days. Those would be the Seventies, when “the Grove” implied folksingers, incense, McGovern bumper stickers, and pottery classes. When the Last Carrot opened in…
While we were dining at Fiedele’s Seafood Restaurant, a Haitian-Caribbean seafood restaurant on Biscayne Boulevard and 72nd Street, hundreds outside the INS building seven blocks north were protesting the U.S. government’s treatment of Haitian immigrants vis-à-vis people coming from that other island nation. I’d love to weigh in on the…
Last Night at the S&S Diner, the 1987 Mel Kiser/Corky Irick flick about pretrendy Miami, brought national fame to this classic counterspace-only eatery, along with an unending rush of trendy directors seeking instant authenticity. Most recently scenes for The Versace Murder were shot there. But the S&S Diner had been…
Those who believe in unlucky restaurant locations would probably consider the National Hotel one such site. They could trace the origins of the curse to the Oval Room, which opened three years ago in the ravishingly renovated hotel. I still remember their “butternut squash risotto-style,” which I misread as being…
It’s high season, time once again for the ravenous hordes from the North to descend. Time again to schlep the ravenous hordes out to the Everglades, for the obligatory gator-gaping expedition. And time again — assuming they don’t get eaten trying to stump-jump their rental bikes over Shark Valley’s snoozing…
Of all the significant trends in the food world over the last decade of the last century, the most exciting for travelers was the revolution in hotel cuisine. And encouragingly, it wasn’t just in sophisticated cities that hotel restaurants transformed from lowest-common-denominator food factories for tasteless (presumably) tourists into kitchens…
Fast food is, in essence, a less expensive mockery of real food. In the case of the Texas Taco Factory, the fare is twice removed from reality. It caricatures Tex-Mex, which is itself a bastardization of Mexican. In a way this extra degree of separation works to its advantage: The…
The SouthSide Café is located across the street from the Shops at Sunset Place, which really is the restaurant’s raison d’être. The menu, modeled toward accommodating families accustomed to eating at chain restaurants like the Cheesecake Factory, is well balanced, with a wide selection of soups, salads, wood-oven pizzas, and…
When some old friends came to visit recently and wanted to know the scoop on the Beach’s hottest new restaurants, I immediately mentioned The Strand. “That’s been around forever,” said Jennifer, a former South Beach denizen. It’s true, having opened more than a dozen years ago, the old and beloved…
I’ve always wanted to write an article about a scandalous “gate.” I once was tempted to pen a “Tomatogate” piece after being subjected to one pale, plastic-tasting monstrosity after another, but the subject matter didn’t seem solemn enough. Then the incident at Thai Toni occurred. It reeked of gate-ness. As…
Imagine a restaurant with horrible food, lousy service, exorbitant prices, and an arrogant maitre d’ who just for the hell of it kicks you in the seat of the pants on your way out the door. The Miami Herald would give this place their lowest assessment: “Satisfactory.” Therein lies just…
Take a stroll down Lincoln Road, and though you might not think it’s exactly Anywhere, U.S.A. (Victoria’s Secret hasn’t moved into the Miami City Ballet’s former space yet), you could be justified in calling it Anywhere, Europe. That’s because the hosts of the various restaurants have begun doing what the…
A recent New Yorker article about life in restaurant kitchens, written by a professional chef, contained the confession that he and those in the food business regard vegetarians “and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans,” as “enemies of everything that’s good and decent in the human spirit. To live life…
The food is as good as ever, only now it’s kosher. Yes, Tani Guchi’s Place in North Miami, which twice was named best sushi joint by New Times, began serving glatt kosher food about eight months ago, just a few weeks after Passover. Why? That might be the obvious question…
Tinny pings of sitar music tinkle through the air at Anokha, Coconut Grove’s first Indian restaurant, while waiters in white gauze shirts carry trays of aromatic food through the dimly lit, 40-seat dining room. It’s a simply decorated space, with none of the heavy draperies and dusty Eastern artifacts prevalent…
It seems like only months ago that the new restaurant Oaxaca was moving into the 26-seat space on Washington Avenue now occupied by Ernie’s Amazing Burgers. As a matter of fact, it was just a few months ago. But Oaxaca is no more. Never was, really. For unknown reasons the…
