One of the focal points of the elegant room at Ke’e Grill in Boca Raton is a pair of blue marlin mounted on a bamboo wall. The other is a sheet of floor-to-ceiling glass windows overlooking a tropical garden. But it’s the marlin, each the size of a Mini Cooper…
Where: Graziano’s Gourmet in the Gables 2301 Galiano St., Coral Gables, (305) 460-0001 What $15 Gets You: Parrillada with a side salad (or fries) and an Anchor Steam…
Castro resigns! I’m not old enough to remember a Cuba without El Caballo in the presidential compound, but in solidarity with those who are, we hied ourselves over to Little Havana in Deerfield Beach last week, wanting to absorb the flavor of the prelapsarian island metropolis. The closest I’ve ever…
Where: LC’s Roti Shop, 19505 NW 2nd Ave, Miami Gardens. What $15 Gets You: A chicken roti, a sugar cake, a doubles, and a Coke. Caribbean cuisine is hard to define because of the mixing of cultures that exist in the area generally referred to as the Caribbean. When a…
People don’t want to cross the bridge to get here,” says Peter Wong. He’s talking about the little concrete blip that arches over the Intercoastal on East Commercial Boulevard in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, a clackety span you could just about hop over with a running start. Wong opened Noodle Box on Ocean…
Where: Japanese Market Inc. 1412 79th Street Cswy North Bay Village, (305) 861-0143 What you get for $15: The Deluxe Sushi combination (8 pieces Nigiri) plus a fat beer. Sushi in this town sucks. It’s either prohibitively expensive or poorly done or some combination of the two. Fortunately for us…
Where: American Adobo, 633 NE 125th St., Miami What $15 Gets You: Teriyaki chicken, longaniza, rice, cabbage soup and a Coke Don’t let the name American Adobo fool you, the only thing American in this restaurant is the ketchup. The restaurant focuses on Filipino cuisine. As me and my friend…
It’s Friday night on Clematis Street, and the line for drinks at Rocco’s Tacos and Tequila Bar is four deep. I’m checking the wall of patrons for chinks so my buddies and I can nab a shot of El Jimador while we wait for a table. Suddenly, someone says, “I…
Where: DJ’s Diner (Best Western Windsor Inn), 12210 Biscayne Boulevard, Miami. What $15 Gets You: A Mexican-style burger, fries, mozzarella sticks, and a drink. DJ’s Diner at the Best Western Windsor Inn on 12210 Biscayne Boulevard is easy to overlook as most people are usually speeding by on that street…
I got to know Japanese food intimately at Yoko, a long, thin strip of a restaurant lined with pleather-covered booths, smoked mirrors, and a sushi bar backed by oversized photos of bamboo. The place, always filled with regulars, was situated between Babies R Us and the Spy Store off Okeechobee…
It must be a bit disconcerting for an American to enter Caribbean Delite. The Trinidadian eatery is nestled unassumingly in a generic, largely island-themed strip mall on SW 160th. Reggae blares from the record shop down the way, but the interior of the restaurant is silent, save for the sound…
Our lame nation spent Sunday coveting the pig skin. Brazil ate it and had a real party. Because a bawdy, sexual parade is about a million times more interesting than two squadrons of men running into each other between expensive tv ads. That said, I decided to celebrate the week…
Winston Churchill painted seascapes from his cabana here. In the 1950s, General Motors debuted their new car models in its grand ballrooms. The club has hosted parties for Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Douglas MacArthur, Elizabeth Taylor, and the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. Tony Bennett and Julio Iglesias have sung on…
Where: Sabores Chilenos, 10760 W Flagler St Suite 305, Sweetwater, (305) 554-4484 What $15 Gets You: Churrasco al Plato, Inka Cola, and a pastry or dessert When someone mentions Latin food in Miami, Cuban is the first word that comes to mind. In areas like Sweetwater and Hialeah, there are…
To celebrate his decade of success, owner Romeo Majano is offering complimentary champagne this Sunday, and each succeeding Sunday through April. Recently rated in the Zagat Guide as “Top Italian” restaurant in Miami, Romeo’s Café, on Coral Way, distinguishes itself via lack of a written menu. Chef Romeo visits each…
The last time I’d stepped through the door at 2671 E. Oakland Park Blvd., I’d skirted under a neon martini glass and around an ashen-haired biker hobbling gamely on metal crutches. The biker, not as tough as he looked, was one of the trio of big shots who owned Ruggero’s…
There is a certain Jorge Luis Borges twist to me, a restaurant critic, critiquing a show whereby average folks play restaurant critic. I’m talking of the first installment of Check, Please!, the PBS series that has met with great success in Chicago and Los Angeles, and hopes to do likewise…
Check, Please!, hosted by Miami’s favorite local chef, Michelle Bernstein, makes its debut on PBS (WPBT, Channel 2) tonight at 7:30 p.m. Every episode features three guests who pick their favorite restaurants, then visit the establishments anonymously and offer their critiques back in the studio. I spoke with Michelle over…
This past October, The New York Times purchased tuna sushi from 20 restaurants and markets in New York City and subjected the samples to laboratory tests. The startling results were reported yesterday: Mercury levels of tuna from Nobu Next Door, Sushi Seki, Sushi of Gari, Blue Ribbon Sushi, and Gourmet…
They say we eventually come to look like what we truly are. Our inner selves transform the outer ones little by little, nudging our whole being into alignment, until we make a reflective house of our bodies the way a snail articulates its shell. Or maybe it’s the opposite: skin…
I’m waiting my turn in the assembly line-style queue at Sunrise Pita (2680 N. University Dr., Sunrise, 954-748-0090) when the line cook asks the woman in front of me what she’d like on her shawarma lafa. Her lips purse as she contemplates the options — tomato and cucumber salad, roasted…
My right leg is bouncing up and down rapidly, a nervous tick I’ve had since high school. The waiter at Social Miami can not bring my check soon enough, and I cannot run out of this den of condescension and superficiality they call a restaurant fast enough. Social’s website advertises…
