Cape Cod Room (5937 Collins Avenue, Miami Beach) at the Bath Club is Ken Lyon's, the caterer and restaurateur, new northeast American seafood house specializing in what he calls comfortable, familiar food in a vintage room for a retro dining experience.
Jacob Katel
Nantucket Bay Scallops
​Lyon says, "A lot of people in South Florida have roots or went to school in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and they have a fond sort of memory of it. South Florida has a lot of great fish, but the fish and shellfish of the north Atlantic has a whole nother thing going on."
Short Order spent a few hours in the kitchen at the Cape Cod Room on a Friday night and saw lobster, mussels, fish, scallops and more. We even got to try some lobster bisque.
The Cape Cod room's kitchen operated at a frenetic pace with a small staff and a high level of output. Here are some pictures from the Cape Cod Room's kitchen.
​Waxy's On the River (690 SW First Court, Miami) is a Key West-styled Irish pub that specializes in fish. They shoot for a neighborhood joint feeling and are proud to showcase buzzworthy local acts like ArtOfficial, and Locos Por Juana, through their midweek live music bookings.
The restaurant is located on the ground floor, riverside (opposite Andu), of Brickell's Neo Vertika building.
Executive Chef Reginald Collier, who at age 25 was named executive chef of Doraku South Beach, a popular sushi place, also worked in Orlando at a Disney kitchen that saw several hundred covers a day.
He says of the food, "You can tell a chef made it. Fine dining will never leave my heart. That's my passion and I bring those touches to the food here."
Check out these pictures of some of the food they crank out at Waxy's.
​TIMO (17624 Collins Ave.) in Sunny Isles is the product of the teamwork of a top chef, experienced GM, and a staff committed to going above and beyond.
Chef Tim Andriola started working kitchens as a kid in Lee, New Hampshire at his family's restaurant, the Gateway. In South Florida he started as a busser at Chef Allen's before becoming Chef De Cuisine. Later, he worked as Executive Chef at Mark's South Beach before opening his own spot, TIMO in Sunny Isles with former Norman's GM Rodrigo Martinez.
TIMO specializes in Italian/Mediterranean cuisine and serves home made pasta, lots of fish, and brick oven pizza.
Here are some kitchen pictures from a recent night at TIMO.
Chef Cindy Hutson in the kitchen at Ortanique On The Mile.
​Cindy Hutson started her professional cooking career in 1994 when she and her partner Delius Shirley opened Norma's On The Beach. They named the place after his mother, Norma Shirley, a famous chef who Food & Wine once called the "Julia Child of the Caribbean."
Cindy says "Our first restaurant, Norma's, we took over the Lazy Lizard on Lincoln Road in 94' and completely gutted the place. About a month before we opened Delius said 'well, you better write the menu.' I said 'what?!' I'd never worked in a restaurant in my life. I thought his mom was cooking.
I didn't wanna waste no money on knives and aprons. I used to be in the kitchen in flip flops and a sundress. The first six months I cried every night, 'I can't do this, I wanna go home.' Well, when the first review came out it was top of the line everything, they loved it, and that was the New York Times. That's when I said 'I can do this.' Then the articles kept coming out, so I finally bought some knives and an apron, but I didn't wanna buy anything if I wasn't gonna make it.
We named it Norma's because she was famous and nobody knew who I was, everybody thought she was the one cooking, but once it was established that I knew what I was doing you better believe I let everybody know it was me in the kitchen."
Norma's closed in 1999, the same year Ortanique on the Mile opened. Here are some pictures from the kitchen.
​Last Monday, South Florida's Chefs Club, a network of culinary professionals who meet regularly to eat, talk shop, and crack jokes, got together over a tailgate style feast at the bar of BLT Steak Miami during the Dolphin's opener against the Colts.
Executive Chef Sam Gorenstein says of hosting Chefs Club, "I think it's a great opportunity to get know your colleagues. It's a small community here compared to New York, LA, Chicago, and San Francisco, so it's a good chefs night out.
I took a low key approach. We're doing tailgate food with a twist. If you think about what chefs like to eat on their day off it's street grub, at least me, I don't want nothing fancy. You don't have to make really high end food for people to enjoy eating it. Good ingredients, good flavors, good technique, and that's it."
Here are some more images from the Monday Night Football chefs club and regular dinner service at BLT Steak Miami.
MIA at Biscayne (20 Biscayne Blvd., Miami) is a brand new resto-club-lounge on the corner of Biscayne and Flagler with the feel of South Beach in downtown and the look of a millionaire's playground.
MIA at Biscayne's executive chef Gerdy Rodriguez helms the kitchens, which put out what the restaurant is calling "creative takes on culinary classics that marry the international flavors of Spain, Japan, and Latin America."
The luxe and heavily cushioned interior of MIA at Biscayne is designed by Isaac Valdes. Technological appointments include a metamorphic color scheme courtesy of alternating synchronized light patterns on most surfaces. A motion sensing iWall and iBar, and club elements like laser lighting, and high caliber sound system are prominent features.
Check out these exclusive Short Order pictures from behind the line, behind the bar and behind the scenes at MIA at Biscayne.
Executive Chef Sean Bernal is a swordfish samurai.
​
The Oceanaire Seafood Room is a classy joint in Brickell with a partytime atmosphere. It's not at all stuck up, lame, pretentious, or boring. At high velocity the kitchen operates like a well oiled machine. At least that was the case when Short Order stepped in last Thursday night for a 54-top Duckhorn Wine tasting dinner amid regular service. A veritable army of front of the house staff flowed in and out of the kitchen like a South Beach high tide, with a smoothness that belied its power. The management, Chef, cooks, expediters, runners, servers, bussers, and dishwashers communicated easily and with humor. This was a fun place. Check out the pictures...
​ The Ritz Carlton South Beach's DiLido Beach Club (One Lincoln Road) is an oceanfront restaurant that serves food inspired by South Mediterranean and North African cuisine. Top Chef Jeff McInnis runs the kitchen. He is shown above filling up on liquid nitrogen. What could he possibly need that for? Check it out, we'll show you.
Bancroft Supper Club (1501 Collins Ave) is a culinary nightlife concept on South Beach. They have a full menu with organic elements created by well respected, high profile chef, Tim Andriola of TIMO in Sunny Isles, and a full scale night club open til 5 am.
Andriola, a New Hampshire native, spent 7 years at Chef Allen's, where he worked his way from busser to a 5 year run as Chef De Cuisine. He then worked as executive chef at Mark's South Beach before opening the nationally lauded TIMO in Sunny Isles.
Bancroft Supper club says their objective is "to create and deliver a senses-centric experience by
combining creative organic and natural American cuisine with the city's
best nightclub entertainment."
Check out these exclusive Short Order images from the kitchen of the Bancroft Supper Club.
​ The mafia's got a way of referring to itself called "this thing of ours." Chefs are the same, not a mob, but a network of bosses, underbosses, and soldiers who put in work to bring home the fattest envelopes and be recognized for their accomplishments. It's no secret society, the restaurant industry is one that anyone can join and move up the ranks through hard work, natural ability, and willingness to learn. But it's not so often that the best of the best all get together for a sitdown. Thanks to Chefs Club that's all changing.
Mattie Brown greets all who enter The Mahogany Grille. She's the mother of and inspiration for the owners.
​
The Mahogany Grille (2190 NW 183 St) is a neo-classic soul food, white linen tablecloth, gourmet down home American Southern/Island Caribbean restaurant in the heart of Miami Gardens. It's a family owned and operated joint. Legendary baseball player Andre "The Hawk" Dawson and his brother Vincent Brown own it, and their brother Greg Brown runs the kitchen. Click here for Lee Klein's full 2007 review of the place. The Mahogany Grille is a two time Best of Miami winner for Best Soul Food Restaurant and Best Sunday Supper. Follow Short Order as we go in the kitchen, where Executive Chef Greg Brown and his crew make it all happen.
Chef Michelle Bernstein and husband, restauranteur, David Martinez
Chef Michelle Bernstein says "The first place I worked as a cook was Janjo's in the Grove for Chef Jan Jorgensen. At the end of my shift he'd say 'here's half a lime. Go clean the stove.' I said 'Can I get a whole lime?' and he said 'No. Too expensive.' He locked me in the fridge one time to make whipped cream. What a great first chef. He made me tough, got me ready for all the crazy French guys."
Asked what he does at Michy's her husband David Martinez says "I drink rum and cokes all day. Just kidding. I take care of the business. It takes a very unique personality to be in restaurants. You have to be very passionate. If you just wanna get rich you're in the wrong business. We have 15 more years on the lease here. I would love to be here forever."
Coopertown Airboat Rides and Restaurant has stood on the Tamiami Trail (a few miles west of Miccosukee Resort & Gaming, or 11 miles west of the turnpike) since 1945. Captain Jesse Kennon the proprietor says "This is the oldest original airboat tour in the Everglades. I've been here permanently since 1981, but off and on since childhood. Our specialties here are alligator tail and frog legs, but we got burgers, dogs, breakfast and lunch.
We deep fry the gator nuggets. The meat we get fresh from Parker Island Farms just outside Sebring. They deliver us about 75 - 100 pounds a month. The frog legs come from frogs caught right here in the Everglades by different froggers we known for years, people who been livin' in the Glades their whole lives. They catch 'em early in the morning with a 4 prong gig. We used to do it ourselves, but after you hit around 30 years old you don't wanna wake up at 4 in the morning, put a flashlight on your head, catch frogs, and then go to work at 6."
The weekly Paradigm dinner at Neomi's Grill in the Trump International Sonesta Beach Resort takes eaters on a culinary acid trip; blasting their flavor modulators (tongues) through outer space with alimentary combinations that taste like they came from the great beyond. A recent Paradigm dinner saw Chef Kurtis Jantz, Chef Chad Galiano, pastry Chef Fabian De Paolo, and Chef Chris Windus from the Blue Zoo in Orlando, along with a crack team of kitchenary science professionals, team up for an 11 course meal of epic proportions. And all this happens amidst the fully functioning Neomi's Grill kitchen working their full menu. Local food blogger Frodnesor was there as well, his thoughts appear on Food For Thought Miami. Cost for Paradigm is $85, I ate free, standing up, in the kitchen. Here are some scenes from the kitchen that night.
It could be a sign of desperation for fuss-free neighborhood eats, priced right in the financial district, or merely a coincidence. Either way, Puntino Downtown was filling to the brim quickly by noon yesterday with a power lunch crowd hungry for a taste of its new "Fine Italian Cuisine."
In addition to the area's white collar set, Goldilocks would approve of
the menu here. It's front-loaded with just the right amount of
antipasti, insalate and primi piati among which to choose for a
satisfying lunch from The Boot. And each is comprised of just the
right number of ingredients. Like in Italy, the Neapolitan chefs
commanding this closet kitchen let the ingredients speak for themselves
in most dishes -- a very good sign.
BLT Steak Miami Beach chef de cuisine Sam Gorenstein, 25, shows Off his meat's marbling.
BLT Steak Miami Beach takes Chef Laurent Tourondel's formula for success and applies it to Dade County. Read Lee Klein's New Times review of the joint here and Victoria Pesce Elliot's Miami Herald review here.
BLT Steak Miami Beach's Chef De Cuisine Sam Gorenstein says "I was born in Colombia and I went to Kropp High School in Miami. I started cooking at a young age, I'm 25 now, at 17 I decided to get serious and went to Johnson & Wales. I dropped out. That's right I'm a drop out. I went to New York and started from the bottom to working at Union Pacific with Laurent Tourondel. I opened a BLT Fish with him up there and worked as a line cook. I came back to Miami and worked at Michael's (Genuine Food & Drink) and then I received the BLT offer."
The event featured cooking from chef/winemaker Chef Superdave (aka Chef David Gordon) and 5300's Executive Chef Josh Wahler, a Hell's Kitchen season 3 contestant. The four-course, seven-dish meal was billed as a "culinary dialogue" between the two chefs complete with paired Sunbox Eleven limited production 2007 releases. Here are the pictures.
Raise a white flag in trying times? Nonesense. After 17 years in business, Christine Gouveia flipped a big white bird at all the naysayers, the pouters and the wallowers, and instead chose to open her Roti Shop four hours earlier than usual yesterday to launch a breakfast service.
It's in between tropical downpours in the Design District as I wade through the humidity to Michael's Genuine Food & Drink. Summer's making its usual graceful entrance, and I'm curious about what happens to a restaurant with a menu that celebrates local foods, when the local growing season ends. What's fresh on the mind and inside the walk-in of Chef Michael Schwartz and crew in his shrine to vines?
Like delivered today, pulled-off-the-tree-today fresh?
Mark Militello is to South Florida cuisine what Muddy Waters is to Chicago Blues, an originator of the art form. As a member of the "Mango Gang" alongside Norman Van Aken, Douglas Rodriguez, and Allen Susser, Chef Mark helped pioneer "New World" cuisine, the South Florida marriage of refined technique and regional influence. That was Miami in the 1980's.
Nowadays Mark is the Executive Chef at the Regent Bal Harbour, which means he's in charge of all culinary operations on the property including 1 Bleu restaurant and the View Bar. Here are some recent Tuesday night pictures from the kitchen of 1 Bleu.
Oysters wrapped in shoestring potatoes, fried, and served with caviar
A New York chef clearly commited to his craft works the line at Bourbon Steak
Bourbon Steak has garnered plenty of press and attention for its gourmet burger menu, but the restaurant is more deserving of accolades for its commitment in theory and practice to fresh, organic, locally sourced ingredients. Chef Gabriel Fenton is a relatively young dude and he hasn't been in Miami long, but he carries the work ethic that Michael Mina saw fit for opening his brand's outposts in Los Angeles and Mexico City before settling him permanently in Miami.
Don't get me wrong, they do make a tasty burger, but take a look at these exclusive kitchen pictures and video to see what else they're up to in Aventura.
It's around 6 p.m. on a Friday at Lotus House Women's Shelter in Overtown and the dinner bell is ringing. Soon about 50 women of all ages, and some of their children, will gather for a healthy and nutritious meal prepared at cost by local catering company Hearts of Palm, formerly The Corner Muse.
Lotus House Women's Shelter is a residential facility and resource center. They house women that are homeless due to poverty, domestic abuse, release from incarceration, and untreated medical or mental illness. The shelter provides them with food, housing, education and access to resources and information that help them break the cycle of homelessness.
AP photographer Lynne Sladky told me about Lotus House after a shoot she did over there and it got me to thinking about shelter food, so I emailed Constance Collins Margulies, who runs the place, and asked her if I could come by and document dinnertime.
Two Chefs is a South Miami culinary mecca. They've been plating their innovations in contemporary American cooking for 15 years and are known for having some of the best souffles in town. Sous Chef Jose Guerrero leads a cooking class of up to ten people once a week on Saturdays. Two Chefs owner Jan Jorgensen says of Jose "he's one of my best proteges."
Chef Jose, who nine years ago started at Two Chefs, the first and only restaurant where he's ever worked, says "I was here peeling potatoes and washing dishes. Here's where I learned how to cut myself, how to burn myself, what it means to have an angry chef yelling in your face. I'm 26 now, once I'm more known I'll open a restaurant. This is the only kitchen I ever worked. I fee like my heart belongs here. I'm just a chef, I cook for a living, I have a good personality, and I love talking to people.
The cooking class is meant for anyone with a love for food. I joined on a recent Saturday and worked alongside a recently married couple who got the class as a wedding present and a couple of friend-girls who work together. We went behind the line with Chef Jose and cooked up and ate a feast. He said "See what I'm doing here? I'm improvising, being creative, going out of my bounds. This is what I try to teach my students. I motivate you to be more open minded."
Area 31 Restaurant & Lounge (recently praised by award-winning food critic Lee Klein) on the 16th floor of Downtown Miami's sexy Epic
Hotel specializes in seafood fare from Fishing Area 31, which
encompasses marine waters off the Florida coast, Central America, and
parts of South America. The restaurant offers an iconic view of Miami
including a one-of-a-kind sightline straight down Brickell Boulevard
into the lights of the city. The dining experience is balanced between
indoor and outdoor and can include a private dining room (see above) infinity-poolside casitas, cabanas, and balcony couches. Area 31 takes you out of the hustle and bustle of the streets of Miami and places you in a light-breeze-infused loungey tranquility. Now, let's go behind the line with Executive Chef John Critchley.
Andu Restaurant & Lounge is located on the ground floor of the Neo Vertika building in Brickell. It is owned by brothers Antonio and Juan Pablo Viejo and serves an eclectic Mediterranean cuisine with Spanish, North African, and Italian influences. Executive Chef Nate Martin, formerly of Nikki Beach, Pearl, and the now closed 8 1/2 saw the restaurant being built, approached the owners, introduced himself, and got the job as top chef. Says Martin: "I lived in the building and bumped into Antonio and Juan Pablo in the lobby. We started talking, and it went from there. I started off in Dallas, never went to school, and I've worked with chefs from all over the world." Check out these images from a recent Friday night dinner service at Andu.
Pascal's on Ponce, winner of three New TimesBest of Miami's and more national accolades than you can swing a cleaver at, is still going strong after all these years. Chef Pascal Oudin says in his distinct French-accented English, "We're celebrating our anniversary next year...Ten years is a lifetime in the restaurant business."
Check out this slideshow of the highly vaunted contemporary French cuisine produced in Pascal's tiny kitchen.
Christy's Restaurant is THE fine dining Coral Gables institution where rich and powerful politicians, ceo's and celebrities have talked business over lunch and dinner for 30 years. Christy's has stood at the same location under the same ownership making it one of the longest-running establishments to do so in Dade County. They're known for their steaks. Christy's catered a meal for George HW Bush on Air Force One when he was president.
Baseball flamethrower Orlando El Duque Hernandez eats there with his wife and manager in the off-season, as have Tiger Woods and Michael Jordan. Rap star Rick Ross has downed some chow there with a lady friend, ordered fruit punch with his meal, and left a good tip. Another notable good tipper is the ailing Robin Williams. According to managing partner Chris Klaic, high profile clientele eat there because "they want to be left alone to talk business."
This past weekend, the Dade County Parks and Rec and Thai-American Association sponsored the annual Asian Culture Festival, now in its 20th year at Homestead's Fruit & Spice Park. It gave fairgoers the unique opportunity to experience the cultures of Asia through the food, music, and dance of the Far East. About 30 food vendor booths offered a wide variety of authentic Asian cuisine alongside Indian, Jamaican, and even Israeli cuisines.
I met this Siam Lotus-affiliated family through their vegetable spring rolls, which were perfectly cooked to a satisfying crunch. Check out how they make 'em.
Goto Sushi Express is a great little sushi joint around Biscayne and 54th. Check out this video interview slash rolling demo with the husband-and-wife team that owns and operates the place. With sushi as with most everything, ain't nothin' like the real thing, baby, and Goto has got it. Check 'em for eat-in, takeout, or delivery.
8 comment(s) / Post a Comment
