Courtesy of Hard Rock Cafe

Miami Hard Rock Cafe executive chef and Magic City native Gideon Horowitz gets back to burger basics this Memorial Day.

Memorial Day is fast approaching, so what does this mean for food? Burgers. Lots and lots of thick and juicy burgers. And grilling them over an open flame, turning raw slabs of bovine muscle protein into delectable, denaturized eats.

It's all about the meat, the bun, and the grill. Everything else is lagniappe. Gideon Horowitz, executive chef at the Hard Rock Cafe in Miami, is here to offer some no-bullshit tips on building the best burger.

See also:
- Memorial Day Grilling in Miami
- Top Five Miami Parks For a Memorial Day Barbecue

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Talk to any successful chef and he (or she) will tell you that opening a restaurant takes grit and guts. Expect to drop substantial cash, kill your social life, and put an end to luxuries like sleep and days off. To top it off, you must enter the culinary battlefield knowing most restaurants won't make it past their first year.

When Adrianne Calvo opened Chef Adrianne's Vineyard Restaurant & Wine Bar at age 22, many thought she couldn't check a single box off that list. She garnered attention young, had little experience, and was opening an eatery in West Kendall. Pretty ballsy considering Kendall is where dreams go to die.

Fast forward six years. Calvo is hosting a celebration tonight (Thursday) commemorating not just surviving, but thriving. She's serving a six-course, prix-fixe dinner ($75) beginning at 7pm tonight. The meal includes some of her favorite dishes served at the restaurant and includes complimentary cocktails courtesy of Diplomático Rum.

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Michael's Genuine Food & Drink

Michael Schwartz dishes about his new projects.

Michael Schwartz has a lot on his plate.

While the paint has barely dried on his new Design District restaurant, the Cypress Room, the chef and restaurateur is working on finalizing his place at the Raleigh Hotel in South Beach and is planning an eatery at the new SLS Hotel in Brickell, scheduled to open in 2015.

Add to that roster his two Michael's Genuine Food & Drink locations (in Miami and Grand Cayman), Harry's Pizzeria, and his collaboration with Royal Caribbean to design the menus for the cruise line's 150 Central Park restaurants on board mega ships Oasis of the Seas and, soon, Allure of the Seas, and you've got one busy guy.

We asked the James Beard winner about the new Cypress Room, how he manages multiple locations, and what's next in his quest to build a restaurant empire.

Read also:
- Michael Schwartz to Open the Cypress Room
- New SLS Brickell Will Michael Schwartz Restaurant, Katsuya, and The Bazaar by Jose Andres

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World Red Eye courtesy of Key Group

Geoffrey Zakarian and Anne Burrell pose after a live taping of Food Talk.

The tents have been taken down for another year and the 2013 edition of the South Beach Wine and Food Festival is but a memory. There is, however, one way to relive the magic made when you get some of the world's funniest and most talented chefs together in one city and add some alcohol.

During the festival, dapper celebrity chef Geoffrey Zakarian hosted a one hour long live taping of Food Talk for SiriusXM satellite radio at the James Royal Palm's pool deck.

During that one hour, Zakarian managed to chat with Andrew Zimmern, Anne Burrell, Guy Fieri, Al Roker, Lee Schrager, Curtis Stone, Marc Murphy, Mark Summers, Sunny Anderson and Scott Conant.

Though you can't see some of the crazy moments we did when we watched live -- like when Fieri and Zakarian smoked us out with cigars and downed copious amounts of tequila -- the show, which airs tonight, March 15, on SiriusXM's Stars (channel 107) at 8 p.m. will still be packed with some great stories (did you know, by the way, that Guy Fieri started out by selling pretzels as a kid?)

We spoke with Zakarian about the show, his very apparent love for Miami, and what his plans for the future are. Read on now and tune in later:

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It's no secret -- Hispanic culture centers around good food. No matter what their country of origin, traditional dishes are a source of pride and familiarity for most Hispanics. But they carry certain health risks.

The prevalence of diabetes among Hispanics is high, so high that it borders on an epidemic. According to the Centers for Disease Controll, lifetime risk estimates for developing diabetes is high for both Hispanic men and women. Hispanic women born in 2000 have a 52.5 percent risk of developing diabetes in their lifetime while Hispanic men have a 45.4 percent risk. That compares, for example, to a 31.2 percent risk for non-Hispanic white females and 26.7 percent risk among non-Hispanic white males.

"Unfortunately, for the Latin community it is hard to adjust for and educate about diabetes because we don't want to give up our traditions," said cookbook author celebrity chef Leticia Moreinos Schwartz, who Sunday stopped at Calle Ocho Street Festival as part of Merck Pharmaceutical's Cuida tu Diabetes, Cuida tu Corazon (Taking Diabetes To Heart). With help from the American Diabetes Association and Jefe's Original Food Truck, Schwartz demonstrated how just a few small measures can make a big difference for those suffering from diabetes.

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Courtesy of Food Network

Anne Burrell

For more on the South Beach Wine & Food Festival, check out New Times' Taste guide, hitting newsstands Thursday, February 21.

Anne Burrell is the Food Network's bubbly, blond ambassador of good times and great eats. A frequent face on the network, she's taken turns on Iron Chef America and Best Thing I Ever Ate, hosted Secrets of a Restaurant Chef, and just kicked off season four of Worst Cooks in America and season two of Chef Wanted With Anne Burrell. Her second cookbook is set to be released later this year (her first was a New York Times bestseller), and she's participating in a whole host of events at the South Beach Wine & Food Festival. She's kind of a dynamo.

When it comes to the nonstop food frenzy of the festival, this ain't Anne's first rodeo. She's a five-year veteran of the annual shindig, and her tenure has seen some memorable moments. Audiences aren't likely to forget when she sprayed a fellow Food Network star with prosecco or encouraged her audience to "spank your pork chops!"
We spoke to Burrell about her favorite bar in the 305, her relationship with Robert Irvine, and her obsession with karaoke.

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Eddie Huang

Eddie Huang and Jada Stevens.

The first part of Eddie Huang's Fresh Off The Boat Miami episode airs today on YouTube and starts with the New York chef and author riding around on the Bang Bus with Jada Stevens, discussing how she's stays fit, what she eats before a shoots and cutting a scene with an average Joe.

When Vice magazine offered Huang the chance to go anywhere to film the show, he said Miami was one of the first cities he wanted to visit.

Read Also:
- On the Bang Bus with Eddie Huang: Looking Beyond Midtown Trends
- Enter The Pork Bun: Richard Hales and Eddie Huang's Twitter Smackdown

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Eddie Huang

Jada Stevens and Eddie Huang doing Miami.

People come to Miami for a lot of different reasons. Some come to escape cold climate, some life under a leftist dictator and others just don't want to pay state income tax. Eddie Huang wanted to ride the Bang Bus and shout out Miami's cultural and gastronomic diversity.

"I really like the hood. There's a real community, those people are there, they grew up there, they live there," he said. "There are so many interesting native Miamians that I hope get to own the city, do their thing and show the world what they have."

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Nadia G via Facebook

The host of Cooking Channel's Bitchin' Kitchen, Nadia G

It was past dusk this last Thursday, and Wynwood's Awarehouse was lit up in shades of scarlet. A line had formed outside, and the crowd was trickling into the expansive building. They creeped into the warehouse, anxious for a glimpse of Nadia Giosia, the host of Cooking Channel's Bitchin' Kitchen.

The event, called "A Bitchin' Evening", celebrated Giosia's partnership with Apothic Wines -- the popular brand of blended wine that features two offerings, red or white. Nadia G. (as she is known) had prepared recipes to pair with these libations. The stage was set-up like a kitchen. It displayed a food processor, and bowls of butter and raw sugar.

The warehouse filled up quickly with people. Suddenly, Giosia dashed onto the platform. Wearing a teeny striped red and white dress, the 32-year-old walked across the stage. Her legs were toned, lengthened by fierce scarlet four-inch heels. The spotlight illuminated her many tattoos. The ink on her forearm spelled the word hungry in large cursive letters.

"We're going to get this party started, alright?" she asked rhetorically. The attractive TV host spoke in her signature lilting accent -- part Italian, part Quebecois, part English. "I'm going to say, 'go', and ya'all are going to say, 'nads'. Together, we are going to say, 'gonads'!"

The crowd responded in unison, murmuring with laughter. They obediently shouted the syllable. With that, Nadia G. had captured every spectator's attention. Her segment was half comedy skit, half cooking show, and it was a resounding hit.

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Short Order knows that when it comes to dining out, few people are pickier than a professional chef. We talk to some of Miami's top chefs to learn about their favorite restaurants in town and the dishes they recommend at each.

Timon Balloo, closing in on his third anniversary as exec chef and partner at Sugarcane Raw Bar Grill in Midtown, has been attracting lots of attention and accolades since the place opened in early 2010. He was named "Miami's Best Up-and-Coming Chef" in Miami New Times' Short Order Awards and "Chef of The Year-Miami" by Eater, and was nominated in Food & Wine's "The People's Best New Chef" competition. Under Balloo's direction, Sugarcane has been named Miami New Times' "Best Restaurant" and Eater's "Restaurant of the Year," and was a semifinalist in the James Beard Foundation's "Best New Restaurant" category.

See also:
- Best Chefs_of_2010
- Behind the Line atSugarcane
- Sugarcane in Midtown Tastes the Sweet Smell of Success

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