Miami Food Blog

​Every evening, thousands of local foodies head up to their respective rooftops and issue a plaintive wail that resounds and echoes forth into the dark and balmy Miami sky: God is great, but the same can't be said for our Chinese restaurants! Actually, most of these people are obnoxious New Yorkers. And it's not exactly thousands of them. Well, all right, it's just me, and I only did it a couple of times -- but that doesn't take away from the validity of the sentiment.

Granted, things have improved with upscale newcomers Hakkasan, Philippe, and Mr. Chow -- at least for those willing to pay for an egg roll what a working class person might consider shelling out for a new pair of Wranglers. But when it comes to the sort of affordable, family-style Cantonese restaurant that every neighborhood should have, precious few do. As such, most locals know that the go-to place for all things gastronomically Chinese requires a drive to 163rd Street in North Miami Beach -- and many concur that Sang's Chinese Food is the best on that strip.

For the rest of the review of Sang's, tune in here. Or why don't you just pick up the paper for a change?

Lifefood Gourmet, which moved a while ago to an airy new location on Coral Way, promises to be a mecca for healthy eaters, vegans and raw-foodists alike. Advertised as "the most sustainable cuisine on the planet," Lifefood makes guilt-free dining easy with no dairy, wheat/gluten, soy, corn, chemicals, "strange proteins" or anything artificial -- everything on the menu is truly fresh, raw, wholesome, and thankfully, legitimately delicious.

My companion and I arrived hungry and got to work on the appetizer sampler. The cucumber rolls were filled with a sumptuous nut pate that could put any cream-based filling to shame, and the Mexican nachos were smothered with a hearty amount of guacamole and pumpkin "meat" (though it could have included a few more chips as we grabbed forks to scoop up the remainder of the topping). The nori crisps were better than the best blue corn tortilla chips. The world-traveler dining next to us couldn't help but comment that he bought some to take with him on his next trip to Costa Rica, but only made it down the block before he devoured the entire bag.

Not the Same As It Ever Was We once loved chic Maison Carlos for its nostalgic take on Italian and French "Continental" cuisine; the menu felt like a '60s throwback plunked down in the middle of Clematis Street, from the oysters Rockefeller and vichyssoise to the soupe a l'ognion and the perfectly calibrated martinis served by elegantly dinner-jacketed staff. These days the concept feels more dated than delightful, and sadly, recently both food and service have succumbed to dreaded mediocrity. From gummy lobster risotto to fish served a la Milanese but reminiscent of Mrs. Paul's, or a tossed salad  swimming in olive oil, the kitchen seems to have given up in exhaustion. Our Tuscan-style steak was too tough to chew, and a bland dessert flan did nothing to sweeten the deal. The small wine list of French, Italian, and California bottles is mostly pricey and uninspired. Even worse, the pall has settled so thoroughly over the place that even the once perfectionist staff just doesn't seem to give a damn. The only thing that remains of the old magic is the luxurious prices. Maison Carlos Lunch/Dinner/French/Italian/Continental 207 Clematis Street West Palm Beach maisoncarlos.com 561-659-6524.

Unrepentant beer drinkers, rejoice! Each week, Short Order will select one craft or import beer and give you the lowdown on it: How does it taste? What should you drink it with? Where can you find it? But mostly, it's all about the love of the brew. If you have a beer you'd like featured in Beer of the Week, let us know via a comment.

In my beer travels, I've come across two types of beer drinkers. The first want a smooth, easy-going beer - something that they can drink without pushing their palate too much or leaving much of a flavor in their mouths. The later want a beer that's going to kick their ass by way of their G.I. track; one that pushes boundaries and makes them re-evaluate what they like, and don't like, about beer.

OK, so there are probably a dozen other types of beer drinkers in between those two extremes. But I'm oversimplifying to prove a point: There are beers, and entire breweries perhaps, for both of those types of people. And if you fall squarely into category one, you can probably skip the rest of this. Go ahead, shoo. Are those people gone yet? Good, they were cramping our style. For the rest of you thrill-seeking manly-man and womenly-women types, this week's beer is a brew after your own heart. It's The Reverend, a Belgian-style quadrupel ale (no, not quadruple) from the always bold and adventurous Avery Brewing Company. 

Unrepentant beer drinkers, rejoice! Each week, Short Order will select one craft or import beer and give you the lowdown on it: How does it taste? What should you drink it with? Where can you find it? But mostly, it's all about the love of the brew. If you have a beer you'd like featured in Beer of the Week, let us know via a comment.

Damn it, people, Coloradoans need some love right now. I think I've mentioned on Short Order before that, yes, I am from Denver. And it is a shitty, shitty time to be in the Rocky Mountain Club. See, Denver is a town that's all about playing, living, and breathing kick-ass football. It's in our blood - or maybe it's that mile high air. I myself am a rabid Donkeys fan. But with the offseason the Denver Broncos have been having, I'm feeling terrible about our fair city. But hey, at least we still have beer.

That's right - Colorado is host to some of the best microbrews in the country, second in number only to California (yet Colorado still employs more brewery workers than any other state). The beer in the Rocky Mountains is great stuff: bold, vibrant, fresh, cutting edge. And Great Divide Brewing, only of Denver's oldest and most sucessful craft brewers, is at the top of that list. This week, I jumped into one of their richest offerings, Saint Bridget's Robust Porter.   

  

Unrepentant beer drinkers, rejoice! Each week, Short Order will select one craft or import beer and give you the lowdown on it: How does it taste? What should you drink it with? Where can you find it? But mostly, it's all about the love of the brew. If you have a beer you'd like featured in Beer of the Week, let us know via a comment.

If there's ever been a trend in the beer world that is a double edged sword, it's been he rampant obsession with over-hopped beer. Don't get me wrong, hops - those delicate, floral buds that give beer its characteristic bitterness - and, in particular, very hoppy beer ,are wonderful things. But around the time that Dogfish Head started to produce it's now infamous 60, 90, and 120 minute IPAs, some really lousy, over-hopped beers slipped onto the markets. Have you ever had an IPA so bitter it almost tasted of bile? Yeah, for me, that's too much. I much prefer my beer to have a balance of flavors rather than simply try to club me over the head with one extremely potent ingredient.

Almost every serious, American beer maker does an IPA now, each one claiming to be hoppier than the next. And with beer fans are snatching Double IPAs and Imperials up by the cases, these brewers would be crazy not to get in on the action. Which isn't to say all these brewers are just riding the wave, because there are some really interesting IPAs out there that could only be made by folks who truly live for the stuff. In this spirit comes Hop Stoopid, a super-hopped monster IPA from California's Lagunitas Brewing Company. But is Hop Stoopid really worth your time, or is it just another catchy name?

Unrepentant beer drinkers, rejoice! Each week, Short Order will select one craft or import beer and give you the lowdown on it: How does it taste? What should you drink it with? Where can you find it? But mostly, it's all about the love of the brew. If you have a beer you'd like featured in Beer of the Week, let us know via a comment.

Welcome back to Beer of the Week -- this edition, we'll take a beer from Oregon-based Rogue Brewery: Morimoto Signature Hazelnut Brown Ale. In 2003, Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto partnered with Rogue to create a series of Signature Ales, including Imperial Pilsner, Black Obi, and Soba Ale, which I talked about to some extent when I reviewed the Chef's Boca Raton restaurant a few months back. Those three are unique additions to Rogue's expansive catalog, the later two being brewed with roasted soba (not the noodle but the buckwheat from which it is made). But the Hazelnut Brown Ale is a slightly different story. It's widely believed that the beer is basically a repackaging of Rogue's Hazelnut Brown Nectar (in fact, there is no listing on Rogue's site for the Morimoto version of this beer). But does that mean Rogue slipped us a mickey on this one? Read on to find out. 

Guaranteed cure for a case of the crabs.

Truluck's seafood restaurant got its start in Texas, but its appearance in Florida is reason for stone-crab lovers to rejoice: The company keeps its own crab fishing fleet of 16 boats outside of Naples, Florida, where it hauls in enough crab to provide the chain with seriously fresh claws during season: "From our traps to your table in less than 24 hours." You can chow down the large claws for $10.99 each any time, either alone or as part of a "build your own" seafood tower, but every Monday night at Truluck's is a crab massacre -- $59.99 for all the stone crab claws you can eat, plus grilled asparagus and mashed potatoes. It may sound like mayhem, but you'll be sucking those claws in style: the Boca Raton location is beautifully appointed with leather booths inside and elegant tables on the terrace, plus a wide-ranging wine list offering dozens of wines by the glass or flight. There's also a good selection of fresh -- never frozen -- fish that changes depending on availability, either simply grilled or fancied up, from Gulf red snapper, wild salmon, and black cod to black grouper Pontchartrain blanketed in crab and shrimp sauce. The stone crabs we ate last night were as good as the ones we had in Everglades City, and the snapper and grouper was perfectly seasoned and cooked. Recommended for fish lovers.

Truluck's
351 Plaza Real
Boca Raton
561-391-0755 

John Linn

Unrepentant beer drinkers, rejoice! Each week, Short Order will select one craft or import beer and give you the lowdown on it: How does it taste? What should you drink it with? Where can you find it? But mostly, it's all about the love of the brew. If you have a beer you'd like featured in Beer of the Week, let us know via a comment.

For our first edition of Beer of the Week, we're bringing you a rather unconventional brew: Lakefront Brewery's New Grist. It's a beer brewed not with wheat or barley but with sorghum, a tropical grain typical of the Southwest Pacific, and rice extract. That means New Grist is gluten-free, making it a perfect choice for those with intolerance to wheat. It's also just a damned fine, highly drinkable beer that's perfect for the approaching spring and summer months here in Florida.

Critique and more after the jump: