What's Next?

I was very grateful to have been asked to participate in a Facebook Live discussion on “Check Please! South Florida” earlier this week with host Michelle Bernstein, Palm Beach chef Lindsay Autry, and Fort Lauderdale food writer Mike Mayo, to talk about the future of the South Florida restaurant industry in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Thanks to all who joined us live; if you missed it and want to watch, I've embedded it above and you can find it here: “Check Please! Conversation with Michelle Bernstein."^[1]

I wrote down a lot of notes in preparation for the talk, and thought it would be worth sharing and expanding on some of those here. Many of these thoughts will not be anything new if you've been following the effect of this crisis on the restaurant world and food supply chains. But as we reach an inflection point – this week Miami-Dade County began the process of lifting “shelter in place” orders and authorized restaurants to reopen with limited capacity – it seemed a good time to think about where we’ve been and what’s to come.

THE RESILIENCE AND COMMUNITY MINDEDNESS OF THE RESTAURANT INDUSTRY:

Let me start by saying how much I admire the resilience, the resourcefulness, the perseverance, and the care for their employees, their customers, and the community at large displayed by so many chefs and restaurant operators. When this crisis and shutdown hit, the immediate reaction from so many of the folks I know was to help: to try to take care of the employees they had to lay off as best they could, and then to provide meals and groceries for first responders, laid off workers, and anyone in the community who might be struggling to find a meal.

I do business bankruptcies for a living, and in my career have never seen a greater challenge – not just because of the shutdown, but because of the uncertainty of what comes next. To be looking to help others, while the businesses they’ve spent years of hard work and money building are facing a genuinely existential threat, is a truly remarkable response, but one that seems to come naturally to so many who have chosen this path.

(continued ...)

Miami Restaurants Doing Takeout / Delivery During the Coronavirus Shutdown

Hope everyone's staying safe and healthy. Since many have asked, here's a quick and incomplete list of Miami restaurants that are offering takeout, delivery, prepared meals, cooking kits, groceries, fresh produce, wine and cocktails as we shelter in place during the coronavirus shutdown. If there's something good that's been left out, let me know. If there's an option to order directly from the restaurant, keep in mind this will save the restaurant substantial commissions that the delivery services charge them.

Some other lists that you can check:

Miami Eats (courtesy of the Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau)

Curbside Miami (handy spreadsheet format, sortable by neighborhood or any other field)

Infatuation Miami Neighborhood Takeout and Delivery Guide (organized by neighborhood)

Edible South Florida with a map of South Florida restaurants open for takeout and delivery, and a list of places to buy fresh produce.

Downtown Development Authority list of Downtown Miami restaurants doing takeout and delivery, with another list of participants in its "Go Local Program" (10% off if you order direct from the restaurant).

--------- THE LIST (updated 5.9.2020)

Now organized by neighborhood!

Aventura / North Miami Beach:

Captain Jim's (North Miami) doing takeout 12-6pm, call 305.892.2812 to order.

Hadekel 1 (North Miami Beach) doing takeout and delivery, order through the website.

Houston's (North Miami Beach) open for take-out with curbside pickup, order through the website.

Bal Harbour / Surfside:

Josh's Deli (Surfside) open Fri-Sun for takeout, pre-order for pickup, menu on Instagram.

Hillstone (Bal Harbour) open for take-out with curbside pickup (and delivery at Bal Harbour), order through the website.

Makoto (Bal Harbour) open for takeout and delivery 12-8pm, order through the website.

Surf Club (Surfside) is doing take-out of a three-course family meal for $29pp, menu changes daily, check menu and order through their Tock website.

Buena Vista / MiMo District / Little Haiti:

Blue Collar (MiMo District) starting takeout / delivery Tuesday 3/24, order through their website.

Boia De (Buena Vista) doing take-out  and delivery 12-8pm  with pickup through the ventanita, order through their website.

Dogma Grill (MiMo District) open for takeout 12-8pm, call 305.759.3433 to order.

El Bagel (MiMo District) doing pickup only with online ordering at El-bagel.com (closed Tu-We).

Lil Laos (Little Haiti) popping up Saturday and Sunday 5/2-5/3 at Sixty10, check IG for details.

Luna Pasta e Dolci (MiMo District) open for takeout plus pasta kits, order through their website.

Mandolin Aegean Bistro (Buena Vista) reopening for takeout Tues. 4/28, order through their website.

Ms. Cheezious (MiMo District) taking online orders for takeout on their website or delivery through the usual suspects.

Phuc Yea (MiMo District) doing curbside takeout / delivery direct through their website starting at 6pm, use Corona10 for 10% discount.

Pinch Kitchen (MiMo District - ish) open for take-out, curbside pick-up and delivery 11:30am-9pm.

Sixty10 (Little Haiti) doing takeout / delivery 11am-8pm.

Sottosale (MiMo District) doing takeout through dedicated website or call 786.634.1005.

(continued ...)

deep thoughts: Silverlake Bistro | Normandy Isles (Miami Beach)

The restaurant review is having a midlife crisis. So says this guy, anyway. While there's a kernel of truth in his identification of the symptoms, I'm far less convinced of his diagnosis as to the cause. At its heart, his claim is that the problem is the restaurant review format itself:

I just want to deal with one of the genre’s challenges — namely, its form. ... To be blunt, the traditional review is a terrible vessel for inventive prose, contrarian opinions, and nuanced arguments about the mystery and meaning of food.

Well, on that point, I must beg to differ. Good writing transcends genre. Restaurant reviews are as useful a format as any to paint a portrait of of a city, as Jonathan Gold did so beautifully for Los Angeles, to explore social and cultural issues, as Soleil Ho does at the San Francisco Chronicle, to craft poetry like Ligaya Mishan does at the New York Times, to entertain and enlighten with wit and snark, like Jay Rayner does at The Guardian. The problem isn't the vessel; it's all about what you're putting inside.

Also: there's a whole universe of food writing that isn't restaurant reviews. That's not to say I believe reviews should be devoid of any discussion of broader issues – if you've been reading here at all, you know I'm prone to plenty of digressions – but rather, that there are lots of ways to talk about culture through the lens of food, reviews being just one of them.

Also, also: I am perhaps one of a dying breed who believe that the underlying purpose of a restaurant review – to help answer the question, "Where should I want to eat?" – while not as noble or important as curing cancer, is still itself a worthwhile and valuable endeavor.^[1]

Having said that, it does seem that the restaurant review industry, in some quarters anyway, is in the doldrums. I don't think the problem is the format, though no doubt it is kind of a bore to read reviews that just grind through the "here's the apps, here's the mains, here's the desserts" routine by rote. To my mind, it's more a combination of the decline of media outlets that provide the budgetary, editorial and promotional support for restaurant criticism, and the rise of crowd-sourced opinions a la Yelp. Combine that with a lack of diversity and community representation in the voices that still get heard. Throw a little "death of the blog at the hands of Twitter and then Instagram" into the mix too. Sprinkle some "influencers doing it for the freebies" over the top like finishing salt. And what you have is a dearth of credible, reliable voices motivated and able to write thoughtfully and critically about restaurants.

(continued ...)

favorite dishes of 2019: worldwide version

I made a decision this year to split my "favorite dishes" list between Miami and elsewhere. You can see the 25 best things I ate in Miami over here. This list (All lists! All the time! At least until the end of the year!) covers the best things I ate everywhere else in 2019.

We started the year in Marfa, Texas^[1] before taking a long drive to Austin, which is a really fun town where there's a taco truck, a BBQ place, a beer hall, and a live music venue on every block. There were brief visits to New York and San Francisco, and then a wonderful week in Italy (Rome and Venice, broken up by a day in Florence), where I practiced some immersion therapy to get over my biases against Italian food.^[2] Back to the Bay Area for a week. A long weekend in Los Angeles, making only the tiniest dent in the long list of places I want to visit in what may be the best eating town in the U.S. And finally, a late year return to N.Y. before the calendar flipped over.

charred cabbage, satsuma butter - Emmer & Rye (Austin)

Our first dinner in Austin was at chef Kevin Fink's Emmer & Rye, a place with a focus on heirloom grains (as the name suggests), local seasonal products, carts circling the dining room with little snacks a la State Bird Provisions, and generally speaking, some really creative stuff happening in the kitchen. I enjoyed everything, but especially this dish of charred cabbage, satsuma butter, trout roe and mustard greens. Savory, smoky, citrusy, and more, it was odd and delicious.

(See all my pictures from Emmer & Rye.)

(continued ...)