Aside from cheap Major League Baseball and speeding through school zones, summer isn’t prime time for anything in Miami. Still, a plucky crop of new Miami restaurants sprung up over the past few months, so-called slowdown be damned. Here’s a look at the best new restaurants in Miami, and why all seven are a good reason to break out of your restaurant rut.
Allegro Ma Non Troppo
Brickell and “reasonable check” don’t usually end up in the same sentence, so Allegro Ma Non Troppo, from the Dolores But You Can Call Me Lolita crew next door, is a nice surprise. The menu is ten items on an offered up on clipboard and you check off what you want. Get the chicken cotoletta alla Milanese and the Caesar, made with Cardini’s original 1924 dressing, and order the chocolate Basque cheesecake because it’s worth it just for the photo opp alone. All four wines are $9.99 a glass (yes, in Brickell), and we ate the entire menu with several rounds each and still didn’t crack $300 with tax and tip. The space is small, under 40 seats, so bring a date or a friend - but maybe not the whole group chat.
Pro Tip: No reservations, so go for happy hour, 4 to 7 daily with 50% off drinks. Take the Metromover if you can and skip the parking fight. — OF
@allegromanontroppomiami // 1000 S Miami Ave, Brickell
Buccan
Palm Beach’s most OMFG good, impossible to score a resy at just opened in the heart of the Gables. Located on Miracle Mile, Buccan is the most YES spot of the summer. With impeccably dimmed lighting and a cool a$$ bar that beats Houston’s down the street for 2598 reasons, Buccan is the kind of restaurant where I suggest ordering every appetiser in the restaurant. And most certainly, from one to five martinis. Yes. Perhaps that happened in this household. So, the short rib empanada, the hotdog and the tuna crisps and the wood grilled carrots are most certainly enough for a dinner. And it keeps things creative!
Pro Tip: The HOT DOG PANINI. Get two. And many of the vegetables on the menu come from Chef Clay Conley’s farm in Gainesville! —EMN
@buccancoralgables //100 Miracle Mile., Coral Gables.
CHO Funky Asian Bistro
Not that Miami was ever lacking for Asian restaurants. What Miami was lacking in, however, were fun Asian restaurants that didn’t treat dinner like sacred Shogun ritual. Enter Cho Funky Asian Bistro, a new South Beach eatery strategically adorned in Asian knick-knacks. The menu is packed with bold, spicy flavors and an addictive chili crisp, with dishes like Kung pao chicken served in playful ceramic Chinese food containers. The bar is a great spot to post up for a drink too, feeling just enough like an in-the-know speakeasy to seem under-the-radar.
Pro tip: The chili garlic sauce could make a styrofoam peanut taste good. Get a few extra orders and dabble it on your dinner. -MM
@choasianbistro // 1209 17th St., South Beach
EOS Garden
In a city that bulldozes its history almost as enthusiastically as it lines up for mediocre pizza, a great restaurant in an historic space is a unicorn. Which is why I was especially impressed with EOS Garden, where chef Halit Akuva puts out Turkish-inspired food that can rival any place in Miami. What makes EOS so special, though, is its setting inside the historic Bay Shore Pump House, a coral home with a sprawling tropical back patio. Enjoy your shashlik steak skewers and stuffed eggplant by the verdant back pond, as lights twinkle off the water and make it a perfect romantic dinner spot.
Pro tip: Get a sommelier recommendation for the wine. It’s an unusual collection of stuff from Turkey and Lebanon, and this is the kind of place to discover something new. -MM
@eosgarden // 5808 NE 4th Ct., MiMo
Flight West
Step inside the dim-lit interior of Flight West, and you’d truly believe you’re in a Gatsby party. The New York transplant is bringing a refined, upscale atmosphere to South Miami for locals to enjoy without straying too far from home. The New World cuisine feels homey, from the smoked baby back ribs to the prime hangar, but it’s the cocktails that will blow you away. The Luxe Twilight is reminiscent of a blue raspberry Sour Patch Kid and the blackberry foam on The Juniper may be more addictive than the drink itself.
Pro tip: Despite just opening its doors this summer, they’ve already thrown together a very solid Miami Spice menu featuring one of the best churros the city has to offer. -BG
@flightwest // 5894 Sunset Drive, South Miami
San Marco
For those looking for REALLY good food, in a spot that’s TRULY unpretentious - yet, you feel that you are NOT in Miami. Well, enter San Marco. With endless Italian restaurants out there, this one takes the cake. With vibes that equate to Milan meets Manhattan, this South of Fifth gem has the best chicken in town. Their creamy tomato rigatoni is also the sh…. And my bestie Lauren Foster swears by the risotto, stating “I go sit at the bar by myself and have the riso and wine and the chicken and I could eat it every day until the day I die and not get sick of it.”
Pro Tip: Make a resy. It gets jam packed. And it’s the kind of place where you run into the OG locals - be it Crispy or Gingi Beltran, so don’t show up in LuluLemon. —EMN
@sanmarco.miami //840 1st St., Miami Beach
STAND.
The Shingo team, the darlings of Miami’s omakase scene, opened STAND on Miracle Mile this summer, and when their publicist told me there’s a line every day, I nodded politely and did not believe her. Well, I be damned, there was a line out the door the entire hour we were there, and it was still going when we walked back past an hour later. It’s modeled on Tokyo convenience stores and kissaten, and it’s some of the most interesting fast casual-ish food in Miami right now: egg salad sandos, shio pan, thick-cut toasts, a chicken katsu sando with two cutlets stacked inside, and ceremonial-grade matcha whisked in front of you at a bar where you stand (it’s in the name). The strawberry matcha is the one you’ve seen on Instagram, and the sandos are all very good. But if you’re not a line person (a la Matt Meltzer), sit this one out.
Pro Tip: Street parking on the Mile is a fantasy, so use the city garage on Andalusia. —OF
@stand.miami // 98 Miracle Mile, Coral Gables