I hadn't been to Miami in years so I was excited to spend some time down there for a few days for work in December. Unfortunately the conference I was at was in Hollywood, FL which is about 40 minutes away from South Beach but it's a super cheap Uber ride away, so it was definitely worth the hassle to to head down there. Laura, Jen and I decided to head out of Hollywood since there's nothing to do there and opted for dinner at The Bazaar, a Jose Andres establishment. Funnily enough, he's a huge name in the DC food scene yet I've never actually been to any of his restaurants before, so I was glad to check this place out.
It's located in the ever so chic SLS Hotel - a typical South Beach hotel right off the beach with a modern and trendy interior and equally modern and trendy clientele. The menu here is split up into 3 sections of tapas: Miami Meets the World which is a fusion of Miami and Asian food; Spain Yesterday which is more traditional Spanish food; and Spain Today which is Spanish food with a more modern slant. Our waiter suggested about 8-9 dishes so we tried to pick something from each section: from the Miami Meets World section we got the Bao Con Leche ($18), Dragon Fruit Ceviche ($17), and Brussels Sprouts ($10); from the Spain of Yesterday and Today we got the Fish en Papillote ($22), Seared Scallops ($16) and Croquetas de Jamon ($13). There were a bunch of other great sounding dishes but we were also saving room for dessert. Our waiter was super nice and very helpful in navigating us through the super extensive menu.
The Bao Con Leche is their version of steamed pork belly buns and it was quite tasty and satisfying. To be honest, I'm not really sure what the fusion part of this dish was as it seemed like a pretty straight forward pork bun to me. Next we tried the croquetas de jamon - they were small bite size fritters made with delicious Iberico ham on the inside. I would have preferred a bit more cheesey goodness on the inside but it was a great snack to pop in your mouth. The 3rd dish was the Dragon Fruit Ceviche, which is one of their signature dishes. It's super unique - they carved out half of a dragon fruit and served it with raw tuna, lemon, hibiscus and some dragon fruit foam on top. I was a bit unsure of this dish at first but after a few bites I found it to be super refreshing and definitely something I've never had before. The dragon fruit is light, mild and crunchy which was a good pairing with the tuna. The brussels sprouts were your typical roasted version - tasty but definitely something that I could make on my own at home. The main dishes were the fish en papillote (basically steamed fish wrapped in paper) and the seared scallops. The fish was presented in dramatic fashion with 2 waiters coming to "unwrap" the fish but taste wise it was pretty mild and kind of boring - it was a nice and tender white fish. The scallops were served with toasted pine nuts and while they were seared nicely and large in size, there were only 2 of them which was disappointing.
We saved room for dessert and went for the s'mores chocolate cake ($12) and the key lime pie ($12). As many of you know, chocolate is not my favorite dessert but when it's described as chocolate cake served with toasted marshmallow, caramelized bananas, and peanut butter ice cream, it's hard to say no to that. As delicious sounding as it was, it was just too rich and decadent for me, especially after having snacked on a bunch of rich and heavy dishes earlier. As for the key lime pie (we had to order it since we are in Florida after all), it was a deconstructed version with all the different components splayed out on the plate separately. It was sour, delicious and definitely reaffirmed that I'm much more of a fruity non-chocolate dessert gal.
Overall, this was a fun Miami style dinner. It's great people watching, lovely service and unique food. It is a bit pricey given the amount of food served but it is South Beach, it's right on the main drag of Collins Ave, and tapas style, so it's to be expected that you'll pay a bit more. Total bill: $102/pp with tax, tip and drinks
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