Four Twenty Five is a contemporary, elevated restaurant from Chef Chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten. This restaurant was open on Christmas Day, and it was on our list for a while. They offered a tasting menu which mostly resembled items off their normal menu. The day prior, I was very easily able to book reservations without any issues for 2 at 4 PM. We arrived about 15 minutes early, and they had us wait in the bar area while they prepared our table.

As we aim to complete our dining in Miami, this was the last place on our list. Joe’s Stone Crabs is one of those institutionalized restaurant establishments for Miami (Beach). I think of it as their Katz’s to New York City, where it’s just been around for a while, and it still continues to attract all types of people. One of the reasons this was on my list was because it has stone crab claws, which are very meaty and comes in sizable portions. Lastly and fortunately, it was also stone crab claw season, which means the claws are freshly harvested and not frozen. I was able to book a reservation for 2 for 5:30 PM, but we decided to arrive about 15-20 minutes early, and we were easily seated in the back hall.

One of the inspirations and motivations for this Miami trip is to visit the former mansion of Gianni Versace, the Italian designer who was murdered at his doorstep. The mansion is located in the Art Deco district, and it offers some very interesting designs, including pebbled mosaic walls, storied history, and some interesting statues onsite. The lunch area is located adjacent to the pool area. We were able to book a reservation for 2 for 1:00 PM on a Sunday afternoon fairly easily a few weeks in advance. We were fortunately able to check in about 30 minutes early, and they seated us pretty quickly.

Ogawa, translated into “Little River” is a one Michelin Star sushi restaurant in an area that looked very sketchy and barren. As a visitor to Miami, we took a ride-share to arrive here. From several online reviews of this compared to the other Japanese Michelin starred restaurants, they all spoke highly of this as being more inventive compared to the others. Having been to several NYC Japanese omakase or kaiseki restaurants already, I was hoping for something that was a bit more exquisite considering the rent prices here were probably far less than NYC.

Chef Kwame Onwuachi has an amazing restaurant we’ve been to in NYC recently, Tatiana. When I heard of him opening another restaurant not in NYC, but in Miami, I was eyeballing reservations for this for a few months. The menu seemed very similar to Tatiana, and the wait staff told us there were some similarities. The Miami scene has not seemed to catch on to his foods yet, so we were able to make a reservation for 2 on a Friday night without any issues just a few weeks in advance. Chef Kwame is a James Beard Award-winning chef, and we had some expectations for this food tonight because we had a pretty good time when we went to Tatiana.

Ariete has been around for many years, and it received notoriety due to its duck press. It was one of the few restaurants in the United States that had this contraption, where you squeeze out the innards to extract the juices and reuse it for a sauce. Ariete has been featured in the Michelin Guide and has received a Star for a few years now. We were tempted to try the tasting menu, which was a sampling of their menu, but we opted to go for the duck. I recall previously you used to be able to add the duck to the tasting menu, but we felt that would just be too much food. Ariete has been defined as a upscale restaurant that merges old Latin traditions, South Florida ingredients, and high-level French technique. It could only have been born in Miami.

For our trip to Miami, Florida, we booked a series of restaurants to try out. Our first restaurant was Stubborn Seed. This was highly rated by various Miami bloggers and food reviewers as a consistent Michelin dining restaurant. This restaurant also holds a Michelin Star for both dining and sustainability. It was quite easy to get a reservation a few weeks ahead of time, so we stopped by on a Wednesday evening at 5:30 PM.

Tatiana is a very popular restaurant, located in the Lincoln Center, from Chef Kwame Onwuachi. Born and raised in New York City, Chef Kwame opened this as his first NYC restaurant, and it immediately got a lot of public attention. He has appeared on many cooking shows, and the James Beard Foundation named him as the 2019 Rising Star Chef of the Year. Since Tatiana’s opening, reservations have been difficult to come by, and many people resort to waiting in lines hours before the opening. My partner had been here before and wanted to show me this restaurant’s flavors. They waited in line ahead for an hour (~4 PM) before opening in 25 degree(F) weather.

Nuyores is a new Peruvian restaurant located in the former spot of Flex Mussels in the West Village and Chelsea boundaries. The restaurant’s cuisine was inspired by the rich flavors of Peru and offers Chilean wines. I stumbled onto this higher-end restaurant looking for something new to try, and I knew my partner loves Peruvian cuisine. We’ve had mostly misses in NYC because they compare NYC Peruvian food to a classic Los Angeles establishment, Mario’s. We made a reservation for 5:30 PM on a Friday evening easily a few days in advance.

Coqodaq is the second restaurant from owners of Cote Korean steakhouse. This restaurant like Cote is difficult and annoying to snag reservations for a reasonable time. I checked out their Thanksgiving menu, and it seemed close enough to their regular menu. I ended up making a reservation for 1:30 PM on a Thursday fairly easily a few days prior.

This restaurant also was featured in an episode of “Knife Edge: Chasing Michelin Stars”, and it was interesting to learn about the attention they provided to something as straight forward as Korean fried chicken.