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REVIEW | Area 31 in Epic Hotel

By on November 14, 2011 in mmm! - mini mangia memoir, Reviews, Uncategorized
Area 31 - Tuna Tartare

1st Course - Tuna Tartare

Quite possibly, our worst restaurant experience in a LONG time. 

If you’ve been reading this food blog, you’ve probably noticed that the overall ratings tend to be pretty “above average”.  Is it because I’m nice… eh maybe.  Is it because I try to find the positive in each dining experience…perhaps.  Is it because I don’t want to ruin a restaurants’ reputation based on my one experience…probably.  For instance,  what if I went on bad night, ordered the wrong thing, or just happened to get the only cranky waitress? No need to have a foul review living on the internet for all eternity, right?   Yes, in most cases…but my friends, this is NOT one of them!

Our Mangia Memoir (what we’ll remember):

Our pal Irmaliz was celebrating her birthday and her handsome boyfriend, Ignacio, planned a small gathering at a local restaurant on the water, for his beloved.  Very thoughtful and well orchestrated by Iggy.   He even negotiated a group discount and bringing in some of her favorite wine. Irmz was surrounded by close pals and a promising menu of delightful food.  Unfortunately, the menu did not stand up to the good company.  ALLLLL ABOARD!  There is a trainwreck-a coming!

The Verdict:

  • 1 out of 5
  • FOOD: Tasting Menu specifically – probably the tiniest portions ever.  It was almost comical. After 5 courses, we left hungry. Needed a double-cheese burger from Mickey-D’s.  “A for effort” in terms of creativity, but c’mon… yes, we know what a “tasting menu” is, but it was taken waaay too literally here.  We came to eat.  Sorry chef – food was good, but increase the portions, please!
  • SERVICE:  started off bad and got progressively worse.  Remember that “group discount” Iggy organized? Yea, well that took 45 minutes to figure out.
  • AMBIANCE:  standard attempt at a luxury Miami restaurant. Probably would have had a different feel if the experience wasn’t so bad.
  • Would We Go Back?:  NOOOOOOOOOO
Items Ordered (5 course Tasting Menu):
  1. Tuna Tartare – with jalapeno, thinly sliced onion: good flavor, but not even a bites worth
  2. Duck Confit Soup – full flavored broth, and shredded duck was a nice addition.  Unfortunately, portion left you wanting more….way more.
  3. Cobia “Rueben”: basically a creative “take” on a deconstructed Rueben sandwich.  Fun idea, good flavors, but the sushi grade fish with the Rueben flavor kinda wigged me out a little.  It was good, but was the one portion I could have done less with.
  4. Steak & Veal Cheeks:  Really delicious, perfectly cooked meats.  They should have left the steak knife in the kitchen because there wasn’t enough meat to even cut.
  5. Tomato Foam Ice Cream:  nice try on creativity and don’t remember all the ingredients, but nobody finished it.
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MMM! | Finally, an Italian Market!

By on September 8, 2011 in MMM! - Major Mangia Memoir!, Reviews

Laurenzo's Italian Market Miami

Life without an Italian Market, is a life not worth living!

It’s been nearly 2 years.  2 years without the joy of having immediate access to fine Italian delectables.  Paper-thin salty prosciutto, milky fresh mozzarella, spicy “gabagool” (capicola) and guilt-ridden mortadella with pistachios.  Mama Mia!!!  I could go on FOR-EV-ER!  It’s sick, the amount of pure and utter pleasure I find from smoked meats (and don’t be gross!).

Sweet baby Jesus answered our prayers and alerted us to Laurenzo’s Italian Market in North Miami Beach.  For all of you Italians/Italian-Americans in South Florida, fret no more….this is your spot!  Maybe check it out this weekend?

Our “Mangia Memoir” (what we’ll remember)

We drove 30 minutes in Tony’s HOT. AS. HELL. car without air conditioning, obnoxiously singing to the soundtrack of In the Heights the Musical, just to keep our minds off the fact that our flesh was melting off. But when we got there….GLORY!

Skip the Laurenzo’s Produce Market.  There is not much there that you can’t find elsewhere.  Head directly to the market with the deli and plan to stay for hours.  We did.

Literally prancing through the aisles, with devilish grins on our faces, we terrorized this poor place.  We purchased roughly 10 gallons of olive oil, 6 pounds of really fun artisan pasta, a pound of fresh mozzarella, mortadella and prosciutto, fresh baguettes, calamari… ok, I could go on forever, but you would just think I was disgusting. Tony even found a bottle of wine, “Castranova” that was the same as his grandma’s maiden name, so of course, a couple of bottles of that were added.

We heard the workers speaking Italian, heard the butcher screaming over to the seafood guy who was bantering with the market guy.  It was pure bliss and it just felt so right.  Not pretentious.  A real “family” feel.   We grabbed a deli sandwich to share and some fried smelts and calamari.  Seriously, who has smelts?!  It was like being home for the Christmas Seven Fish Dinner (what the hell is that?  Well, that’s an entirely different post, but this site is pretty funny and video might give you a flavor for what it is for Italian-Americans).

Thank you, Laurenzo’s Italian Market for lighting up our lives and also providing the ingredients for us to make this glorious meal.

bruschetta with prosciutto fresh mozzarella and fresh basilhouse-made tomato pasta with spinach shrimp garlic 

The Meal: Bruschetta with prosciutto, fresh mozz and fresh basil.  Tomato pasta with spicy lemon garlic shrimp & spinach

The Details: We toasted the bruschetta, then rubbed garlic cloves over it, added the fresh mozz and put it under the broiler for a second. Then, added the prosciutto—it will melt right on to the mozz, but not dry out in doing it this way.  The tomato pasta was house-made at Laurenzo’s and the rest of the sauce was a one-pan creation.

The Verdict

  • Bruschetta: 5 stars
  • Pasta with Shrimp: 3 stars
  • Would You Eat It Again?  Bruschetta, definitely.  Pasta, maybe with some tweaks.
  • What Would You Change?  While we loved the “idea” of the tomato-flavored pasta, it wasn’t what we were hoping for.  I think the texture was a little gummy and the flavor wasn’t intense enough.  Also, from a visual standpoint, it was “off”, because the spaghetti sort of looked like carrots, creating a disconnect between what you were seeing and what you were tasting.  Next time, I’d probably opt for a traditional non-flavored pasta and throw in some tomatoes instead.

 

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MMM! | Blog Launch Party with Crazy Creations

By on August 23, 2011 in MMM! - Major Mangia Memoir!, Recipes

red snapper

Adventure anyone? What better way to celebrate the launch of a food blog than with fresh whole fish, a raw meat concoction and great friends? I don’t thing anything!

My loving husband decided that we needed to have a “launch party” for the birth of Mangia! Memoirs because of the hard work that went into it.  I believe that to be true, but I also think he may have been looking for a good excuse to have friends over, eat some food and down some wine.  Regardless, the impromptu launch party took place and let me tell you, we went on a culinary adventure joy ride!

beef carpaccioWe were thinking to go big or go home, so ended up creating food items that we had never ever made before and honestly, really had no idea how to.  First up, beef carpaccio.  For those not familiar with carpaccio, I’ve included a link, but it’s basically very very thinly sliced raw “something”.  There are seafood carpacci, beef carpacci, vegetable carpacci – you get the point. We’ve had these many times in restaurants, but the real kick here is that it is 100% RAW and I was serving it IN MY HOME.Blog Launch Party

I’d tried to do all the gruesome meat pounding before everyone got here, in order to salvage their appetites, but I’d have to say my favorite quote of the evening from our pal Kelvin, (as I lay delicate slices of meat on a plate), was “Soooo, uhh…that was marinated like ceviche, right?”  NOPE! Sorry, buddy, when I said raw, I meant RAW.  I honestly got a little nervous after that point, thinking “Alisa, what the hell are you doing serving raw meat to your friends?!  But the show must go on.  We served up the beef carpaccio with fresh arugula and shaved parmigiano, olive oil and fresh cracked pepper.  Overall, a HIT.

The “sleeper” favorite of the evening ended up being the pasta.  I really just made this as a “filler-up” dish from things we had lying around. Fusilli lunghi (long spirally pasta that looks the way someone’s hair would look if they got electrocuted)  pasta in a mildly spicy artichoke heart, tomato, garlic and white wine sauce.

Next up was the MAIN EVENT.  I’d been wanting to cook a whole fish for sometime (just to see if I could do it), and this ended up being the perfect night for it.  My husband and I went to the local fish market, Garcia’s Seafood, and purchased two jumbo red snapper and decided to follow the directions of 2 awesome ladies from Florida that demonstrated an ancient technique for baking fish.  Naturally, we found this on YouTube.  You can stuff the fish with any herbs you like (I chose lemon, rosemary and thyme), then pack the fish in course sea salt, creating a salt cast that develops over the fish and keeps it moist while baking.  The craziest part, is that the salt becomes hard like concrete and you have to literally CRACK the mold to get the fish out.  It was totally wild and so much fun! I used my grandma’s rolling pin for extra drama – thanks Gram.

The Verdict:

  • 5 stars!
  • Would You Eat It Again?: Heck, yea with multiple exclamation points
  • Would Would You Change? Buy more fish.  For a party of 6, two fish was a bit of  stretch as a main course.

Our “Mangia! Memoir” (what we’ll remember):

This was a food event worth remembering and I definitely recommend it.  The fish was moist and fell right off the bone.  The herbs that we had stuffed within the fish cavity infused the fish with flavor. And surprisingly, even though the fish was encased in salt, it wasn’t salty (Heads up, though – there were a few salty areas, mostly around the edges where the fish was right up against the salt cast).  Since this was a new technique for everyone, the whole party was centered around seeing this come to life, which ended up being pretty darn cool.

Every one watched in anticipation as the fish was stuffed, packed in salt and then put into the oven.  We then held our breath as the rolling pin smacked open the cast and inside lie the fully in tact and cooked fish.  Once we slid the fish from the bones, everyone, as if on on queue, starting picking at the remnant pieces.

I mentioned that the fish cheek is supposed to be very succulent and instantly everyone started going for it!  Then conversation shifted to how if you are ever stranded, you should eat fish eyes, because there is water in them.  Next thing I know,  people are going for the EYES!!  It was like be shot back to caveman era – everyone was so primal!

 

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