Score: Miami, by a landslide.
Next day: success at the pool. We arrive early and wage a stealth war to retain our chairs, quelling our appetite with Fage yogurt from the breakfast bar ($4; "Nothing is free!" warns the sign) and hummus served on hospital trays. Swaddled in white spa robes, we may look like invalids or loonies, but we've scored a spot near the restaurant this time; servers pass within arm's reach so we get plenty of booze and bottled water. Then the sun goes down again and we're off to Michy's.
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The Standard Hotel
40 Island Ave.
Miami, FL 33137
Category: Hotels and Resorts
Region: Out of Town
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Michy'sbedevils the bumpkins. A smoked-glass storefront in an alarming part of town looks deserted from the street; the sign is minuscule, easy-to-miss. So this is the Michy's of Food & Wine accolades, James Beard awards, Zagat kudos. Inside, things are silly, pretty, plain, and charming: mismatched chairs under gigantic icicle chandeliers, fabric walls, and tables crammed next to orange banquettes so close together that servers must pirouette under their trays. Our table isn't ready. So we order prosecco mojitos at the bar. The bartender susses us as first-timers; he engagingly offers his recommendations. We must try the croquetas and the black cod. And whatever we do, order two desserts and make sure one is bread pudding. A waiter stops to pick up drinks and gets into the argument: White gazpacho is the thing to order, he says, and a fantastic rabbit salad with arugula. Bartender retorts: Whatev. But order the parpardelle carbonara. And so on.
We mostly take their advice, ordering plate after plate with no regard for tomorrow's bikinis. Croquetas ($9) dissolve in our mouths like three bubbles of jamon and blue-cheese-scented air. Crispy sweetbreads ($13) reveal molten, creamy centers beneath a crunchy shell: They're an unimpeachable argument for offal. Rabbit salad ($8) tastes wild, herbal. And then the larger courses: squares of pork belly ($19) with sweet carmelized crusts partnered with clams in shiitake broth: sweaty, fatty pig meat stunning against salty, bitter shellfish and stinky mushrooms. Amazing. And black cod fillet ($36) set on a downy duvet of the finest artichoke purée, coating the mouth with silk, alongside a single grilled baby artichoke tinged with smoke.
So much changes so often at Michy's — the preparation of the cod and the sweetbreads, the nightly specials — but the couple sitting next to us keeps coming back on every trip from Brooklyn. They can't ever really free themselves, the bejeweled wife tells us, from the polenta with bacon and fried egg cracked into the middle of it. They are haunted by memories. She relinquishes the last spoonfuls of baked Alaska to her spouse, a little sadly.
Another solid win for Miami.
So the magic is real. There's nothing at Michy's to shatter the mass delusion of endless sunlight, hot bods, and enough ready credit to buy a round of mojitos for every man, babe, and Prada-scented twinkie in the joint. So we'll sweat it off tomorrow in the steam room if we can squeeze in between the goddesses. And when the dream ends at last, it's just an hour's drive or so to make it a recurring one.
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