Eateries >>

• Personal Best
  Michael Blum
  Food as Sideshow Michael's Kitchen is a showy new restaurant in downtown Hollywood where dinner is as much a spectacle as a food experience. Flames spout from stoves in the open kitchen, frying pans sizzle like lava eruptions, and chefs parade through the place with creatively displayed dishes.... More >>
• Best Indian Restaurant
  Madras Café
  The cuisine of India is perhaps the only in the world whose aftertaste is more seductive than its taste. Infused with cumin, cardamom, turmeric, chili powder, coriander, and jaggery, the menu at Madras Café, a quaint restaurant in an unassuming strip mall in Pompano Beach, features some... More >>
• Best Cuban Restaurant
  Señor Café
  Cuban food is not complicated, nor is it generally gourmet fare. But it's spare, delicious in its simplicity, and, most important, fresh. Well, for all this you couldn't pick a better location than next door to a grocery store. And Senor Café, an ultraclean, well-lighted joint next to... More >>
• Best Haitian Restaurant
  Chez Moy
  Don't bother looking for menus in this down-to-earth neighborhood place. All its offerings are up on a mirrored wall, each dish spelled out in blue tape. But then, that might not even help you. "Do you speak French?" the owner recently queried a first-timer at Chez Moy. No, came the reply.... More >>
• Best Caribbean Restaurant
  Hope's
  Audrey Hope doesn't have to fish for compliments. Her customers offer them generously enough, most likely through a mouthful of fried snapper or over a bowl of tilapia stew. Hope and daughters Lucretia and Jessica, who hail from British Guyana, serve breakfast, lunch, and dinner Caribbean-style... More >>
• Best Jamaican Restaurant
  Jerk Machine
  We hate chain restaurants. Can't stand 'em. Not even Pollo Tropical escapes our wrath. But there's an exception to every rule, and it must be said that the septet of Jerk Machines not only breaks the mold; it chops it into teeny, tiny pieces. Founded in Lauderhill 16 years ago by islanders... More >>
• Best Salvadoran Restaurant
  Atlakat
  Brush up on your Spanish, gringo, because few people at Atlakat are likely to speak your tongue, except when it comes to the universal language of great homemade food. But if you can open a menu and point, you'll be well taken care of at Manuel Chavez's Salvadoran café. Make a stab at the... More >>
• Best Mexican Restaurant
  Tacos al Carbón
  Blather all you want about authentic Mexican food, but how do you know it? The old lady in the kitchen pressing tortillas? The "secret" spice recipe? Maybe it's a menu that unabashedly sells tongue burritos ($3.50), tripe soup ($6), pork skin tacos ($1.50), and shrimp/octopus cocktails ($7.99).... More >>
• Best Inexpensive Italian Restaurant
  Salerno's
  Those of us who have taken to barking incessantly about the insulting lack of quality in everything these days -- the DVD player that skips whole movie scenes first time you plug it in, stylish steak knives that break off in your T-bone -- will cherish Salerno's for every drop of its home-made,... More >>
• Best Expensive Italian
  Paradiso Ristorante
  Short of booking a flight to Italy's Amalfi coast, you're not going to find a whole bunch of restaurants where the waiters address you as madam, whip out plates of char-grilled calamari on shredded artichoke and arugula salad, uncork your wine with a flourish of white linen, appear with glasses... More >>
• Best Restaurant in South Broward
  Michael's Kitchen
  Nothing in life feels quite as sweet as being on your way up. And Chef Michael Blum's star sure looks to be rising over the Hollywood skyline. Blum's new restaurant on Harrison Street is the culinary equivalent of a blockbuster or a box-office smash: the one thing everybody's gotta see and all... More >>
• Best Restaurant in Fort Lauderdale
  Trina
  Chef Don Pintabona comes from so many generations of Sicilian cooks that he could make ricotta cavatelli blindfolded, one-handed, and asleep. The cuisine is in his blood -- from his grandmother's simple, impeccable recipe for marinara to a witty plate of tuna, salmon, and yellowtail carpaccio... More >>
• Best Thai Restaurant
  Thai Spice
  Somehow, someone in Thailand a long, long time ago discovered that the sweet taste of coconut could be mixed with hot chili powder to create some of the most savory sauces to come out of the Southeast Asian peninsula. The taste can be exotic, uncompromising, and sometimes surprising. You can... More >>
• Best Restaurant in North Broward
  Ponte Vecchio Restaurant
  Ponte Vecchio (Italian for "Old Bridge") doesn't look like much from the outside. It's at the end of a strip mall on busy Commercial Boulevard, right next to an empty lot that accommodates overflow parking on busy Friday and Saturday nights. But as in Italy, the outside of the building says... More >>
• Best Restaurant in Palm Beach
  Maison Carlos
  Maybe it's baby-boomer nostalgia that makes Maison Carlos seem so comforting. The place is decidedly old-fashioned in its tastes, exuding a worldly, early-'60s-era charm that was always more mirage than reality (Dean Martin really was a bastard, and those Playtex girdles were freaking... More >>
• Best New Restaurant in Palm Beach
  L'Opera
  It takes guts to open a restaurant in a place where even the hardiest eateries have succumbed to the deadly Clematis Street pox. There isn't a restaurant on West Palm Beach's Main Street that has survived into adulthood; recent road construction, a late-night club crowd, parking horrors, and the... More >>
• Best New Restaurant in Broward
  Kaiyo
  The best new restaurant in Broward County never sent out a press release. It didn't cost $2.2 million to open. It doesn't have a celebrity chef, and waiters do not ferry convoluted cocktails to tables full of PR ladies clutching Kate Spade handbags. There are no "small plates." No ceviche... More >>
• Best Restaurant When Someone Else Is Paying
  Soleil at the Ritz-Carlton
  OK, we're going to assume that if you're reading this category, you need a place to take the grandparents. Down for the weather, they've promised to give you a break from your normal dinner of chicken wings and Schlitz. You'll need to take them to a place on their turf, and there's nothing... More >>
• Best Sit-Down Deli (1 Comment)
  H&E Marina Deli
  If your palate craves strong flavors and your belly demands a hearty meal, head to H&E Marina Deli. The mouthwatering food and no-nonsense service merit the sometimes difficult search for the deli, which is tucked away in the back of the Southport Shopping Center. The first two meals of the day... More >>
• Best Diner
  Howley's
  You've complained for years that the major thing wrong with most diners is you can't get a vodka gimlet straight-up with your eggs over easy at 3:30 in the old a.m. Well, quit your bellyaching, you hopeless lush; the oldest diner in Palm Beach County not only hops around the clock on weekends... More >>
• Best Restaurant for Kids
  Waffleworks
  Robin: "Holy car collection, Batman!" Batman: "Uh, yeah, Robin. That's what Daddy keeps around the restaurant for all the little kiddies." There's generally nothing unique about a Waffleworks franchise, but the one in Hollywood is extraordinary. It's decorated with about 500... More >>
• Best Restaurant to Die and Be Reborn
  KM at the Grapevine
  If you believe in reincarnation, you probably think you'll come back in the next life as a sky princess or a space wizard. But odds are just as good you'll eke out your latter days as a skink. Dramatic transformations are the stuff of the afterlife. Hell, even restaurants undergo major... More >>
• Best Restaurant for the Hearing-Impaired
  Kitchenetta
  Brush up on your American Sign Language before heading to this stylish Fort Lauderdale eatery... because the torturous clamor prevents any meaningful conversation. What with the metal chairs and concrete floors, the tables on rollers, and the exposed ceilings, you can hear every barked order,... More >>
• Best Chinese Restaurant
  Silver Pond
  The best way to find great Chinese food -- unless you happen to live in San Francisco, where it rains jasmine tea -- is to disguise yourself, Inspector Clouseau-style, and trail a Chinese family at a safe distance. A little careful sleuthing and you'll end up at Silver Pond in Lauderdale Lakes.... More >>
• Best Restaurant for Intimate Conversation
  French Quarter
  "Language of Love Spoken" reads the sign in the window. Not really, but where better for a sotto voce discussion of the nice and naughty things you'd like to do with that plate of shrimp maison au beurre blanc ($14.25 lunch, $25.95 dinner) than at the French Quarter? In this centrally located... More >>
• Best Service in a Restaurant
  Herban Kitchen
  Good help is so hard to find these days. Sure, you'll be well-attended at the Captain's Table on the QE2 or in the grand dining room of the Ritz, but the servers at most neighborhood cafés might as well have been trained at Fawlty Towers. Consider it a lucky break if you don't end up with... More >>
• Best Service at a Lunch Counter
  Daily Squeeze
  Someone forgot to tell the guys who serve sandwiches, salads, and smoothies at this bustling downtown Fort Lauderdale lunch spot that they have every right to behave as über-efficient Soup Nazis -- Get 'em in! Push 'em out! Instead, just for walking in the door here, you're likely to be... More >>
• Best Vegetarian Restaurant
  Low Fat No Fat Café
  Anthony DiCarlo must have spotted an unfilled niche in South Florida: There are maybe two natural food restaurants operating between Palm Beach and North Miami -- if you don't count the chain cafés like Whole Foods -- to feed thousands of hungry health nuts. Sure, there are plenty of... More >>
• Best Dim Sum
  Hong Kong City
  Faced with a menu of full entrées, some diners find it hard to pick just one. Dim sum is the Chinese solution to indecision -- the ultimate sampler plate. And this bright and airy restaurant offers about 60 items from which to assemble a unique, tailored-to-your-tastes meal. Your best bet... More >>
• Best Waterfront Dining
  Nikki Marina
  Though Nikki Marina claims it is "knot just a place to dock your yacht," it wouldn't hurt to arrive in one. Granted, you can pull into a slip with whatever showy marine vessel you managed to inherit from Daddy, be it a catamaran or a Cigarette, but don't dare pull up in a Boston Whaler and... More >>
• Best Seafood Restaurant
  Brooks
  This place takes its seafood seriously. Though the menu is merely two pages long, there are so many succulent selections that it may take you and your lovey some time to decide. Choices include delicately steamed Prince Edward Island mussels marinière ($7), shrimp cocktail served with a... More >>
• Best Place to Dine Alone
  Las Palmas
  OK, it's not the place to dine solo if you're planning to slog through another chapter of Finnegan's Wake. But if you're reasonably pulled together (leave the fanny pack at home) and arrive somewhere between happy hour and midnight, you're bound to find yourself inexorably drawn into the crowd... More >>
• Best Place to Dine with Gramps
  Old Florida Seafood House
  Grandpa's in town for the season, and it's clearly time to get the old coot married off again. You could pour through Google listings for Golden Years dating services, but here's some advice: the 70-something eye candy at Old Florida Seafood House ought to give him an excellent excuse to refill... More >>
• Best Place to Take Out-of-Towners
  Cap's Place Island Restaurant
  The cousin-from-Camden contingent has arrived, half a dozen nippers in tow, and by day six, you've stage-managed everything from airboat rides in the Everglades to daytrips to Disney. Worse news is in store: Your loud-mouthed sister-in-law has dropped in for a surprise inspection. Drastic times... More >>
• Best Greek Restaurant
  Pitios Greek Village Grill
  Ulysses and his hearty crew sailed the dark canals of Broward County. As they approached Pembroke Pines, Ulysses ordered his men, good and true, to lash him to the mast. For they approached Pitios, whose siren scent of deliciousness called to the stomach and could drive hungry men mad. The crew... More >>
• Best Chain Restaurant
  Seasons 52
  You'd never dream of setting foot in an Olive Garden, much less a Red Lobster, but that doesn't mean their parent company, Darden Restaurants Inc., is giving up on you. Darden introduced a high-end, low-cal restaurant this year that's drawing yuppies as inexorably as a Prada close-out sale --... More >>
• Best Restaurant for Gluttons
  Crazy Buffet
  Our American romance with Asiatic foodstuffs shows no signs of slowing -- and now some genius has dreamed up a gigantic, all-you-can-eat Eastern food complex adapted to our very Western waistline -- Super Size Me-San. At Crazy Buffet, a budding Florida franchise with outlets in Orlando, Tampa,... More >>
• Best Outdoor Dining
  Istanbul
  The top views in Hollywood come courtesy of the ocean-facing tables at Hasan Kochan's 13-year-old restaurant on the Hollywood Broadwalk. Those tables have withstood annual flocks of snowbirds, the gentle if charming weirdness of the area, and a handful of hurricanes. But taking the long view... More >>
• Best Museum Café
  Cornell Café

  The Morikami Museum and Japanese Garden

  The state of dining in many museums is disappointing. You're part of a captive audience. What a pleasure, then, to know that after you've strolled the goldfish ponds and other loveliness of the Morikami's gardens, some fine and affordable Japanese food is waiting at Cornell, which overlooks all... More >>
• Best Coffeehouse
  Boomerang Coffeehouse
  Across from the comfy half-moon couch in a corner of this roomy caffeine bar hangs a large black-and-white drawing of a rhinoceros. The animal's eyes glare menacingly, and his nostrils flare. Hasn't had his coffee, obviously. Or perhaps he just hasn't found the right place to drink it. Relax,... More >>
• Best Teahouse
  Belle & Maxwell's
  Ladies who shop and then lunch have enjoyed leisurely afternoon tête-à-têtes at Belle and Maxwell's for years; it's time they scooched over their Chanel-clad fannies and made room for the rest of us. In the heart of West Palm's Antique Row, where uniformed chauffeurs keep the... More >>
• Best Middle Eastern Restaurant
  al-Salam
  To embrace Middle Eastern culture is to learn to enjoy overeating. Liberate yourself from those blindered Western values by throwing on a flowing, figure-concealing thobe and heading for this cultural island out west. The menu and service at al-Salam epitomize Middle Eastern generosity and... More >>
• Best Korean Restaurant
  Da Mee Rak
  If heaven exudes a fragrance, it's the one that awaits when you step into Da Mee Rak. Korean barbecue is the specialty of the day here, with marinated beef, pork, and seafood sizzling and snapping atop each table-top grill. Once you've partaken of this distinct Asian cuisine, you'll wonder why... More >>
• Best Filipino Restaurant
  Pegasus Pinoy
  Quick, name your favorite Filipino dish. If you're stumped for a response (roasted poodle is not an answer), it's time to go back to foodie boot camp for a refresher course in delicacies like dinguan and bulalo, the national dish of the Philippines. The outré ingredients of Filipino... More >>
• Best Japanese Restaurant
  Kiko
  Though the raw (and cooked, for that matter) fish is stellar, Kiko is best-known as perhaps the region's finest -- only? -- country-style Japanese restaurant. Instead of the flashy, neon-drenched techno-meal you'd find in the hip sections of Tokyo, this clean, bright space in the Fountains... More >>
• Best French Restaurant
  Brasserie La Cigale
  The latest relentlessly trumpeted diet plan? To stay chic and slender as any Frenchwoman, you have to eat like one. And that plate of escargots with mushrooms, garlic cream sauce, and chives, the one that promises to melt away unwanted pounds like magic, is waiting for you at 4-year-old... More >>