15th & Vine

Hi Uncle Steve (and Rad), 

Lauren and I had another delicious meal on the Amex gift card you sent. Thank you. 

This week (actually, last week; took me 11 days to get around to this), we went to 15th & Vine. Despite it's name, it is at neither 15th Street nor Vine Street. Rather, it's at 5th Street and Brickell Avenue. The name comes however from the fact that it is on the 15th Floor of the Viceroy Hotel, part of the Icon condo development, and overlooks the beautiful pool at the hotel and, of course, the beautiful waters of Biscayne Bay. It's a very modernly appointed restaurant, but perhaps is a bit too avant garde for my tastes, no pun intended. However, we sat for our meal at a very comfortable four-top by the window. 

As to the food (yes that important part), 15th & Vine's menu is best described as consisting primarily of modern American small plates (I won't say tapas, because it doesn't have a primarily Spanish or Hispanic influence). The plates are well priced and a good size: your problem is not ordering everything off the menu! 

To start, we ordered a Braised Bacon, Gorgonzola, & Whisky Poached Pear flat bread. We highly anticipated the plate and when it arrived, we ate a quarter of it before we realized they had sent the wrong flat bread! They had instead sent us the Roasted Garlic, Leek Confit, Manchego, and Truffle flat bread. To their credit, Lauren and I think they shaved actual truffles on the flat bread, but we weren't that impressed with the flavor of it. When they sent us the correct flat bread: Wow!

Let's call that the Wow! flatbread. Lauren's take is "Delicious." In any event, highly recommended. 

Before we get too far along in the solids, may we consider the liquids. Lauren had a glass of pinot grigio. I had two beers: a local hefeweizen called 'El Jefe' and a local saison whose name and brewery escapes me. Both were excellent, especially the former, which was an unusually fruity expression of that style. 

Continuing to our main dishes, we had three: Pulpo Salad, Wagyu Tartar, and a grilled salad with prosciutto. Pulpo is the spanish for octopus and, being a seafood salad, the Pulpo Salad was light on the lettuce. It was a warm salad, the octopus having been grilled and mixed with potato confit, mandarin oranges (fresh, not canned), romesco and a mustard vinaigrette. I can't place quite what went right with it, but it was probably the most delicious preparation of octopus I've ever had. Also highly recommended. 

The Wagyu Tartar was also a good dish. Certainly no fault in it, but eleven days later, nothing memorable about it and certainly not in comparison to the other dishes. 

The grilled salad with prosciutto was also excellent. Peaches, black cherries, green tomatoes and not-green tomatoes were grilled and then tossed with prosciutto, balsamic dressing, and a small bitter green (arugula?). As the salad was about 90% comprised of these dense (relative to lettuce) fruits, it was served on a very long, thin plate with the salad stretched out along the plate. Again, a very good dish and highly recommended. Regretfully though, it no longer appears to be on the menu. Although perhaps I should have made this point somewhere in the second or third paragraphs, the menu claims and appears to be highly seasonal. 

Finally, someone ordered a coconut dacquoise for dessert. It's very difficult to describe. It appeared to be a layered cake, which was very light and fluffy. Lauren thought it was very tasty, though I was indifferent. I think we'll just have to disagree there. 

In the end, it appears that killed the card. On the other hand, we probably could have ordered half that food and been satisfied: the portions are generous as noted. I can't however imagine ordering the chef's tasting menu at $65 per person for 8 plates or $90 per person for 12 plates, though presumably those would be smaller plates. In any event, highly recommended and would add to your list. 

--Stephen (& Lauren)