food in fl picture post (part 2)
I haven't really done enough picture posts in Florida to keep up with the pictures i have been taking, so this is going to be a long one. I'm going to make this a food post and not a regular photo post, since with food posts i just include the one photo i took of each dish and mumble about the context rather than trying to select a set that's actually interesting or beautiful to look at. I need a bit more time to sit down and figure out which scenic bits of this "wang" of Florida are worth sharing.
In case you missed it, check out part 1 of the food in Florida picture post, which was taken along the panhandle. When i got onto the Florida west coast i really struggled to find food that wasn't a chain restaurant, because so much of the landscape is just residential communities and strip malls. I am going to stop in Miami so that i can give the Keys and my journey back up a separate part 3 post. Let's get things started with some tofu.
As mentioned, the opening photo is tofu. But the real star of that photo is the sake appletini, which i got in a fit of exasperation with the utterly miserable food situation heading down through these suburbs-without-a-city. The appletini was so silly that it made me feel happier about the hell i was traveling through. This was from a Japanese restaurant in a small town called Williston. I also got tempura veges, as seen in the next pic.
Surprisingly, the sushi here was also really good. I stayed full vegan, with an avocado and peanut roll on the left, and a sweet potato roll on the right.
Unfortunately the next picture is much closer to the reality of what you will find in central/southern Florida. I was at a self-proclaimed "tiki bar" (actually just a normal bar with outdoor seating) in Dunellon, and figured i should get the famous key lime pie. I think i've eaten key lime pie once before, at some shitty chain restaurant, probably with my ex, and i didn't like it. But i thought i would like it in Florida. I did not. It's not a pie in the sense that i would describe a pie. It doesn't have fruit. It's mostly a weird cream/custard thing with a vaguely fruity flavor. But, in this case, it was somehow simultaneously sickly sweet and gaggingly tart. It was like a thick layer of lemon curd spread onto a digestive biscuit, to describe it in British terms. Yuck.
I was really desperate after cycling through the suburbs for way too long, so desperate that i took a 30km detour out to a little beach right on the edge of nowhere. This is crab cakes, fries and a frozen lemonade slushee thing from the food hut on the beach at Pine Island. That is, the tiny Pine Island north of Hernando Beach, not the much bigger Pine Island that will be featured later on.
After another long morning of cycling through suburbs, i found a Puerto Rican bakery in a strip mall somewhere west of Tampa. This is a pastry they called a "mallorca", which is so-named because it is a Mallorcan pastry called ensaïmada. It is basically a hunk of bread made with lard and a ton of icing sugar on top. It is very heavy, not vegan, and very delicious. The drink was some kind of tamarind soda water.
I was originally going to try find a Cuban sandwich in Ybor City, but i was so hungry and exhausted by the endless suburbs that i stopped into a "Latin American" place west of downtown Tampa that looked kinda interesting and affordable. Turns out it was a Colombian restaurant, and pretty much every dish on the menu was some kind of steak. I pretty much hate steak, but i was too tired to turn around and find something else, so i ordered what they called a palomilla apanada. This was their snazzy name that i think is a mash-up of bistec de palomilla (thin-sliced steak) with bistec apanado (breaded and fried steak). It was essentially a beef schnitzel, which is more well-known in the area for being a Cuban preparation that you eat in a sandwich. Whatever. It was a very large piece of fried meat. And it came with rice, plantain, yuca, potatoes and beans. This was probably the biggest, heaviest, most calorie-laden meal i have eaten on the journey so far, and even with the drink (agua fresca of some flavor i don't remember) and tip it was under $20. The best possible thing a bike tourer could find. My mood was so much better after getting through this.
My next hearty meal came from a Jamaican bar just north of Bradenton. One of the great things about Jamaican restaurants is that they usually have vegan dishes, because many Rastafarians are vegan. This is ackee (a sort of mildly nothing-flavored fruit) and callaloo (greens) with rice and beans, and plantain. I topped it with way too much scotch bonnet pepper sauce and it was scrumptious, every bit.
As usual on the journey, i have been trying to find pastries or some kind of late morning snack as a way to keep my calories up. I don't take photos of all of them because they're all fairly similar, but i'll include the ones that are unique. This was from an Argentinian bakery. I've never had Argentinian pastries before. On the left is some kind of dry biscuit-like thing. I'm not quite sure how to describe it. It wasn't sweet at all. It was bland, but filling. On the right is a sort of flaky pastry tube filled with caramel. Not bad.
The next day of cycling was a total wasteland. Just gated communities and chain restaurants out the ass. I stopped in a town called Punta Gorda that had a handful of local-ish looking restaurants, although none of them looked very good. I ended up in so-called English pub where i got a Strongbow (cider) and fish'n'chips. This fish'n'chips sucked. The batter was so light and crispy that they might as well have just been serving grilled fish. And the fish was so flaky that it didn't feel like i ate anything. And what the fuck is this meager serving of chips? Unsalted, too! The seasoning was non-existent. Dire. And expensive, to boot.
My second escape from the suburban wasteland was to a different Pine Island - this is a much bigger island north of Fort Myers. It's big enough to have a few different restaurants on it. This was from the taco truck just as you get onto the island. I think it was tacos al pastor. The salsas were very good (i got a salsa picante as well, to go with the verde that is pictured), the tortillas were corny... As far as Florida tacos go, this was one of the better ones. Horchata to drink.
The next day it was raining, so i just took a quick loop up to the Bokeelia marina and ate at the restaurant there. I got a fish sandwich with catch of the day (tripletail), "blackened", which seems to mean cooked with some Cajun seasoning on it. It was a pretty good fish sandwich. Not as good as the grouper sandwich i got in Carrabelle, but solid. The basket of fries underneath it was generous too.
Since i was stuck in the rain, i decided to order another thing at the marina. This is a smoked fish dip, which is one of the things that has been on the menu in seaside restaurants all along the Gulf Coast. I don't think i've ever ordered this at a restaurant before, but it's fairly similar to the sort of thing you'll get at a gallery opening or whatever free big city event that people tend to sneak into to get free food and booze. It was fine. Wouldn't pay for it again.
I wish that my post-Pixel phones were better at taking nighttime shots, because this meal deserved something more than the dark, underexposed snapshot you are getting here. This was roast pork, rice, salad and beans from a Dominican restaurant that had literally just opened the day prior. It was a real homemade style feeling - there wasn't even a sign for the restaurant, and they seemed set up to serve the local farm workers. This is the kind of place i ended up also finding in Miami - a sort of mini-restaurant in the back of a Latin American grocery store serving cheap and hearty grub. It didn't have a massive punch of flavor, but that's pretty standard for Latin American food outside of Mexico. It was filling and felt like i was eating at someone's house, which was nice.
Speaking of Latin American food, here is one of the better pictures i got of an ubiquitous Cuban pastelito - the guava and cheese pastry. I have been a bit confused by all the "guava" pastries i have been eating along the way because they don't taste much like actual guavas, to my tastebuds. I think what they do is mulch the guavas into a sort of jam, with a shit-ton of sugar, so it doesn't taste like guava any more, it just tastes like sugar. In my normal life, i would never eat anything this sweet, but with the bicycle touring i am chowing down on sugary stuff to try make calories. You can find these pretty much everywhere, and they only cost about a dollar, so it's kinda like the donut of south Florida.
Here is something unexpected. I went to a vegan café in Fort Myers Beach and ordered one of their "bowls". I have seen "açaí bowls" around the place in the past, but never bothered to order one because they seemed much too expensive for what appeared to just be a fruit salad that you can get at a grocery store for a quarter the price, but i was in the mood for fruit and this was only one of the two things i got. This was a "dragonfruit bowl", whose ingredients just looked like a fruit salad. But, what you don't see in this photo, is that the dragonfruit has been frozen and blended with some oats or something to give it a strange, cold, yogurt-y consistency. Apparently that's what these "bowls" are - they're not just the fruit, they're a blended concoction that's halfway in-between a smoothie and a gelato, gussied up to look very pretty for Instagram. This was a very pretty dish, but it was also very tasty. On top it had chia seeds and coconut and sesame seeds and blueberries and pineapple and banana and some other stuff i don't know what it was, served in half a coconut shell. Cute.
Also from the vegan place, avocado toast. This one was served with tomatos, sesame seeds and sprouts on top. The bread was some kind of seedy, sprouted whatever-the-fuck. Typical American health food. It was tasty, although perhaps overpriced for the small serving.
Now. Naples. This is where i walked into a Spanish restaurant, expecting it to be as laid-back as every other place i had been in Florida. No, sir. This was the kind of restaurant where the wait staff and bartender wore suits, and so did the clientele. I looked like an absolute bum, and they treated me like one too - at first - banishing me from an outside table to the back of the bar inside. To subvert their expectations of what a rich person should look like, i proceeded to spend a ton of money on tapas and tip very well.
The first tapa was one that the bartender recommended when i asked if they were open for breakfast, because i really missed the simple tostada you get in Andalucía - a slice of toasted bread, with olive oil, salt and tomato pulp on top. Turns out they served the same thing as a tapa using pan de cristal (a type of bread) supposedly imported from Spain. Of course it didn't taste as good as it did in Andalucía. I had to add some salt to get the flavor i remembered, but the tomatoes didn't have the richness that i remember, probably because Florida isn't a tomato-growing region. Also, not enough olive oil! Probably not worth the price for the average person, but for me it did kindle some fond memories, so that was nice. I ate it with a sangria.
The next tapa was croquetas de jamón serrano, which i had with a beer. These croquetas were well-cooked, not too oily, not too heavy. It was a bit silly to put microgreens and a freakin' flower on the plate, but that's what happens when you go to a fancy restaurant. Personally i think the Serrano ham flavor didn't come through strongly enough, but i get it probably costs a fortune here so they're not going to grate it in like dollar store parmesan.
But, finally, this was the tapa that made the evening worthwhile. They had figs with goat cheese soaked in wine. This is where i went full-blown pretentioso and asked the bartender for his wine recommendation to pair with the tapa. He pulled out an expensive pinot noir and gave me a sip. It tasted like wine, i guess. But, whatever, i ordered a glass and savored these tiny bites because they were fucking incredible. Probably the most delicious things i have eaten on this trip, period. The downside of fancy restaurants is they are always snooty and invariably overpriced. The upside is that when they roll their sleeves up and prepare a properly highbrow dish, it tastes fantastic. I don't do haute cuisine very often, but this was a treat.
To bring it down a few (many) notches, i went to a taquería on my way out of Naples. The food was much more down-to-Earth, much cheaper, and they even had free radishes to cleanse the palate. Lowbrow eating is just fine.
Going across the Everglades, there are only about 3 restaurants along the highway. They're all legendary in their own way, by the looks of things. This restaurant sold gator and crab, but they were both very expensive so i went with some simpler appetizers instead. This was a "frybread" with salsa. The frybread wasn't like (East) Indian frybread, it was a bit more like a Chinese spring onion pancake. It was oily and dense and quite delicious, and the salsa was far more elegant than you would expect from this shack in the middle of the swamp with rowdy, gruff servers bringing you out the food. It had tomato, onion, zucchini, bell peppers, mango, i think? It had a nice amount of acid and could almost have been a salad on its own.
I also got fried green tomatoes, for that Southern vibe. Fried green tomatoes are exactly what they sound like - roughly cut, unripe tomatoes, dipped in fried chicken batter, deep fried. With ranch dressing, of course. As you'd expect they're a bit sour, but not in an unpleasant way. Not bad.
In the middle of the Everglades, i gave key lime pie another chance. This was a much, much better key lime pie. This one was extremely cold and light. It tasted more like a cream pie, as in, a pie crust with cream inside it. It wasn't sweet at all. The acidity of the lime was just a hint of a flavor instead of an overpowering tartness. It was much more subtle than i expected and actually not a terrible dessert.
Well, hey, real quick, i also got "proper" frybread a bit further along the highway. This one came with honey, which turns out to be a yummy accompaniment. This kind of Indian frybread, it's doughy in a way that helps it to drink up the sauce around it, so dipping it in honey gave you almost a sort of baklava feeling, except with a strong, heavy, bread-y mouthfeel instead of that annoying flakiness.
Alas, here you have another underexposed nighttime shot of some food i got in Miami Beach. I was so tired that first day i didn't really know what to get. I wanted noodles, so i went to one of those American noodle places that are set up like a Subway or a Chipotle where you have to tell the server exactly all the different vegetables and meats and sauces you want in your noodle. I am not a fan of these sorts of places, but i had a craving. I got "rice noodle" (turned out to be 河粉) with bok choy and shiitakes and tofu and a bunch of other vegetables and some "Himalayan umami sauce". It was not a great noodle. The most annoying part is that either they deliberately cut the noodles up into little pieces, or they crushed the noodle cakes before boiling them, so the noodles were in such short sections that it was impossible to get a proper mouthful. I feel like you're defeating the point of noodles if they are so short that you can't get a decent bundle of them twirled up on the chopsticks. It just turns into Italian pasta at that point. This was a disappointing meal, but the passionfruit boba green tea was good.
The next morning i had a bit more time and energy to look around for something good, and i ended up at some vegan junk food place. Check out the presentation of the food, it is so blatantly designed to make beautiful Instagram posts and also advertize the name of the restaurant at the same time. The South Beachest shit ever. But! The food was very good. This was a buffalo chicken blue cheese burger, all vegan, and absolutely fantastically delicious. It really does feel glorious to eat junk food without the nagging guilt of knowing animals were killed or enslaved to get it in your mouth. Next time i am in Miami, i will go here again and work my way through the menu.
Now, the other side of Miami is the unpretentious sandwich bar slash deli slash café or whatever. This seems to be where you find the cheapest and heartiest food. I don't know the name of this place, but it was just one of many sleazy late night dives serving up Cuban and other Latin American fare. I got a medianoche (midnight) sandwich, which is similar to the famous Cuban sandwich, but on a different kind of bread. It has ham, roast pork, cheese, pickles, mustard and mayonnaise. The bread is sweet and eggy, like challah. It is super greasy and fatty and delicious. With fries. And Inca Kola. Not much over $10, if i recall. Truly a fantastic feast.
One thing i didn't take photos of when i was in Miami was the many "coffee shop crammed in the back of a gas station" or "cafeteria attached to a grocery store" spots, where i went for breakfast and snacks at every opportunity. They serve an incredible coffee called a colada, which is something like 4 shots of very stiff, sugary espresso. It's only a couple bucks. And they serve small, chewy bread rolls with ham or salami or cheese in them, just like they do in Europe. Empanadas, too, and rice and beans and meat. You could eat like a king all day at those places and probably not spend more than $20, the price of a single main at the touristy joints along the beach. I felt so at home there.
Anyway, that was a lot of food. Yesterday in Key West i visited a stupid amount of restaurants to try get my money's worth. It was fine, but i'm definitely heading back up to Miami tomorrow. Perhaps i'll get another picture post in before that.
In case you missed it, check out part 1 of the food in Florida picture post, which was taken along the panhandle. When i got onto the Florida west coast i really struggled to find food that wasn't a chain restaurant, because so much of the landscape is just residential communities and strip malls. I am going to stop in Miami so that i can give the Keys and my journey back up a separate part 3 post. Let's get things started with some tofu.
As mentioned, the opening photo is tofu. But the real star of that photo is the sake appletini, which i got in a fit of exasperation with the utterly miserable food situation heading down through these suburbs-without-a-city. The appletini was so silly that it made me feel happier about the hell i was traveling through. This was from a Japanese restaurant in a small town called Williston. I also got tempura veges, as seen in the next pic.
Surprisingly, the sushi here was also really good. I stayed full vegan, with an avocado and peanut roll on the left, and a sweet potato roll on the right.
Unfortunately the next picture is much closer to the reality of what you will find in central/southern Florida. I was at a self-proclaimed "tiki bar" (actually just a normal bar with outdoor seating) in Dunellon, and figured i should get the famous key lime pie. I think i've eaten key lime pie once before, at some shitty chain restaurant, probably with my ex, and i didn't like it. But i thought i would like it in Florida. I did not. It's not a pie in the sense that i would describe a pie. It doesn't have fruit. It's mostly a weird cream/custard thing with a vaguely fruity flavor. But, in this case, it was somehow simultaneously sickly sweet and gaggingly tart. It was like a thick layer of lemon curd spread onto a digestive biscuit, to describe it in British terms. Yuck.
I was really desperate after cycling through the suburbs for way too long, so desperate that i took a 30km detour out to a little beach right on the edge of nowhere. This is crab cakes, fries and a frozen lemonade slushee thing from the food hut on the beach at Pine Island. That is, the tiny Pine Island north of Hernando Beach, not the much bigger Pine Island that will be featured later on.
After another long morning of cycling through suburbs, i found a Puerto Rican bakery in a strip mall somewhere west of Tampa. This is a pastry they called a "mallorca", which is so-named because it is a Mallorcan pastry called ensaïmada. It is basically a hunk of bread made with lard and a ton of icing sugar on top. It is very heavy, not vegan, and very delicious. The drink was some kind of tamarind soda water.
I was originally going to try find a Cuban sandwich in Ybor City, but i was so hungry and exhausted by the endless suburbs that i stopped into a "Latin American" place west of downtown Tampa that looked kinda interesting and affordable. Turns out it was a Colombian restaurant, and pretty much every dish on the menu was some kind of steak. I pretty much hate steak, but i was too tired to turn around and find something else, so i ordered what they called a palomilla apanada. This was their snazzy name that i think is a mash-up of bistec de palomilla (thin-sliced steak) with bistec apanado (breaded and fried steak). It was essentially a beef schnitzel, which is more well-known in the area for being a Cuban preparation that you eat in a sandwich. Whatever. It was a very large piece of fried meat. And it came with rice, plantain, yuca, potatoes and beans. This was probably the biggest, heaviest, most calorie-laden meal i have eaten on the journey so far, and even with the drink (agua fresca of some flavor i don't remember) and tip it was under $20. The best possible thing a bike tourer could find. My mood was so much better after getting through this.
My next hearty meal came from a Jamaican bar just north of Bradenton. One of the great things about Jamaican restaurants is that they usually have vegan dishes, because many Rastafarians are vegan. This is ackee (a sort of mildly nothing-flavored fruit) and callaloo (greens) with rice and beans, and plantain. I topped it with way too much scotch bonnet pepper sauce and it was scrumptious, every bit.
As usual on the journey, i have been trying to find pastries or some kind of late morning snack as a way to keep my calories up. I don't take photos of all of them because they're all fairly similar, but i'll include the ones that are unique. This was from an Argentinian bakery. I've never had Argentinian pastries before. On the left is some kind of dry biscuit-like thing. I'm not quite sure how to describe it. It wasn't sweet at all. It was bland, but filling. On the right is a sort of flaky pastry tube filled with caramel. Not bad.
The next day of cycling was a total wasteland. Just gated communities and chain restaurants out the ass. I stopped in a town called Punta Gorda that had a handful of local-ish looking restaurants, although none of them looked very good. I ended up in so-called English pub where i got a Strongbow (cider) and fish'n'chips. This fish'n'chips sucked. The batter was so light and crispy that they might as well have just been serving grilled fish. And the fish was so flaky that it didn't feel like i ate anything. And what the fuck is this meager serving of chips? Unsalted, too! The seasoning was non-existent. Dire. And expensive, to boot.
My second escape from the suburban wasteland was to a different Pine Island - this is a much bigger island north of Fort Myers. It's big enough to have a few different restaurants on it. This was from the taco truck just as you get onto the island. I think it was tacos al pastor. The salsas were very good (i got a salsa picante as well, to go with the verde that is pictured), the tortillas were corny... As far as Florida tacos go, this was one of the better ones. Horchata to drink.
The next day it was raining, so i just took a quick loop up to the Bokeelia marina and ate at the restaurant there. I got a fish sandwich with catch of the day (tripletail), "blackened", which seems to mean cooked with some Cajun seasoning on it. It was a pretty good fish sandwich. Not as good as the grouper sandwich i got in Carrabelle, but solid. The basket of fries underneath it was generous too.
Since i was stuck in the rain, i decided to order another thing at the marina. This is a smoked fish dip, which is one of the things that has been on the menu in seaside restaurants all along the Gulf Coast. I don't think i've ever ordered this at a restaurant before, but it's fairly similar to the sort of thing you'll get at a gallery opening or whatever free big city event that people tend to sneak into to get free food and booze. It was fine. Wouldn't pay for it again.
I wish that my post-Pixel phones were better at taking nighttime shots, because this meal deserved something more than the dark, underexposed snapshot you are getting here. This was roast pork, rice, salad and beans from a Dominican restaurant that had literally just opened the day prior. It was a real homemade style feeling - there wasn't even a sign for the restaurant, and they seemed set up to serve the local farm workers. This is the kind of place i ended up also finding in Miami - a sort of mini-restaurant in the back of a Latin American grocery store serving cheap and hearty grub. It didn't have a massive punch of flavor, but that's pretty standard for Latin American food outside of Mexico. It was filling and felt like i was eating at someone's house, which was nice.
Speaking of Latin American food, here is one of the better pictures i got of an ubiquitous Cuban pastelito - the guava and cheese pastry. I have been a bit confused by all the "guava" pastries i have been eating along the way because they don't taste much like actual guavas, to my tastebuds. I think what they do is mulch the guavas into a sort of jam, with a shit-ton of sugar, so it doesn't taste like guava any more, it just tastes like sugar. In my normal life, i would never eat anything this sweet, but with the bicycle touring i am chowing down on sugary stuff to try make calories. You can find these pretty much everywhere, and they only cost about a dollar, so it's kinda like the donut of south Florida.
Here is something unexpected. I went to a vegan café in Fort Myers Beach and ordered one of their "bowls". I have seen "açaí bowls" around the place in the past, but never bothered to order one because they seemed much too expensive for what appeared to just be a fruit salad that you can get at a grocery store for a quarter the price, but i was in the mood for fruit and this was only one of the two things i got. This was a "dragonfruit bowl", whose ingredients just looked like a fruit salad. But, what you don't see in this photo, is that the dragonfruit has been frozen and blended with some oats or something to give it a strange, cold, yogurt-y consistency. Apparently that's what these "bowls" are - they're not just the fruit, they're a blended concoction that's halfway in-between a smoothie and a gelato, gussied up to look very pretty for Instagram. This was a very pretty dish, but it was also very tasty. On top it had chia seeds and coconut and sesame seeds and blueberries and pineapple and banana and some other stuff i don't know what it was, served in half a coconut shell. Cute.
Also from the vegan place, avocado toast. This one was served with tomatos, sesame seeds and sprouts on top. The bread was some kind of seedy, sprouted whatever-the-fuck. Typical American health food. It was tasty, although perhaps overpriced for the small serving.
Now. Naples. This is where i walked into a Spanish restaurant, expecting it to be as laid-back as every other place i had been in Florida. No, sir. This was the kind of restaurant where the wait staff and bartender wore suits, and so did the clientele. I looked like an absolute bum, and they treated me like one too - at first - banishing me from an outside table to the back of the bar inside. To subvert their expectations of what a rich person should look like, i proceeded to spend a ton of money on tapas and tip very well.
The first tapa was one that the bartender recommended when i asked if they were open for breakfast, because i really missed the simple tostada you get in Andalucía - a slice of toasted bread, with olive oil, salt and tomato pulp on top. Turns out they served the same thing as a tapa using pan de cristal (a type of bread) supposedly imported from Spain. Of course it didn't taste as good as it did in Andalucía. I had to add some salt to get the flavor i remembered, but the tomatoes didn't have the richness that i remember, probably because Florida isn't a tomato-growing region. Also, not enough olive oil! Probably not worth the price for the average person, but for me it did kindle some fond memories, so that was nice. I ate it with a sangria.
The next tapa was croquetas de jamón serrano, which i had with a beer. These croquetas were well-cooked, not too oily, not too heavy. It was a bit silly to put microgreens and a freakin' flower on the plate, but that's what happens when you go to a fancy restaurant. Personally i think the Serrano ham flavor didn't come through strongly enough, but i get it probably costs a fortune here so they're not going to grate it in like dollar store parmesan.
But, finally, this was the tapa that made the evening worthwhile. They had figs with goat cheese soaked in wine. This is where i went full-blown pretentioso and asked the bartender for his wine recommendation to pair with the tapa. He pulled out an expensive pinot noir and gave me a sip. It tasted like wine, i guess. But, whatever, i ordered a glass and savored these tiny bites because they were fucking incredible. Probably the most delicious things i have eaten on this trip, period. The downside of fancy restaurants is they are always snooty and invariably overpriced. The upside is that when they roll their sleeves up and prepare a properly highbrow dish, it tastes fantastic. I don't do haute cuisine very often, but this was a treat.
To bring it down a few (many) notches, i went to a taquería on my way out of Naples. The food was much more down-to-Earth, much cheaper, and they even had free radishes to cleanse the palate. Lowbrow eating is just fine.
Going across the Everglades, there are only about 3 restaurants along the highway. They're all legendary in their own way, by the looks of things. This restaurant sold gator and crab, but they were both very expensive so i went with some simpler appetizers instead. This was a "frybread" with salsa. The frybread wasn't like (East) Indian frybread, it was a bit more like a Chinese spring onion pancake. It was oily and dense and quite delicious, and the salsa was far more elegant than you would expect from this shack in the middle of the swamp with rowdy, gruff servers bringing you out the food. It had tomato, onion, zucchini, bell peppers, mango, i think? It had a nice amount of acid and could almost have been a salad on its own.
I also got fried green tomatoes, for that Southern vibe. Fried green tomatoes are exactly what they sound like - roughly cut, unripe tomatoes, dipped in fried chicken batter, deep fried. With ranch dressing, of course. As you'd expect they're a bit sour, but not in an unpleasant way. Not bad.
In the middle of the Everglades, i gave key lime pie another chance. This was a much, much better key lime pie. This one was extremely cold and light. It tasted more like a cream pie, as in, a pie crust with cream inside it. It wasn't sweet at all. The acidity of the lime was just a hint of a flavor instead of an overpowering tartness. It was much more subtle than i expected and actually not a terrible dessert.
Well, hey, real quick, i also got "proper" frybread a bit further along the highway. This one came with honey, which turns out to be a yummy accompaniment. This kind of Indian frybread, it's doughy in a way that helps it to drink up the sauce around it, so dipping it in honey gave you almost a sort of baklava feeling, except with a strong, heavy, bread-y mouthfeel instead of that annoying flakiness.
Alas, here you have another underexposed nighttime shot of some food i got in Miami Beach. I was so tired that first day i didn't really know what to get. I wanted noodles, so i went to one of those American noodle places that are set up like a Subway or a Chipotle where you have to tell the server exactly all the different vegetables and meats and sauces you want in your noodle. I am not a fan of these sorts of places, but i had a craving. I got "rice noodle" (turned out to be 河粉) with bok choy and shiitakes and tofu and a bunch of other vegetables and some "Himalayan umami sauce". It was not a great noodle. The most annoying part is that either they deliberately cut the noodles up into little pieces, or they crushed the noodle cakes before boiling them, so the noodles were in such short sections that it was impossible to get a proper mouthful. I feel like you're defeating the point of noodles if they are so short that you can't get a decent bundle of them twirled up on the chopsticks. It just turns into Italian pasta at that point. This was a disappointing meal, but the passionfruit boba green tea was good.
The next morning i had a bit more time and energy to look around for something good, and i ended up at some vegan junk food place. Check out the presentation of the food, it is so blatantly designed to make beautiful Instagram posts and also advertize the name of the restaurant at the same time. The South Beachest shit ever. But! The food was very good. This was a buffalo chicken blue cheese burger, all vegan, and absolutely fantastically delicious. It really does feel glorious to eat junk food without the nagging guilt of knowing animals were killed or enslaved to get it in your mouth. Next time i am in Miami, i will go here again and work my way through the menu.
Now, the other side of Miami is the unpretentious sandwich bar slash deli slash café or whatever. This seems to be where you find the cheapest and heartiest food. I don't know the name of this place, but it was just one of many sleazy late night dives serving up Cuban and other Latin American fare. I got a medianoche (midnight) sandwich, which is similar to the famous Cuban sandwich, but on a different kind of bread. It has ham, roast pork, cheese, pickles, mustard and mayonnaise. The bread is sweet and eggy, like challah. It is super greasy and fatty and delicious. With fries. And Inca Kola. Not much over $10, if i recall. Truly a fantastic feast.
One thing i didn't take photos of when i was in Miami was the many "coffee shop crammed in the back of a gas station" or "cafeteria attached to a grocery store" spots, where i went for breakfast and snacks at every opportunity. They serve an incredible coffee called a colada, which is something like 4 shots of very stiff, sugary espresso. It's only a couple bucks. And they serve small, chewy bread rolls with ham or salami or cheese in them, just like they do in Europe. Empanadas, too, and rice and beans and meat. You could eat like a king all day at those places and probably not spend more than $20, the price of a single main at the touristy joints along the beach. I felt so at home there.
Anyway, that was a lot of food. Yesterday in Key West i visited a stupid amount of restaurants to try get my money's worth. It was fine, but i'm definitely heading back up to Miami tomorrow. Perhaps i'll get another picture post in before that.