This week on Check, Please!

South Florida, a classy meal paired with waterfront views in Miami.

I was actually really surprised by how tasty it was.

[michelle] A quaint spot for tasty American classics in Fort Lauderdale.

I'd like to mention it, and I'd like to forget it.

It's so fattening and so delicious.

[michelle] And a plant-based menu made with love in Wynwood [marleah] The menu is so extensive for vegan or vegetarian eaters.

[voiceover] Cultural culinary secrets and global flavors.

We have a passion for blending ingredients and seasonings from around the world.

[announcer] Additional funding for Check, Please!

South Florida, is provided by George and Helen Weaver and the Friends of South Florida PBS.

You will look at food differently when you leave.

One didn't really help the other.

And I just know it was the best.

It was just a perfect dish.

Prepared to perfection.

Hello, I'm Michelle Bernstein and welcome to Check, Please!

South Florida, the show where regular people from all over South Florida recommend and review their favorite restaurants.

So this is how the show works, every week we have three guests, each recommends his or her favorite spot and then the other two go to check them out and see what they think.

This week, retiree Steve Sherman, is spending time at his favorite chef-owned bistro in Broward County.

He says he can't miss this eclectic menu full of crafty dishes.

And health specialist, Marleah Singleton, says her Wynwood pick is the perfect fit for non-meat eaters.

This trendy spot is all about making plant-based foods accessible to anyone and everyone.

But first our guests are going crazy for this local spot on Biscayne Bay.

The restaurant is serving us a warm, inviting experience coupled with unique tapas and entrees, not to mention that picturesque view, which rounds out the entire dining experience.

It's located in Miami, and it's called Crazy About You.

I am Joaquin Chamizo, and I am the managing partner of the Passion Restaurant Group.

The Passion Restaurant Group encompasses Dolores But You Can Call Me Lolita, which is our sister restaurant, and Crazy About You, where we're sitting right.

Crazy About You, we opened 11 years ago.

We're a very casual dining restaurant right here in beautiful Biscayne Bay.

We're a detail-oriented company that sells food.

In a nutshell, that's what Crazy About You is about.

We have a menu that it's really set for an everyday restaurant.

We have a little bit of everywhere in the world, so we call it a worldly cuisine.

We have a little bit of Spanish food, we have a little bit of Mexican food, a little bit of Argentinian, so it's a worldly menu.

Some of the signature dishes as far as entrees goes, we have the zucchini carbonara, which is a low carb zucchini pasta.

It's one of our popular dishes.

Our skirt steak is very popular of course with the entrees.

And I think we have probably two of the best desserts that I am very proud of.

We have the wild cheesecake, which is the best cheesecake and we also have the best chocolate cake in the world.

We don't really attract a demographic, it's really a restaurant that we designed, built for all ages.

I mean, it's very energetic, very loud, it's one of the destinations that people wanna come here in Brickell, and be seen and be hanging out and looking at the beautiful Biscayne Bay.

Crazy About You is all about the senses.

We're all about the details.

You come here and you have the views, we go out of our way to make sure that it's a dining experience that you will never forget.

So, Crazy About You was recommended by one of our viewers, Alexa Kaplan, and unfortunately she couldn't join us for this recording due to some technical difficulties.

But she sent us her review, and I wanna talk about some of the dishes she tried.

So the first thing Alexa had when she went to Crazy About You, was the smoked mahi dip.

And smoked mahi dip takes a delicious fresh mahi and they house smoke it, and they combine it with little bits of vegetables, a touch of mayonnaise and whip it up and serve it with crackers.

And she said it was just delicious.

She also had the churrasco with chimichurri, which if you don't know what chimichurri is, it's kind of a vinaigrette used for grilled meats, and it is from Argentina.

It is based with parsley, a little bit of dried chili, sometimes lemon, sometimes vinegar, and oregano and olive oil.

So thank you, Alexa, for giving us that restaurant.

Marleah, what did you have at Crazy About You, and what did you think about it?

I thought Crazy About You was a great experience.

First, we had an appetizer of plantain bruschetta.

It was delicious.

They brought out the plantains and set them in front of you, and they were perfectly crispy, like not too crispy and still kinda fluffy.

And then they whipped up some tomatoes and strawberries and other things, and they poured it on top of the plantain.

So that was delicious.

And then for my meal I got something called a Buddha bowl.

It was like a quinoa bowl, and it had carrots and kale and sweet potatoes topped with an egg.

And for the record, I'm a vegetarian, so all of my choices will be vegetarian, but I was actually really surprised by how tasty it was.

It was so good.

Steve, what did you think about Crazy About You, and what did you have?

Crazy About You was actually a very delightful experience.

I had some apprehensions when I logged on the web and took a look at their menu.

The menu was all over the place, and it was a bit odd that the entrees were actually set up by price as opposed to just a listing of entrees.

That said, the food was delicious.

All my apprehension was gone as soon as I ordered and the food was served.

I ordered a few interesting dishes.

The first was my appetizer, which was a serrano croquette.

They were very crispy on the outside, there was very little oil or grease, moist and just delicious on the inside.

My second dish, I'm kind of a salmon freak, I eat salmon everywhere I go, I go for my omega-threes and my antioxidants, and so I usually go to salmon as my entree.

This was a soy glazed salmon.

It was presented as mixed with soy and brown sugar.

It was presented beautifully, it was cooked perfectly, it was medium rare as I like it.

It was accompanied by a stir fry of vegetables that were also very good.

Marleah, how was the service?

I thought the service was great.

And I will say one thing that my family and I talked about was that they were attentive, but they weren't overbearing, so they didn't keep coming to the table, but when they did come they made sure that you had everything that you needed.

And I will say there was also a lot of people in the restaurant.

So for there to be that many people, they still gave us good attention and good service.

Well, Marleah, Crazy About You was not your pick, however, please sum it up for us.

I would say Crazy About You is a great place to try new food, to get a great view, and to spend time with your family at a nice brunch.

[michelle] Steve?

I think it would be a perfect place for a date, to be sitting out there overlooking Biscayne Bay.

And the food is just great tasty fresh dishes.

So everybody would enjoy it.

Enjoy some drinks by the bay when you visit Crazy About You, located at 1155 Brickell Bay Drive in Miami.

They're open daily for brunch, lunch and dinner.

Reservations are accepted and the average price for dinner without drinks is about $50.

Now, retiree, Steve Sherman, is telling us all about one of his favorite go-to spots in South Florida.

He calls it a breath of fresh air, both literally and figuratively.

From the quaint atmosphere to the tasty touches on an American classic menu, it's definitely a standout place to him.

It's located in Fort Lauderdale and it's called Hardy Park Bistro.

My name is Travis Bacon, and I'm the head chef at Hardy Park Bistro.

Hardy Park Bistro, to me, is the neighborhood restaurant that you could really come on a Tuesday, have a burger or fish and chips, or if you wanna come on a weekend before a show, you could wear a nice sports coat and have some good food.

We make everything from scratch.

We make all our purees, all our sauces, all our dressings.

We really wanna keep it simple but we wanna have the food spot on.

We really make sure that the flavor is there, everything's seasoned well, and that there's a variety too, because we have a lot of regulars that come in, so we wanna offer them something where they can eat a little different every night.

So our crispy salmon with our parsnip puree is one of our biggest hits.

We pan sear the salmon so the skin is real crispy, then we put a nice smooth parsnip puree with some braised greens and asparagus, and then we finish it with some basil oil.

The atmosphere is very casual.

I feel like you could really come here on a Tuesday and you could sit outside and have a beer and a burger, or if you're gonna go to the show at the Broward Center, you could come in and dress up a little bit and have a nicer dinner.

Inside's a little bit more elegant, and outside a little bit more casual.

And we're off the beaten path, so it's easier to park, it's less traffic around here.

And we are centrally located, so if you're coming from out west, you could be here in 20 minutes, or out east, you could be here in 15.

Hardy Park Bistro is located in Fort Lauderdale.

We serve delicious food at season, and we're proud of it.

So Steve, tell us about Hardy Park, and do you go often?

I have a feeling you might say yes to that one.

Well, it's my pleasure to talk about Hardy Park Bistro.

This is my go-to restaurant here in Broward.

This restaurant was opened in 2013, and I moved here in 2015 and between then and now I've eaten there over 100 times.

It is just the kind of place where you go, that you just love to go.

It's consistent, the food's always good.

For the show, I decided to try something a little bit different, and I went for the barbecue ribs.

Having come from Texas, 25 years in Texas, I ate a lot of barbecue in Texas.

So I thought this would be a good dish to try.

And it turned out to be wonderful.

It was the kind of ribs where the meat just falls off of the bone, and it was tender and tasty, cooked with a tomato-based barbecue sauce.

And it was set on a sweet potato puree, served at room temperature.

And then it also was accompanied by wilted greens.

And all of it came together just beautifully.

So Marleah, tell me a little bit about your experience at Hardy Park.

What did you have?

Did you love it?

Sure, I loved it.

Again, I went with my family, and the first thing I had, we sat outside, I ordered a veggie burger and fries.

The fries came on the side, so you had to order them separate, but both were very good.

My veggie burger was mainly made of peas and it had a little bit of other good veggies in there too, I saw some carrots and things like that.

And as a lot of vegetarians know, sometimes your burgers fall apart, but this one was like, this one I think had sweet peas or some type of really good binder, so it stayed together and it was really good.

Now you both had desserts that make me swoon.

Steve, especially yours.

Do you wanna mention your icky sticky date pudding a little bit?

I'd like to mention it and I would like to forget it.

It's so fattening and so delicious.

It's a sticky toffee pudding and it's accompanied with a house-made vanilla ice cream and a wonderful caramel sauce.

And it's my go-to dessert.

Unfortunately, I eat that there too often.

Over 100 times, most of the times I ended up with the same sticky toffee pudding.

And then Marleah, talk about sweet, you jumped right into a tres leches, tell us about that a little bit?

It was so delicious.

Tres leches is like a sponge cake.

So this one had three or four layers to it, and the top was kind of crispy, like a brulee, and it was drizzled with caramel sauce, and it was so good.

I would go back just for that.

Well, Steve, Hardy Park Bistro was your pick, sum it up for us.

For those of you that want a creative, crafty menu with chef-driven dishes, this is the place to go.

It's yummy.

Marleah?

I think that this is yeah, a calm, quaint place for you and your family, maybe for a little celebration, and that it's good for any day of the week.

Well, get your all American classics when you visit Hardy Park Bistro, located at 21 Southwest 7th Street in Fort Lauderdale.

They're open for lunch and dinner, Tuesday through Sunday, as well as brunch on the weekends.

Reservations are accepted, and the average price for dinner without drinks is about $35.

So do you all love sweet potato fries?

I know there's a lot of us here that do.

It's a great weakness.

But it's not an easy thing to make, you really can't treat a sweet potato fry the way you would a regular potato.

So I've done a lot of reading and I found the most perfect recipe.

So let's just jump right in.

This is one peeled, extremely large, sweet potato, and I've just trimmed off the ends to make it stand up nice and straight.

From there, we're gonna cut it down into nice, long, somewhat even pieces.

Line them up and go ahead and cut them into nice long skinny fries.

So once you've done that to all of the sweet potato, you go ahead and you're gonna toss it in a bowl with your favorite olive oil or extra virgin olive oil, it's really up to you.

Then a good amount of cracked black pepper, a little bit of garlic powder, a little bit of paprika, and then finally some kosher salt, and you go ahead and you mix all that up really, really well.

Once you're done mixing, go ahead and put it on a sheet pan, kind of like this one.

I love using a little bit of parchment paper.

It takes a good 10 minutes on 400 degrees, kind of flip the fries over delicately, and then another anywhere from 10 to 16 to 18 minutes for really golden brown, crispy fries.

So, while mine are actually in the oven, I'm gonna show you a lovely little dipping sauce for them.

I have a little bit of mayonnaise in this bowl, and then I'm gonna add, it's basically equal parts of mayo to sour cream.

And then I have some prepared horseradish that already comes in a jar, and then just a tiny amount of Dijon mustard.

Go ahead and mix all that up, but I'm gonna add a little bit of salt to it.

Delicious, all right, so let's go ahead and grab our sweet potato fries.

Beautiful, so these are your gorgeous sweet potato fries.

Look how beautifully golden they are.

So let's go ahead and put these.

They're really hot.

And there you have it, beautiful, oven-roasted, which is a lot healthier, sweet potato fries with horseradish dipping sauce.

You can learn how to make sweet potato fries like mine, the recipe's at checkpleasefl.com.

Well, finally, health specialist, Marleah Singleton, is bringing some love to our vegan and vegetarian eaters here in South Florida.

She says this chic spot has everything from unique plant-based entrees to homemade desserts and it's the perfect spot to have a chill healthy meal with friends, and it's located in Wynwood.

It's called Love Life Cafe.

My name is Veronica Menin.

I am co-owner of Love Life Cafe along with my husband Diego.

So Diego and I are both vegans ourselves, and we're also athletes, endurance cyclists, so we're always hungry.

And we built the menu based on what we love which is a lot of delicious vegan food.

Our mission is to get as many people as possible, not only vegans, to come here and have a great experience, relate to the dishes in different ways, you know, you try it, you can have a pizza, you can have a taco, you can have an arepa.

So many familiar things that taste really yummy, and you're really not missing anything from the non vegan diet.

So we won an award for the best veggie burger in America in 2017.

People love it, it's also very clean for a veggie burger.

We make everything in-house.

We make the cheese, we make the patty, we make the pickles.

Everything is plant-based, there's no fake meat in that one, and the bun that we use is a pretzel bun.

We have a sign at the door that says, eat good karma.

We believe that our mission is to serve as many cruelty-free dishes as possible.

And by doing that, obviously we're creating good karma for us, and also creating good karma for the planet.

Because if all of us start to make the right decision towards a clean plant-based lifestyle, the planet will benefit tremendously from it in so many ways.

So that's our mission in life.

So Marleah, as a vegetarian, I bet you've tried so many different places in South Florida that serve plant-based meals.

So why do you love Love Life Cafe?

What stands out?

I love Love Life Cafe because they offer more than just the food, at least when I first started going there.

So they used to be located right around the corner from where they are now, and they had yoga workshops, and they sold clothing, and kind of like pet supplies that you might need, but all plant-based and focused on raising awareness around that.

So I just really appreciate their mission.

I actually love this place too, because the menu is so extensive for vegan or vegetarian eaters.

And they have everything you could think of.

So this last time I got the jackfruit carnitas tacos, it had garnish and it came with a little spicy green sauce that was really delicious.

You also had sweet potato fries, correct?

Yeah, I had sweet potato fries, but I would call them more like sweet potato cubes.

They come in little cube shapes and it comes with a side of almost a cilantro sauce, like a thicker cilantro sauce, and it's really good.

Steve, tell us about what you ordered.

I know you're more of a meat kind of a guy.

I know you have your salmon a couple of times a week, but you love steak.

So what did you think of Love Life Cafe?

How did you do, and what did you eat?

Well, this was quite an experience.

This was my first vegan or vegetarian experience.

So talking about apprehension going to this restaurant, but when I went in, of course I had to ask for recommendations.

I have no clue, I look at the menu, and half the things on the menu, I have no clue what they are.

And the number one recommendation by the person helping me, was to try their vegan burger.

And the burger actually was quite good.

And it was covered with guacamole, a faux cheddar cheese, 'cause I understand they don't use cheese at this restaurant and it had some wilted greens on it.

And it was on a pretzel bun, so that was also a nice touch to it.

It was very good.

So would you say this was probably the best burger, the best veggie burger you'd ever had?

Well, I haven't had the one at Hardy Park Bistro yet, so that's on my list now for my next trip.

But so far, yes, that was the best vegan burger I had.

So, okay, let's jump into dessert really quickly.

Marleah, you tell us first about your carrot cake, then I wanna hear about the mudslide cheesecake that you had, Steve.

So yeah, I had the carrot cake, which I have a lot.

Almost every time that I go, and I'm not positive about what exactly makes it, but it has icing that's similar to cream cheese and it's super light, very fluffy, still has the same sweetness.

I know that a lot of people kind of get hesitant about it not having sugar and not having eggs, but it's really good, and at least worth a try.

Steve, tell me about that mud slide.

It was okay.

I mean, I'm sure for vegans it was probably delicious.

Just my expectations when I ordered a piece of cheesecake was I was getting real cheesecake.

It was quite sweet, so you have to have a sweet tooth for that particular cheesecake, but it was nicely prepared.

It had all fresh fruit on it, sliced fruit, and a very nice sauce on it, and again, not my favorite, but I can see why people go to this restaurant, it's really good.

You know, when it would get so busy, is it hard to park around Love Life Cafe?

I think it can be hard to park, but on the day that I went, it was actually very open.

I went during lunchtime.

So even though it might be crowded, it's all street parking all around, so you're definitely bound to find somewhere close.

Well, Marleah, Love Life Cafe was your pick, sum it up for us.

Love Life Cafe is a very vibrant yet relaxed place that people can go to open their mind about vegetarian and vegan options in Wynwood.

Steve?

I would call it interesting, fresh and tasty.

Try some creative plant-based dishes when you go to Love Life Cafe, located at 2616 Northwest 5th Avenue in Wynwood.

They're open daily for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Reservations are not accepted, and the average price for dinner without drinks is about $25.

We've had such a wonderful time.

I wanna thank my delightful guests, Steve Sherman and Marleah Singleton.

And of course thank you to Alexa Kaplan for bringing us Crazy About You, and I'm sorry you're not here with us.

For more about the restaurants and recipes featured in this show, or if you'd like to apply to be a guest reviewer, visit us at checkpleasefl.com.

And remember find us on Facebook and follow us on Instagram.

Join us next time for three new guests recommending three of their favorite restaurants right here on Check, Please!

South Florida.

I'm Michelle Bernstein, and I will see you then.

Chin-chin everybody.

[voiceover] Cultural culinary secrets and global flavors.

We have a passion for blending ingredients and seasonings from around the world.