This past weekend some of the interns and I decided to bypass South Beach and head straight on through to Lincoln Road, a cross between an outdoor mall, farmer’s market, food festival, and quaint town center.
Spanning several blocks near the ocean, Lincoln Road has no vehicle traffic running through it, but instead takes up both sides of the street with the “road” in between populated by small cafes, food vendors, and fountains. It was the perfect place to spend a Sunday afternoon walking around outside leisurely, frequently taking refuge in the air-conditioned shopping stores and art galleries lining the street. I even spotted a Kilwin’s ice cream store. This was the first Kilwin’s I had seen outside of the one in South Bend and I eagerly craved my favorite flavor- toasted coconut. Since I knew that I would be visiting the South Bend Kilwin’s in a week, I (somewhat begrudgingly) moved on.
The half indoor-half outdoor cafes were extremely reminiscent of the casual restaurants lining the streets in Barcelona. Only the large awnings and plethora of high-powered fans could generate enough shade and breeze to make eating outside in Miami bearable. We ended up eating at Spris, an Italian restaurant complete with a large menu of pizzas, paninis, salads, and pastas. My friend Luke’s brick oven baked pizza came out extremely fast and was everything that a simple, classic margherita pizza should be- soft, crispy, and made with good quality ingredients.
I ordered a spinach salad with avocado, grapefruit, apples, toasted almonds, and a light balsamic dressing. The rich avocado and acidic grapefruit was a well-matched combination that I had never had in a salad before but that I thought made a great pairing. Because the helping of avocado was so generous, the salad ended up being rather filling. Were I to order it again, I would definitely want to add some kind of protein (chicken/shrimp), or grain to make the dish more of a balanced meal, rather than a rich side salad.
To finish the meal off nicely and to discourage any late-afternoon sleepiness, Ara and I ventured just around the corner to a Cuban bakery. There I was treated to my first Cuban coffee or “cafecito”. The little coffee shots came in miniature cups but packed a good punch. We ordered ours sweetened with milk, making the strong coffee an almost dessert-like afternoon treat.
I was also surprised and excited to find that Lincoln Road is home to a Ladurée, an extremely famous french pastry shop known for its macarons. When I was in Paris I sampled the Rose flavor and savored every last crumb, dying for more. I immediately texted this picture to my friends from abroad and we all briefly reminisced about how amazing the macarons were and how much we can’t wait to return.
