Must-do: Eat at the cool kids on the block

the aky crust and steaming, fragrant  lling made it well worth our while to  nd extra space for it. Last stop provided sweet reprieve with its luscious scoops of homemade gelato – it’s the only non-Latin American option on the tour, but it does drive home the “melting pot” modus operandi of food culture here.

“Ask any Latin American living in Miami which country has the best food, and they’ll tell you right here,” quipped our tour guide. There you have it – the experts have spoken.

Milani Gelateria

Walk down any popular dining stretch in Miami, especially in the South Beach area ( Espanola Way, Lincoln Road Mall and Ocean Drive), and it becomes obvious that dining out here isn’t just about the food – it’s a multisensory experience, subtlety optional. At the immensely popular

(www.stkhouse.com), for example, we could barely hear ourselves over the thumping club soundtrack, or see one another in the dark, cavernous space. But there was a

STK Miami

palpable sense of excitement in the air, among the beautifully dressed crowd (think men in suits and women in glittery body- con dresses) – they were here to see and be seen, after all.

The menu of steakhouse essentials, while good (a wagyu burger, in particular, was excellent), was not nearly as memorable as having a personal bathroom attendant, and seeing the snaking queues outside being ushered in by bouncers on a Tuesday night. “Miamians sure don’t do things by halves,” I muttered to myself, feeling underdressed in my (non-glittery) maxi dress.

Over at Lincoln Road Mall and its strip of semi-alfresco restaurants like (www.sushisamba. com/location/miami/dromo), things

Sushisamba