Superstar restaurateur Michelle Bernstein and her enterprise accomplice/husband David Martinez have opened numerous ventures throughout their twenty years collectively. They normally don’t look again when one closes. That’s about to vary with the reopening of Sra. Martinez in Coral Gables, which had a little bit of magic to it throughout its earlier stint within the Miami Design District, Bernstein says.
“It’s funny. We never have ever in our careers — David and I have been together working for about 25 years — brought anything back. We’ve closed a couple and we vowed almost never, ever to go backwards. And that’s kind of how I have lived my whole life is I never go back,” she says. “But, there’s just something that has always itched us about Sra. Martinez and wanting one more shot at it because it died a little young and it was really not because the restaurant did poorly.”
Actual property was the issue with the previous submit workplace constructing not precisely ideally suited for a restaurant. Now, 12 years later, Chef Michy’s Sra. Martinez will return on the former web site of The Open Stage, 2325 Galiano St., Coral Gables.
Bernstein says she and Martinez have discovered quite a bit because the first model of Sra. Martinez closed.
Eating traits change
“Everything’s changed in dining so much in the last 10 years. First it changed just as things naturally do, but then after Covid, it changed again,” she says. “Dining became much less intimate and a lot more informal and food started coming onto the table whenever it was ready. This is what became the new norm. And then after Covid, I think things almost went back a little bit to the intimate. … It’s very interesting how we’ve gone through this whole crazy cycle.”
Her experiences lately with Café La Trova and Candy Liberty present that folks need experiential eating.
“It’s more than just going to eat a meal,” she says. “It is, ‘I want everything. I want it all in one place and I want a whole evening.’ And I get that, because who doesn’t want that? But the thing is, it’s really hard to give great quality food, a great quality experience, amazing cocktails, and then service to boot. It’s really hard.”
However Senora Martinez — that’s the place the Sra. abbreviation comes from — offers credit score to her husband for honing proper in on nice service. Apart from co-owning eating places together with his spouse, Senor Martinez has partnered at different extremely revered bars, comparable to Medium Cool on Miami Seaside, which has nightly reside jazz and DJs, and the upcoming Zebra Membership on the Townhouse Lodge in Miami Seaside.
“He has more bars that I don’t even know if people know that he’s a partner of, but he spends a couple nights a week making sure that everyone is getting a great experience, even if they’re just going to a cocktail bar, the kind of service that you would get at a five-star restaurant,” Bernstein says.
Amidst juggling all their enterprise pursuits (Bernstein admits to liking a little bit of chaos), the couple have a 12-year-old son, Zachary.
“He’s been offering an opinion of my food since he was about five. And I hate to say it, I don’t want him to hear me, but he is usually right. ‘It’s terrible, mom. I don’t think this is quite how it used to be.’ And I’ll feel very offended at first and kind of hurt. And then as he walks away, I’ll taste it and I’ll think, ‘he’s right.’”
She doesn’t count on their son to observe them into the restaurant enterprise, saying he’s a whiz at math and science.
Zachary’s mother and father met when Bernstein was the chef on the Mandarin Oriental’s Azul. David began as a waiter and have become a supervisor. They have been nice mates first after which Bernstein says her crush became marriage.
Their first enterprise was MB from Michelle Bernstein at a resort in Cancun. “They really wooed us into opening a restaurant there,” she says, noting that they didn’t truly personal it. MB continues to be there however now it stands for Muy Bueno.
In 2005, they bought married, purchased a home and ready to open Michy’s (based mostly on her nickname) and helped begin the gentrification of Miami’s Higher East Aspect.
“We realized how well we worked together, and I was the back of his front and he was the front to my back. I never venture into the dining room. I am actually quite shy, and so it’s not something I ever feel comfortable with,” she says. “David’s just so wonderful with hospitality, so good at making people feel good. He just injects this great happiness and service and so good at what he does.”
The transition to their very own enterprise wasn’t straightforward.
“We were in a very cushy hotel, Azul, and I had always worked for other people, and you learn about the good and the bad part of opening your own business,” she says. “You have to fix your own oven. You have to make sure that all the paychecks go through. You pay everybody before you ever get anything yourself.”
She offers numerous credit score to having one among Miami’s most famed restaurateurs as a accomplice at Michy’s.
“We were really lucky because we chose Steve Perricone as a partner. who has been in the industry for twice the amount of time that we have. He is such an important person in the restaurant/bar business in South Florida and beyond. So, he taught us a lot. We were learning as we went.”
Bernstein says she nonetheless will get stopped by individuals who beg her to open Michy’s once more, 10 years after it closed.
Getting ready for a gap
Now, the reopening of Sra. Martinez, anticipated in late September, sounds just like the end result of the couple’s abilities.
They picked a high restaurant designer, whom they’ve lengthy admired: Thomas Schlesser, the founding principal of New York’s Design Bureaux. His firm is a three-time James Beard Award winner for excellent restaurant design with Chicago’s The Publican in Chicago and New York Metropolis’s DBGB and Bar Boulud.
Bernstein says The Publican is one among her favourite designs. Previously, her sister has at all times designed the eating places — “my sister almost knows me better than I know myself and she has better taste.”
The sister duo began speaking a few European/Spanish flavored design. Sra. Martinez goes to have freshly poured inexperienced and pink terrazzo flooring. There will probably be black and white tiles, loads of vegetation, some wrought iron and a bar the entire size of the restaurant. The home windows can all be pushed open throughout cooler climate and there will probably be a stage for leisure.
Diners will have the ability to peek into the kitchen, however Bernstein averted a design that makes the kitchen crew really feel like they’re in a fishbowl. Patrons will have the ability to see a few of the meat hanging. She’s very enthusiastic about a big wood-burning oven the place she will be able to put together entire chickens, fish over greens and end off tortilla Española and a brand new oxtail paella topped by bone marrow.
On the time of the interview close to the tip of July, the menu was 70 p.c performed. She is bringing again British chef Andrew Gilbert, who was on the first Sra. Martinez. He’s additionally recognized for the since closed Seven Dials in Coral Gables.
“He and I have been really creating this menu together, and he’s very strong. He is strict and kind and very smart, and he’s really good with numbers. I think he’s going to make a fabulous chef at Sra. Martinez,” Bernstein says.
The menu will certainly have her ode to Spain, Bernstein says. “It will be old world meets very new world using new techniques and new styles and, for me, new recipes.”
She’s been experimenting quite a bit with croquettes, together with one which has carbonara inside and an egg yolk aged for 12 days grated excessive. Shes additionally give you a faux mozzarella made out of tofu and plans to serve it with tomatoes or plums if they’re in season.
Bernstein is partnering with just a few native farmers and shes planning a extra seasonal menu than she normally does. In fact, the caveat is the rising season in our semitropical paradise is quite a bit totally different than up north.
She’s excited in regards to the totally different choices for patrons: You possibly can have a drink and a chew on the bar and expertise the music, or you possibly can come and have a household meal within the eating room and take heed to music. She’s promising wonderful cocktail service and is happy in regards to the Coral Gables eating scene and the placement subsequent to Graziano’s Mercado.
There will probably be some Latin music, however the couple additionally wish to push the envelope a bit. Count on a vibe that varies from weekdays to weekends.
Does she count on folks to get out of their chairs and dance? “God, I hope so. I hope so. I would love them to. I always told David, ‘I want a place that I can hang up my apron and go dance,’ so why not?”
