Another One Bites The Dust

Another one, but not just any one. Mark’s South Beach, in the Hotel Nash, is no more. Perhaps not surprising, as The Nash was a curiously low-profile address for so high-profile a chef. It was out of sight from the street and, as far as locals were concerned, pretty much out of mind.

For those who may be new to these parts, the eponymous chef Mark Militello was one of modern day Miami’s very first star chefs. When in 1988 he opened Mark's Place in North Miami Beach (currently the site of Two Chefs Too) it was, bar none, the restaurant In town. Shortly thereafter Food and Wine magazine named Militello one of the Ten Best Chefs in America, and he received one national accolade after another. Just a few years ago The James Beard Foundation honored him as Best Chef in the Southeast.

Militello was, and still is, one of our elite, top-shelf toques, his best dishes so sensational they sear in the memory so that you can -- and do -- recall them for years to come. Larry LaValley, executive chef at Mark’s South Beach for years, is likewise a serious talent to be reckoned with. His name was somewhat buried in the Nash, too, but something tells me we’ll be hearing a lot more of him.

And we’ll still be hearing from, and can still savor Militello’s cuisine -- especially at his flagship Mark's Las Olas but also at Mark's at the Park (Mizner, that is).

--Lee Klein