Miami’s 8 Most Expensive Restaurant Meals

Miami’s 8 Most Expensive Restaurant Meals

Miami has always been a city filled with dreamers. Maybe it’s the tropical breezes, or the way the sun bathes everything in a golden light, but people come here from all over the world to let their fantasies come true. In Miami, you go big or go home, including with its food and drink.

Sure, you can come to Miami and eat the perfect Cubano for under ten bucks or enjoy some of the best street tacos you’ve ever had — but when we talk about Miami, we talk about the decadence. What fun is it to drive up in that rented Lambo to Pollo Tropical? Ballers, after all, gotta ball, and Miami doesn’t disappoint in that respect.

From gilded steaks to a giant cotton candy Marie Antoinette wig to a $30,000 cocktail that comes with its own Birkin, here are the eight most decadent things to eat and drink in Miami. 

Oro

If a restaurant is named Oro, you know there are going to be some golden moments and lavish menu items, but nothing compares with the Bananas & Caviar. This combination of Kaluga caviar, fermented banana peel butter, plantain waffle, and horseradish is simultaneously sweet, briny, and savory. The dish is listed as a “prelude,” but at $250, no one will bat an eye if you want to save it for the meal’s finale. 

El Cielo

Your TikTok feed might recently have been going haywire with reviews of Copenhagen’s Alchemist restaurant, where a 50-course tasting menu includes eating a whole butterfly, scooping caviar from a giant (fake) eye, and tainting the walls with edible paint for dessert. Don’t hop on a plane just yet — Miami has its own, slightly tamer, version that has its own surreal moments. El Cielo’s 20-course tasting experience ($289) includes courses like the Tree of Life (yucca bread on a metal tree) and the now-famous Chocotherapy, where you bathe your bands in chocolate and lick the sweet liquid off with your tongue. Speaking of tongues, the Lick Me is a palate-cleansing sorbet dish where no hands or utensils are allowed. There’s even a “Yellow Butterfly,” a nod to the lush coffee-growing regions of Colombia — thankfully, this butterfly is just a cookie. 

Maple & Ash

If you’re the person who goes into a restaurant and can’t decide what on earth to order, then Maple & Ash doesn’t give a f*@k, either. Literally — as in the restaurant’s I DON’T GIVE A F*@K menu. For $225, Maple & Ask will serve you a selection of fire-roasted shellfish, steaks sourced from small farms, freshly caught seafood, and “seasonal delicacies.” What seasonal delicacies? Well, if they don’t give a f8@k, maybe you shouldn’t either. 

Palm Tree Club

Whether you’re five or 95, chances are you love chicken tenders and French fries. What’s not to like about golden, crunchy strips of chicken, crisp fries, and plenty of dipping sauces? You know what else people like? Seafood towers. But what if you don’t like oysters or have a shellfish allergy? Well, then you do the unimaginable and fill that tower with chicken tenders and French fries. The tower might be an impressive photo for Instagram, but you might cluck at the $105 price tag. 

Nusr-Et Steakhouse 

There was a time when Nusret Gökçe, aka Salt Bae, was such a pop culture icon that Saturday Night Live parodied his signature steak salting moves. At one time, the chef operated multiple restaurants worldwide. Now two remain, in New York City and Miami. There, you can find Sale Bae’s Golden Experience collection of meats wrapped in gold. If you want the full Midas experience, order the Golden Armor, a 32-ounce, gold-wrapped wagyu rib cap ($1,500), followed by the Golden Baklava ($60), a gold-wrapped baklava, served with ice cream. Wash it down with the Golden Cappuccino ($49), literally a coffee with steamed milk, covered with a thin slice of edible gold leaf. 

Cote

This Design District steakhouse received a Michelin star for its premium meats and cocktails, but one drink stands alone in sheer decadence. The $850 Vintage Vault Martini is made with a vodka so rare, you need an invitation to purchase a bottle: Chopin Vintage Vault, a vintage potato vodka made from the Polish vodka brand’s very first release three decades ago. For the Vintage Vault Martini, that rare liquid is paired with orange bitters and (naturally) caviar. If you want to recreate the drink at home, know that the bottle costs $3,000 (if you can secure that invitation to purchase one). 

Papi Steak

DJ sets and Miami A-listers flashing their bling are the first warning that you’re not in for a casual evening at Papi Steak. Glance at the menu and you realize you’re in for one of the most hyped meals in town. You’ve likely heard about the cocktail that made it to Page Six: The It’s Not a Bag, It’s a Cocktail is made with Belvedere 10 vodka, grapefruit oil saccharum, Lillet Blanc, and Siberian caviar. The NY Post clocked the cocktail at a cool $30,000 — complete with an authentic Hermes Birkin bag. In reality, the cocktail costs $150, sans bag. If you’re really interested in the bag, speak to Papi (co-owner, David Einhorn), and he can make arrangements. Still want more? There’s Papi’s $1,000 Beef Case, a 55-ounce purebred MS 9+ Australian wagyu tomahawk steak, presented in a diamond-encrusted briefcase, and the $1,000 Louis XIII Baked Alaska to end one extravagant evening. 

Barton G

Long before the days of influencers taking pictures of seafood towers and cheese pulls, restaurateur Barton G. Weiss was serving food as art. His eponymous Barton G restaurant offers not one, but an entire menu of edible showpieces ranging from lobster Pop-Tarts to a carnival-themed dessert. If you really want a meal fit for royalty, order the Barton’s Castle — a Tomahawk steak, lobster tail, roasted asparagus, and loaded mashed potatoes with bearnaise sauce and jus — served in an actual castle (MP). Finish your evening with the Marie Antoinette ($42), where you’ll be presented with the queen’s head resplendent in an edible cotton candy pompadour “wig.”