Elevated Mexican Food At Mercadito Restaurant In Midtown Miami

I met one of our foodie tour guides at el Mercadito this past Tuesday and when I arrived, she was already having a fabulous margarita (I like that), a glamorous margarita is all a girl needs after a day of hard work. The glass was chilled but not drippy (not sure if that word exist, drippy? I'll google it later), but you know when the water starts running outside a chilled glass - that's drippy to me. I had a zip of it - but this is not for me, too sweet and the rim had what we thought it was a combination of sugar and comino but they were pretty busy and I did not want to start getting on our waiter's nerve as I just walked in the place. I am a wine type of girl so I just had a chilled glass of German wine ( which was pretty spectacular).

Here it goes the byline in which they are marketing themselves:

Expertly blending traditional Mexico with creative interpretations of local and seasonal ingredients is the inspiration behind Mercadito restaurants.

Ceviche Dorado $10.50 - mahi mahi, avocado, tomato, orange-chile de arbol broth

This was the first guest arriving to the party and wow, this was ceviche perfection. The avocado was buttery, the oranges fresh, sturdy delivering small amount of rapid cold orange juice shots as you bite into them, by the time I tasted the mahi mahi while savoring the limey juices with chile I had nothing but a moment. In short, I feel sorry for the rest of the Mexican people making ceviche and chefs that cook Mexican food and even all of the Peruvian ceviche out there because el Mercadito really scored on this one. (yeah, I know, this is my opinion)

Ceviche Camaron $10.50 shrimp, tangerine roasted jalapenos, citrus-guajillo broth

Shrimp is getting on my nerves lately, shrimp this, shrimp that... (so what?). This dish was good, nothing to compared to the mahi mahi ceviche though. If you are still all hyped up by shrimp then order this one.

Tacos Hongos $13.50 - huitlacoche, wild mushrooms, manchego, cheese, salsa verde

If you like tacos, then drop what you are doing and head to el Mercadito, seriously. You can literally lick the sauce out of the plate on this one - crunchy in all the right places, fresh, with a mild salsa verde accent. There's some real talent going around at el Mercadito.

Tacos Pastor $13.50 - chile ancho rubbed pork, grilled pineapple, chile de arbol salsa

I get it, people love to have pineapple in their food here in South Florida (at least I see more dishes with pineapple than when I was living in San Francisco), I simply don't like it. Of course this is one of the staple flavors of Mexican cuisine and Caribbean countries use it a lot in their food (I am not so clueless about food), but for me pineapple is too sweet to combine it with an animal flesh like chicken (call me whatever, this is my opinion). I think it is a matter of taste, I tried these tacos because Gigi order them - you can put anything in front me, I will try it.

So that's it for now for el Mercadito. I will be back to try the entire menu little by little. I will bring my camera next time and I'll shoot some video, stay tune.

Mercadito Midtown

3252 N.E. 1st Ave.
Miami, FL 33137
www.mercaditorestaurants.com/midtown