Cafe Motek - Downtown — Restaurant in Miami

You can’t find this place just by walking by, but when you do find it, the reward is incredible!

The Downtown Miami location for Motek Cafe can be found in the Seybold Jewelry Building, between a plethora of—-you guessed it—-jewelry stores. Their floral vine awning and modern interior, completely opened to the walkway, and their walkway patio seating, tells you that their spot is not like their neighbors. If you sit facing the outside of the cafe, you can gaze at the jewelers cases while you feast on fresh, nourishing Mediterranean food!

If you’re like me and can’t decide on one item to get, they have samplers and platters that give you multiple dishes in one. You can also build your own sampler by getting mezzes (small plates) separately. They’re perfect for sharing with someone or yourself.

I shared the Motek Sampler Plate: Hummus, Babaganoush, Egglant Salad, Israeli Salad with pita bread. The hummus was tremendously creamy, the babaganoush was sweet and savory, the Israeli salad was fresh and full of herbs but could have used a little more dressing or seasoning, and the eggplant salad was a perfect tender compilation of smoky roasting and sauciness. We also shared the Spicy Schnitzel Sandwich after seeing the photos of the Crispy Schnitzel Sandwich, and it was spot on minus the spicy part. The expertly crispy chicken schnitzel with the crispy eggplant accented with a long hot green pepper was an uncommon and incredible combination. They provide plenty of tahini inside the sandwich and on the side to complete the tastes with some nutty smoothness. The sandwich, created with an imposing challah, is undoubtedly the size of 2 normal sandwiches in one. You should share it or take half of it home with you and congratulate yourself on doing so.

Their idea of spicy is—-not spicy. Despite the use of the long green hot pepper, we detected zero spicy flavor in the sandwich. I would suggest they rename it to “Another Crispy Chicken Schnitzel”. But I would still get this one for the crispy eggplant.

Service was attentive despite there only being 2 servers around for the while cafe. Is it on the more expensive end of casual Mediterranean cuisine? Probably. But did I spend about $24 including tax and tip for a wonderful early dinner? I sure did and left completely stuffed. Motek has become one of the best places I’ve been to for Mediterranean food in Miami, mainly because the options in Miami are quite slim. Nonetheless, I’m eager to go back and conquer the rest of their menu. Let’s go...

This place would be very good even in the middle of Tel Aviv.

It’s a fast casual concept with a full menu of starters, salads, hummus, main plates, etc. But the recipes are great and the food tastes like it was cooked with care.

The restaurant is entirely authentic in its dishes and spicing, it doesn’t cater to an American palate, rather it serves Israeli home/street food as best it can. Everyone will find something they like. Every dish comes with ‘chamutzim’ (pickles and jalapeño), a side Israeli salad of very fresh tomatoes and cucumbers (unseasoned), and a fresh pita (interesting square shape, very fresh).

Overall, everything was super fresh. We can only hope they are able to keep the high quality of spices, protein, produce, and baking. Did we say the food was fresh?! A real treat to have.

Our order:

Hummus w/tehina - Excellent restaurant style hummus. The hummus has good seasoning and good texture. And the tehina is very, very good as well (this is a big deal as it’s the base of so many Israeli dishes). You can’t go wrong with this dish.

Vegetarian Arayes Burger (should be called kabbab) - LIFE CHANGING if you’re vegetarian. I’ve been looking for something with this flavor profile for 20 years. It’s the single best middle eastern vegetarian kabbab I’ve ever had. If you’re middle eastern you’ll love it. If you’re American it’ll change your concept of how (faux) meats can be sliced and prepared. Excellent! The dish also comes with Israeli style French fries, which are well seasoned and very good (our American friend says it’s the best he’s had).

Chicken shawarma empanada - my wife liked it.

Schnitzel - wife say it’s very solid... crispy, tasty, and delicious. Our son loved it too, and he won’t eat any chicken tenders, because safta (grandma) makes him schnitzel all the time. If it reminds him of his safta’s famous cooking then it’s got to be great!

Israeli sampler platter - nice mix of hummus, eggplant (w/tehina), labaneh, and Israeli salad. The eggplant was very nicely grilled. The labaneh was classic. A very nice dish with good potions of each of the items.

Baklavah- probably the best house made baklavah I’ve ever had. It’s incredibly fresh with hints of rose water. If you like this type of dessert you will love this. I can’t say enough how fresh...

**EDIT: Apparently my 4 star review is not good enough for the managers/ owners. Your response is exactly the problem that we had with the Manager who was rude and condescending and obviously I should change this to a 1 star review. If they dont know how to manage a shift change in a 10 table restaurant then maybe they shouldnt.

REGARDS

Went on Sunday for lunch. We had a waiter which told us he was new, and we were understanding of that. He was great.

The food was in my opinion, very good. We ordered the sampler app. Which came with only 2 pitas, and then they charged us $2 a pita... a bit expensive if you ask me!

We ordered the falafel bowl, excellent. Schnitzel plate, very good, Regular shakshuka, very good, and the arais pita, which I loved the meat mixture and french fries were great!

Where we started to have issues is right when we were ordering deserts... we ordered a malaby, and their challah bread pudding. The waiter told us that it would be 15 mins for the bread pudding as its made fresh. I thought that was fine and was happy to wait! We got the malaby right away. It was very good.

Suddenly, the waiter disappeared, one of the managers did come up to check on us but never once brought up our MIA waiter. We waited about 30 minutes at an empty table for the bread pudding and saw one coming out, and it was taken to a table which still had plates. The guests seemed confused, as were we since we had been waiting 30 minutes by that time.

Anyways, bread pudding came, it was good. We asked for the check, more waiting as the manager forgot to bring it to us. Then the manager became confrontational with my brother when he went to remove the auto 18% gratuity. She said that she was unable to, and then was argumentative.

I gave it 4 stars because the GM was apologetic, and our first waiter was very kind, and good. The floor manager dropped the ball pretty badly.

Its pretty pricey so I expect a higher level of service. Maybe Aventura location...