Smorgasburg Miami — Restaurant in Miami

I visited Smorgasburg on opening day. The New York Times has called the Brooklyn location "The Woodstock of eating." According to their website "Smorgasburg is the largest weekly open-air food market in America, attracting thousands of people to Brooklyn, Manhattan, Jersey City, Los Angeles, and now Miami, each weekend, to eat from hundreds of local vendors."

Smorgasburg come from the Swedish word smorgasbord meaning a wide variety of food. The market debuted in 2011 in Williamsburg and pioneered foods like the ramen burger, raindrop cake, and spaghetti doughnuts. Other locations subsequently opened.

I have read articles online that the Miami location of the market was opening in a "park like setting." Park-ing lot setting is more like it. It is a gravel area with absolutely no shade abutting Wynwood Walls. There is a parking garage a few blocks away and that is probably your best bet since there is a lot of construction in this area and the street parking is very congested. The market is open every Saturday at 11.

I got there when the market opened which is a good idea because by the time I left the line to enter wrapped around the block. There were approximately 30 food tents and several retail tents. SoJara was there selling their vintage concert T shirts and concert inspired clothing creations. I saw some familiar faces like Ms. Cheezious, Pink Love Donuts, Sinna Buns, and Bona Bona. Food and drinks included cocktails, beer, duck fat burgers, poutine, raw oysters, acai bowls, coconut cold brew coffee, pizza, lobster rolls, fried chicken, grilled cheese, babka, cookies, churros and ice cream, Philly cheesesteaks, and jerk chicken and shrimp. There were quiet a few vegetarian and vegan options like plant based burgers. S. Pellegrino was handing out free samples but I am not a fan of mineral water. The event is dog friendly with dog food items on some menus and giveaways and free samples for dogs.

It was 90 degrees with a feel like temperature of 95 degrees during my visit. The heat was pumped up because later on that afternoon a cold front came in. Still 90 plus degrees is a typical south Florida summer temperature. I walked around the market hoping to see find something exciting that I had never seen before like the aforementioned raindrop cake or some kind of unique Miami twist on food. After determining that the vendors were ones I was already familiar with or selling standard food I decided on the jerk place. Unfortunately by that time the line was long, in full sun, and no breeze. After 15 minutes and still not near the front I felt dizzy and had to give up.

I posted a lot of pictures with prices so you can see it is not inexpensive to eat here. For the same money I can sit inside air conditioning and not deal with crowds. Wynwood is filled with an embarrassment of riches of places to eat. Places where you can sit and use a real restroom. Smorgasburg set up picnic tables in the center but there weren't enough of them and their bathroom is gross port a potties.

This is the new hot thing in Miami so expect crowds. Would I try it again? Maybe if I didn't feel like I was burning alive and there were less people but this being Miami that is not going to happen. It is only going to get hotter every day here on out. I have a mile long list of restaurants bookmarked in Wynwood and would probably turn to that first before trying...

PSA: once upon a time Smorgasburg Miami was a great place. it had many fully vegan vendors and many vendors had plant based options, and it was a well run establishment.

I don’t expect the whole world to always have vegan food (it would be nice though), but I do want to warn others before making the trip Wynwood with this venue as a planned destination.

If you can get past the lack of options, which I did, because the one fully vegan vendor that was there was phenomenal. The main issue for me was hygiene and lack of cleanliness.

The bathrooms are porta potties with portable sinks, the bathrooms and washing facilities,which were not maintained or clean, lacked one major component, soap.

There was no where I could properly wash my hands, and even worse, no where that the people who are making your food can wash their hands either. I asked several people who seemingly worked there for soap and everyone shrugged me off. No one seemed to care that the food they were eating was being prepared by people who were not washing after using the restrooms.

I ended up using dishwashing detergent that I found hidden behind a garbage can to wash my hands (not super ideal).

Cleanliness and sanitary conditions are of the utmost importance. I find this completely unacceptable, and I will not be back.

With only one fully vegan vendor (who I advised she should maybe find another location) you are not missing much, also I am sure if vendors are not washing hands, I am positive they also are not putting attention or care into cross contamination from meat to your vegan dish (let’s face it, it’s just contaminated, since they don’t have soap there anyway).

But really is does not matter if it’s Vegan or not vegan, it’s gross, and no one seems to care, and that’s even worse.

Save yourself the trip and check out somewhere else in Miami instead. — feeling sick at...

Chinese new year weekend was probably not the best time to head to this particular area of Wynwood but we decided to go anyways.

It was PACKED and the lines were what you'd expect them to be. Add the blazing sun and the workers that are just over everyone and it's definitely a recipe for disaster. All things to be expected in an environment like this but one thing I kept seeing everywhere at every stand was workers that are serving food wiping the sweat off their face, coughing and sneezing, touching trash, all of this with no gloves and then instantly touching food afterwards...

I first noticed this at the dumpling spot, wish I had gotten the name of it but the lady was straight touching everything with her bare hand while her other hand had a glove on. Then proceed to restock food items with her bare hand. She noticed I was paying attention and promptly started using the hand with the glove but the damage was done by then.

I kept looking at other tents like the Filipino BBQ spot and then the elote spot and it was the same issues. If this was an indoor spot with proper station where you can constantly wash your hands and ensure that your hands are sanitized, then I wouldn't have minded. This isn't the case though. They should be more cautious and pay more attention to detail.

We got our dumplings and said that was enough for the day. The parking is always an issue here so be aware and yeah, bring your sun block and shades and know you're going to sweat with the long lines.

Try...