08/28/2026
There’s something very Shani about putting a tomato on a plate and expecting you to pay attention. At , the Jerusalem-born chef’s new Miami Beach restaurant, that confidence extends well beyond the namesake fruit. This is a celebration of ingredients in their most honest, unapologetically simple form. Fire, tahini, olive oil, vegetables, meat. Not much hiding behind technique for technique’s sake. The simplicity is the point.
If Eyal Shani’s name doesn’t immediately ring a bell, his restaurants probably will. Along with longtime partner Shahar Segal, they operate more than 50 restaurants around the world, including the famously rowdy HaSalon, Michelin-starred Shmoné in New York, and one of our favorite fast-casual stops in Las Vegas, Miznon.
They also share another unmistakable Shani signature: menus that read somewhere between dinner instructions, poetry and the thoughts running through a chef’s head.
“Cabbage cake melting into itself.”
“Hamachi sashimi, the way we do it in the Middle East.”
“Freshly baked 4 spicy instruments that swirl your soul.”
You get the idea.
Hummus Gargirim
So, naturally, we went to see what Naked Tomato was doing for Miami Spice, where $50 gets you three courses and a pretty convincing introduction to Shani’s universe.
Then there’s the Charred Beetroot, described, appropriately, as being “torn apart violently but carefully,” before coming to rest on horseradish cream.
Bag of Green Beans tossed in lemon-garlic vinaigrette. The beans might be the better introduction to what Naked Tomato is trying to say. They’re deliciously simple, bright and barely messed with. A vegetable allowed to taste very much like itself. Of course, staying entirely on the Spice menu would require more self-control than we possess.
The Fire Roasted Eggplant Carpaccio arrives smoky and spicy with tahini and tomato seeds.
And then: THE ORIGINAL WORLD FAMOUS BABY CAULIFLOWER. Yes, the menu screams it at you. The cauliflower seems to demand the attention too. Give it what it wants.
For the main course, Miami Spice moves into Shipudim, or skewers. There are Chicken Thighs billed with the kind of nostalgia Shani does so well, ten
