Cotoa does extraordinary things with cacao - Review - Miami - The Infatuation
"Cotoa is the best Ecuadorian restaurant in Miami. This is both true and a severe understatement, considering you can count all of Miami’s Ecuadorian restaurants on one hand. It’s more accurate to say that Cotoa is one of the best restaurants in Miami, because it gives ordinary pantry staples the flowers they deserve. Over and over again, Cotoa reinvents traditional Ecuadorian dishes the chef grew up eating. Whether or not you, too, grew up with Ecuadorian food, dinner here will feel simultaneously comforting and electric, like being swaddled in your childhood quilt on the peak of Mount Everest. So many of the ingredients on display—plantains, rice, cassava—are staples in the vast majority of Miami pantries. photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC photo credit: Cotoa photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC Pause Unmute Seco de pollo (a chicken stew with fried plantains) turns into tortellini. It’s seven summersaults and three connecting flights away from the original dish, but the tomato sauce, plantain-injected pasta, and bits of chicken keep the essence of the original vision alive. Same goes for the mahi mahi manicero that has the peanut flavor of jipijapa ceviche, but takes a tropical detour with coconut and ginger added to the mix. The creative twists don’t just end with the familiar. Cotoa takes this same ingenious approach with unexpected ingredients. photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC video credit: Julia Malave photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC Pause Unmute This kitchen has about as many uses for cacao as there are commands in a Bop It. The extract is used to make a honey drizzle for cassava croquettes and an infusion for a lime iced tea infinitely superior to an Arnold Palmer. It’s converted into ice cream, and then its nibs are sprinkled atop the very same scoop. You know those sticks of palo santo your yoga teacher uses to try and reorient the minds of Miami scammers? Here, it’s whipped into butter, made into yet another remarkable ice cream, and its ashes are used as a garnish. In their hands, certain ingredients feel limitless. Your brain may start shooting emergency signals to your wallet when you see watermelon radishes chopped into symmetrical matchsticks, and perfectly congruent beads of oil. But you won’t have to worry about that. It’s a reading nook of a restaurant, with rainbow banana lamps, warm terracotta walls, and a basket of socks for sale by the front door (emblazoned with bananas, of course). It’s all as accessible as the kitchen counter where you first met these ingredients. Food Rundown The menu at Cotoa changes frequently, but here are a few examples of the kind of dishes you might find here Humita De La Abuelita You’ve probably smelled palo santo in between sun salutations at your yoga studio, but at Cotoa, you get to taste it. There’s palo santo extract in the butter, and those black specks on the humita are its ashes. It tastes exactly how it smells, and the woody flavor pairs beautifully with this fluffy corn loaf. photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC Wahoo Salsero This is less about the fish and more about that Crayola-yellow passionfruit sauce underneath it. It’s acidic, sweet, and by the time you’re finished, the plate will look like it passed through a carwash. photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC El Pincho Hanger Steak Order this. It’s big enough to share with three people and is topped with a dense forest of chimichurri that tastes like a close family member of tomatillo salsa. To call the potatoes that come with it “a side” would be an injustice. We’re not sure what magical fryer they possess, but the inside eats like potato purée, while the outside has a deafening crunch. photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC Any Ceviche If you’re here with a big group, get it all. Cotoa is making some of the best ceviche in Miami. We can’t guarantee the mahi mahi manicero or shrimp ceviches we had during our last visits will be on the menu, but we can say that any concoction they come up with will take up the next 17 entries in your diary. photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC Cangrejada The rice, plantains, and crab are layered like a casserole. It’s a thoughtful construction that lets you get an even spoonful of sweet, savory, and tomato sauce heaven in every bite. photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC La Tonga Are the prawns smoky? Yes. Is the coconut sauce pleasantly thick? Yes. Does it make the perfect hearty meal for a late 2:45pm lunch? Undoubtedly. photo credit: Ryan Pfeffer Banana Rum Cake This faultless banana cake topped with caramelized coins of banana is a glorious ode to the fruit this restaurant is obsessed with. We’ve never had the same side of ice cream twice with it, but even if they make it with birch wood (we wouldn’t put it past them), it’s going to work. photo credit: CLEVELAND JENNINGS / @EATTHECANVASLLC" - Mariana Trabanino
