MIAReview
photo credit: Mike Butler
Ember
This spot is Permanently Closed.
Included In
Certain creative endeavors could benefit from having someone in the room who is willing to say no - like every DJ Khaled album ever. “Sir, maybe you only have to scream your name once per song,” is a sentence our ears wish happened at some point. Instead, we can’t turn on our car radio without feeling like Mr. Khaled has burst through our rear windshield like the Kool-Aid Man.
Ember could have used a voice like that too - someone to say no to designing a restaurant that looks like the bachelor pad of a Las Vegas Keebler elf, or fire-roasting lasagna just because it sounds cool. But this place feels like the result of a brainstorming session where every idea was given a big fat yes. And what we have now is a restaurant where nothing really makes any sense.
photo credit: Mike Butler
The first thing you notice when you walk into this Design District spot is everything, all at once - like being woken up by a 300-person marching band. There’s no room to focus on the details because everything is screaming for your attention at the same time: the wooden curves that line the mirrored ceiling, the wavy brown and white stripes on the floor that make you dizzy if you stare at them too long, and the giant sculpture in the middle of the dining room that looks like the Stranger Things monster if it was made out of repurposed driftwood.
The surfboard-sized menu is also a bit overwhelming. Ember calls itself a “wood-fired American bistro” and serves random things like savory beignets, roasted cornbread custard, lasagna, fried chicken, and a handful of steaks ranging from $49 to $125. We’re totally cool with a menu that takes some Shyamalan-esque twists, and if Ember’s food was undeniably great, then maybe we could even forgive some of the sensory overload. But it’s just not.
photo credit: Mike Butler
Those NOLA beignets are overwhelmingly cheesy and after two bites, it just tastes like you’re taking shots of warm pimento cheese. The steak burger is better without its bun, which is denser than styrofoam and almost tastes stale. The fire-roasted lasagna needs to borrow some cheese from the beignets and is nowhere near as exciting as it sounds on the menu. And other dishes come to the table room temperature at best, which isn’t what you want with Oysters Rockefeller or roasted cornbread that’s supposed to be custardy in the middle.
It’s not all bad here. The smoked fried chicken is awesome - it’s super crunchy and comes with Haitian-style spicy pikliz. And if you’re a dessert person, the Maduro cream pie is fantastic and topped with a charred meringue that’s taller than the pie itself. But as good as those two things are, it’s not enough to really make us want to come back here - just like how even a few good verses can’t make up for four minutes of DJ Khaled screaming nonsense into our ears.