HaSalon Miami

Despite making its Miami debut with one of the most spectacularly stupid unforced errors in recent memory, HaSalon is among the better options for a dinner that feels like a big, loud party—especially in South Beach.

The Israeli restaurant has a sort of Jekyll/Hyde personality. Before 9pm, it functions as more or less a regular restaurant. The atmosphere is reasonably calm and it’s possible to hold a conversation with the person sitting across from you. After 9pm, the music gets louder, and as the night goes on, things evolve into napkin-waving, table-dancing mayhem. Needless to say, skip this place if that doesn’t sound fun to you. But the silver lining of HaSalon is that the food is actually decent for a clubstaurant.

To be clear, everything is way too expensive. And lots of dishes are rather mushy and lacking in texture. But there are some hits. The grilled local catch is perfectly cooked and has a super crispy skin. The “terrifying hammer” is a parmesan-dusted beef carpaccio, pounded thin in a tableside presentation that is both fun to watch and slightly damaging to the eardrums. It’s a strange, but unique, dining experience perfect for people who are ready to spend a lot of money on a dinner that feels like a wedding reception where everyone’s on ecstasy.