MiamiNights - Miami Night Clubs, Nightlife

So let me set the scene for you. It's Monday afternoon and I am doing the regular 9-5 like the rest of the free world when all of the sudden I find out I have a slew of vendors from out of town that want to treat me to dinner. Obviously I invite four of my coworkers since I know the vendors are going to flip the bill. Now comes decision making time where do we go. I call all the major places Prime 112, Wish, Smith and Wolenski’s and it’s a no go. I felt like Patrick Bateman trying to get into Dorsia. So we decided to go for Nobu at the Shore Club on South Beach. Perfect, the plan is now in motion and its time to get a decent schedule going. I go ahead and call Nobu to get reservations and while the times where a bit out of the way, 7pm and 10:30pm, they were more than happy to take my reservation and my credit card number for a party of six. Like all major restaurants they like to hold reservations with cards just so every Tom, Dick and Harry doesn't call and fill out the restaurant with bogus reservations. So while I am waiting for my co-workers to arrive it seems the vendors show up a little early to the Shore Club. Now here is where the story gets interesting. As you walk into the Shore Club you can find Nobu straight out the main doors of the lobby and to the left. When you walk in the room you will notice that to your immediately to the right is Ago. You really don’t notice that Nobu is a couple of feet forward and to the left. It seems that when you are walking in the hostess at Ago likes to steal business away from the boys over at Nobu. The two people that I was meeting out there were ushered into Ago and it was explained to them it was "ok, don’t worry about your reservation, it’s all the same." When I show up 5min later and I found out that they sat them in the Italian restaurant. I had to walk over to Nobu and cancel the reservation that I held on my credit card and if I would have forgotten that would have been a nice charge of $50.00.

So enough with the back story onto the review of Ago. If you are going for romantic setting this is and isn’t a great place to go. That all depends on if you are actually doing dinner or going to have a drink at the bar. Ill explain, as soon as you walk in there is a long bar that you have to bypass to get to your table. The bar is quite dull and the space is tight. There are tables directly on the other side of you. When you have dinner if you get a table on the outside of the restaurant you have a nice view of the pool in the shore club. I would have to say that added to the ambience but the lighting was disturbing...they were going for dim romantic lighting instead it was just hard to read the menu. One positive thing about the location though its proximity to the Nobu Lounge. A great little bar right outside the dinner area. The drinks are expensive but the very modern surrounding with a total splash of South Beach flavor.Enough with the ambience already lets get onto the main dish, the food review. As an appetizer we tried the “Caprese” and the “Fried Calamari”. The Caprese is about enough for 2 - 3 people. For what you pay for it you might as well go to Macaroni Grill for dinner, just poorly prepared and a real stale taste. As for the main course I had the Gnocchetti alla Sorrentina, a gnocchi with tomatoes, basil and buffalo mozzarella. The presentation is very lacking and they also saturate the gnocchi in a thick red sauce which doesn’t compliment the meal in any way. Some of the other things that were sampled around the table with usually an indifferent reaction was the "Ravioli di magro in salsa porcini," basically a long name for Veal Ravioli with porcini sauce. The rib-eye steak was nothing to rave about either. I can say that the service was excellent though and the turn around on meals and drinks was outstanding. Maybe next time I try to head out to Nobu, I won't get scammed at the door and I can review it for you guys.