This celebrated Miami chef closed all his restaurants. Now he’s got a new spot in Wynwood
Brad Kilgore became one of the best chefs in America for his singular vision at an experimental restaurant in Wynwood before closing during the pandemic. Now, he’s ready to collaborate to return to the dining world.
Kilgore, a finalist for the 2018 James Beard Award at his landmark restaurant Alter, has partnered with the Broken Shaker cocktail bar founders to open a restaurant inside the Arlo Wynwood hotel, MaryGold’s.
The restaurant, what the group is calling a “Florida-inspired brasserie,” is an evolution for Kilgore. At Alter, he became known for using advanced cooking techniques and combining unexpected flavors to present a progressive tasting menu that was a biography of the chef’s skill. Now’s he’s hoping to write a best-seller.
“I don’t just get excited putting garnishes on with a tweezer,” Kilgore said. “I asked myself, ‘Can I still create that level of excitement without putting 10 things on a plate?’ The answer is yes.”
MaryGold’s is less about an immersive, exclusive experience. The key word he is using is “approachable:” using fewer ingredients, presented more simply, but, he hopes, with the same insight that made him one of “Food & Wine” magazine’s Best New Chefs in 2016.
It marks a new chapter for Kilgore, now 36.
The success at Alter led him to first experiment with more approachable restaurants at Ember and Kaido, a pair of restaurants he opened in the Design District. At Ember, he applied his skill to create his version of a steakhouse and at Kaido, a Japanese-inspired menu.
He closed all three for good during the pandemic — and that, Kilgore said, was by design. None could deliver on the kind of restaurant experience he wanted, simply by staying on life support doing takeout and delivery.
He became the culinary director at the Concours Club, a private race track in Opa Locka, with a restaurant that serves the wealthy clientele. He also was in demand as a kitchen and restaurant designer, and planning dining events with his over-the-top cuisine for clients like Harry Winston and Ferrari. It let him step out of the day-to-day kitchen for the first time since he was 15 and reevaluate what he wanted to do as a chef.
He also learned to become a father. He and his wife, Soraya, had a son, and she closed her whimsical Design District soft serve ice cream spot, MadLab Creamery, to focus on being a mom. Together they sought a different path.
“My definition of success shifted,” he said.
But he was always plotting a return to restaurants. This time, starting with MaryGold’s, is going to be different, he said, than what he did in his six years at Alter.
“I was proving something to myself at Alter,” he said. “I felt like we peaked. We couldn’t push any further.”
Instead, at MaryGold, he’s leaning on what he learned at Ember and Kaido, making food approachable – read: easily recognizable and not named like artwork. It’s less Soft Egg, his signature dish at Alter (sea scallop foam, truffle pearls, Siberian caviar). And more like his pimento cheese beignets from Ember, an addictive crowd pleaser that still used his knack for combining flavors.
You can already see it in the MaryGold’s menu — it opens with beignets with jerk oxtail. From there, it’s again a mix of approachable with Kilgore’s flair. The Chicken & the Egg (there’s the cute name again) is a young chicken smoked over hay and served with French Perigord truffle sauce. There is a Florida Clambake served over north Florida grown grits, green chili butter and charred coriander leaf.
Part of the appeal of MaryGold’s was working with Gabe Orta and Elad Zvi, the partners responsible for 27 Restaurant, Broken Shaker and Hoja Taqueria in Miami Beach and Margot wine bar in downtown Miami.
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“I’m not a control freak. I enjoy working with other great minds because they keep my juices flowing,” Kilgore said.
MaryGold’s is just the beginning. A chef with Kilgore’s skill still yearns to create an intimate dining experience, the kind he crafted at Alter, using lessons he learned working at Michelin three-star restaurants like Alinea.
He has closely held plans for a restaurant he envisions as “the next step to Alter.”
But whatever that is, it’ll be a version reflecting the person Kilgore has become.
“I have a few tricks up my sleeve,” he said.
MaryGold’s
Address: 2217 NW Miami Ct., Miami
Info: https://arlohotels.com/blog/hello-wynwood/
Opening Nov. 18
This story was originally published November 16, 2022 at 4:30 AM.
