At this new Miami Italian restaurant, there’s no menu, just a question: Carne or pesce?

When you dine at San Lorenzo, the new Italian restaurant in Miami that just opened near the Little River neighborhood, you need to answer only one question: Meat or seafood?

You don’t need to specify what type of seafood or how you would prefer that meat cooked. That part is up to the chef. For you, it’s carne or pesce. There is no menu. There’s only a choice — pasta with lobster and prawns, or a lasagne Bolognese — and once you make your decision, the kitchen does the rest.

The fixed price dinner for two at the cozy restaurant, which seats 44 indoors and 30 outside along a canal, costs $140 and includes a variety of bread and antipasti. Single diners have the same options for $70. If you’re up for spending more, there are dessert options, including tiramisu and profiterole, and a variety of wines and classic cocktails to try.

San Lorenzo is the second Miami concept for the 84 Magic Hospitality team, made up of Ignacio Lopez Mancisidor, Mattia Cicognani and Andrea Fraquelli. The group’s first restaurant, Cotoletta, which opened in the fall of 2024 on Grand Avenue in Coconut Grove, has a similar mindset: the only item on the menu is, fittingly, cotoletta (veal Milanese).

Opening Cotoletta was a bold move, and there were more than a few doubters, Fraquelli says.

“A few restaurateurs in Coconut Grove said, ‘I wouldn’t have given you a dollar for this,” he says.

But after seven months, the restaurant’s success proved his hunch: that people find comfort in familiarity as well as exemplary service and perfectly executed cuisine.

“The veal Milanese was the dish I was the most sure we’d be able to pull off, having only one item,” he says now. “I’m so proud and happy with how the community and customers have taken to it. They understand what we’re trying to do.”

Fraquelli considered the possibility of doing another one-dish concept at San Lorenzo, possibly only offering the lobster pasta, but instead decided to alter the options slightly.

“We decided there needs to be a degree of flexibility,” he says. “The idea is to come to our home, and we’ll serve you the things we serve friends and family. We’ll offer meat or fish, and if you trust us, we’ll take it away.”

The no-menu restaurants are the result of paying attention to the behavior of customers at Fraquelli’s restaurants in London. Over time, he noticed that the more frequently customers came to the restaurant, the less likely they were to deviate from what they loved best, whether it was their favorite menu item, favorite table or favorite server.

“That sowed a seed,” he said. “It wasn’t so risky to reduce the number of choices. It allows you to buy better products, have fewer sections in the kitchen, hire fewer people” — and subsequently avoid the price hikes diners love to complain about.

A smaller kitchen and fewer cooks means less expense for the restaurant (Fraquelli’s uncle Giulio Rossi leads the kitchen at San Lorenzo with two or three cooks). Buying vast quantities of one or two items — say, veal cutlets or lobster or prawns — means the product will cost less because you’re buying in bulk.

“This way we can aim for the highest quality ingredients,” Fraquelli says. “With things like the lobster pasta, if we were in a restaurant with a big menu, that would have the scary numbers next to it. I’ve seen people wrestle with prices. But when you come here, you’re not scared on any level. The price is free of surprises. Big menus need larger teams and larger kitchens, and that cost gets passed on to the guests.”

There are no plans as of now to alter the two pasta dishes. They’ll remain on the menu, and Fraquelli plans at some point to add a catch of the day. He has thought long and hard about adding a meat dish to the menu but eventually ruled it out.

“The steakhouses here are numerous,” he said. “They know what they’re doing. I have to be humble. I’d have to create something spectacular.”

One of the other differences at San Lorenzo is you can’t make a reservation online, not on Resy or OpenTable or the restaurant website. You have to do it the old-fashioned way: Call on the phone.

San Lorenzo

Where: 620 NE 78th St., Miami

Hours: 6-11 p.m. Wednesday-Sunday

Reservations: 786-828-7136

This story was originally published June 4, 2025 at 5:00 AM.