Zielo

Seriously? Over politics? If you really want to do something, do it!
–How do we get back at the Venezuelan government?”
— I know! we won’t eat at one restaurant in Miami over a RUMOR and give the restaurant a bad Unilocal review! Yeah! that will show them!
Awesome food
Awesome décor
Awesome service
A MUST.

I’ve been to this beautiful restaurant twice for dinner and have fallen in love with the food and décor. The décor is clean, simple and elegant. As for the food I have yet to try something I haven’t loved.
Appetizers: Bacon Wrapped Dates, Prosciutto & Mozzarella, New World Carpaccio (without the Tuna) and the Crab Cakes. ~ Each one gets two thumbs up.
Salad: Zielo Salad ~ The flavors go so well together and all of the ingredients were fresh. ~ Yum.
Main courses: Skirt Steak, Lobster with Champagne Risotto and Sea bass with Mushroom Risotto. The meat and seafood was were cooked wonderfully and the risotto was amazing. ~ Mouth watering.
The only issue I had at Zielo was with the service. During my 1^st visit the service was outstanding. Our server was knowledgeable of the food, attentive and helpful.
The server during the 2^nd visit was terrible. We (two people) got served by five different people, literally. We got appetizers before our the wine and I had to stop a waiter to find my server and to find out what happened to the wine we ordered. I had to ask for a steak knife to eat my appetizer, twice. There were four servers preoccupied with a soccer game instead of focusing on the dinning room. Yes, during the World Cup but be professional you are at work.
My suggestion to the restaurant is that the front of house manager needs to retrain the staff on standards, customer service and attention to detail.

Why are you going to destroy Miami’s economy over another countries political issues?! This isn’t Venezuela this is America. Go back if it bothers you. The food and service here is great. Whenever I pass by they’re usually packed. Your comments will not change it.

It is truly a shame that with all the negative reviews you are getting on Unilocal that you now do a bait and switch with Groupon by not honoring the promotion. We had a group of six people to dine today and only two of us had the Groupon. They are not helping their bad reputation, which just goes to reiterate «Chavistas all the way!!!»
Too bad, they’re loss, and we will certainly not be back as repeat customers as there are plenty of options especially in and around the Coral Gables area.

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Great place. good food good service. Nice staff

Politics, even in the most indirect of ways, tends to shit all over everything. I use Groupon like a poor person, and I treat it like a good way to discover restaurants I normally wouldn’t think of visiting. That’s what happened this time.
I found a pretty decent Groupon: an appetizer, two entrees, and two cocktails for $ 45 at a restaurant with a 4.5-star Unilocal rating. That’s a pretty solid rating, and I’ve never been let down by a place with such rave reviews, so it’s a no-​brainer. That was in February. Fast forward a couple of months, and we’re finally making our way there when we look again to Unilocal for directions.
3 stars. WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED?!
Immediately I started running through scenarios that could cause a place to drop from 4.5 stars to 3 in a matter of months. These were the most plausible scenarios I could come up with:
1. Cockroaches, rats, British cooks, or other unwanted lifeforms in the kitchen.
2. The manager touched literally every guest inappropriately.
3. Obama.
Neither of those were it, obviously, because they’re absurd. But the last one, «Obama», isn’t even that far off the mark. Why? Because the truth of the matter is this restaurant’s ratings dropped due to politics. POLITICS! It turns out I didn’t anticipate how bitchy Venezuelans could be. As the story goes, the owner of Zielo is the nephew of Luisa Estella Morales, someone I stopped giving a shit about after three sentences because her Wikipedia article was written in Spanish. They’re seething with rage because this guy shares 25% of his DNA with some politician they don’t like. How fucking dare he, right?
Listen, this guy doesn’t strike me as a commie. You don’t charge $ 26 for risotto if you’re all about the proletariat. You also don’t live in Miami (where it’s as risky as a transvestite living in Birmingham, Alabama), or open up a fucking restaurant where your target demographic would hate you if you actually were a commie. That’s like a skinhead moving to Harlem and opening up a hair salon. This isn’t Joseph Kony running a Chuck E. Cheese franchise, this is a guy whose aunt happens to be a judge.
So, as far as I know, he’s not some underground sleeper cell working diligently to communistize Miami on behalf of his aunt. You don’t see Jews boycotting Mercedes (quite the contrary) because Daimler AG made Nazimobiles and designed gas chambers. And no, it’s not because the name «Mercedes» throws them off thinking it’s named after some Hollywood producer’s Mexican housekeeper. «That’s because the people who did that don’t have anything to do with Mercedes-​Benz today,» you think to yourself. I know, I guess I shouldn’t hold someone liable for something they’re tenuously connected to just because I feel like bitching about something and use knee-​jerk reactions to do so rather than employ critical thinking for a few seconds. I’m such a stupid asshole.
The food itself was great. It’s a Mediterranean-​Latin-​seafood fusion style. As an appetizer we had the crab cake and bacon-​wrapped dates. The crab cake was on a bed of avocado, and we left no trace of either of those components by the time we were done with it. The dates were sick too. If someone told me I had to eat the flayed flesh of swine, curdled goat’s milk and enzymes, and tree sperm I’d think this was a challenge on Survivor, but it was amazing. As an entrée I had some ravioli and Dana had the grouper. Or, rather, I had ravioli and ¾ of Dana’s grouper, which had a side of mashed sweet plantain with what I could swear tasted like honey. We didn’t have a dessert because we’re doing some 30-​day no added sugar thing. Why? Because we’re experimenting with masochism to see if it’s a «thing» either of us have.
Communist bullshit rumors aside, all of the food exceeded our expectations, and it would’ve been even better if we didn’t have to share most of what was on our plate with everyone else at the restaurant. Overall, though, A+.
PEOPLE WHO WOULD ENJOY IT: Chavistas.
PEOPLE WHO WOULD NOT ENJOY IT: Only the most rational of people.

Amazing food. Great service and amazing place to watch the games. Food was beyond what I expected. Great place for lunch meeting. I will be back for sure. Look forward to doing my bday lunch here

BOYCOTT this place.
Built on money stolen by communist dictatorship. It would be like eating at Ghadafi’s Falafels or something like that.

Please support human rights. DO NOT give your hard earned money to the disgusting, corrupt people that own this restaurant.
Regardless of previous comments the restaurant management have not made any statements in any social media disputing their relationship to Luisa Morales … Their staff were also not instructed to respond callers questions regarding the matter…
With so many great choices in the gables, why not go to any of the other fantastic restaurants in the area?

DISGUSTING!!! Do not eat here. One of the owners is a Chavista Castro-​Comunist. I don’t even care if the food is good or bad this place was build with STOLEN money. If I were the Chef /​crew I will quit ASAP.

There are rumors circulating about one of the owners being the son of Luisa Estela Morales, who sits on the highest court in Venezuela and had a role in perpetuating chavista rule.
The rumors are just that: rumors. I have found more reputable sources suggesting that the owner in question, Gonzalo Morales, is her nephew, not her son. While I don’t know the specifics of the relationship (if any exists), I do know that you can find him on Twitter (@gmorales777) and see that he makes very public statements in support of the Venezuelan protesters, as well as retweeting and echoing messages from them and their supporters. Far from being a chavista, this guy is a public supporter of freedom in his country.
So… chill out. The steak here is awesome.

BOYCOTT this place.
Owner is a Venezuelan government official’s nephew – the same government that condemns even middle classes because they are afraid they will become oligarchs. The government’s propaganda against anything related to wealth or prosperity is a complete hypocrisy when members of the government have all of a sudden become extremely wealthy themselves – and end up opening places like this one.
SUPPORT VZLA #SOSVenezuela

Support Venezuela & don’t eat here. Owned by the nephew of a socialist jerk in the Venezuelan government — the people who are repressing the poor citizens of that country. Shame on you! Plenty of other great places to chow down in the Gables!

I love this place. Seeking a place for my rehearsal dinner and it was highly recommended so I went.
The décor is simply beautiful and the food was delicious. They serve you a small dish with nice soft bread slices along side some delicious garlic hummus. We had the Croquettes and the Short Rib Dumplings. OMG. The dumplings. Wow.
We also had a fabulous salad and a pasta which was just excellent.
For dessert — Bread Pudding. Holy cow! My fiancé doesn’t even like dessert and barely saved me a piece.
We were greeting by the owner and a hostess who were both extremely friendly and pleasant. Cannot wait to go back again! Very pleased.

Amazing food, romantic atmosphere and very good service. I ordered the grouper in mustard sauce and it was exquisite, it comes with a mashed of plantains and it was just the right combination. I can’t wait to be back.
My husband took me here for our anniversary and it was a hit. Love it!

Never going again

This is a beautiful place for a date night! I are here last night, a d as a Miami spice lover, decided to try the menu out. I ordered for starters pear filled pasta in blue cheese cream sauce (yum)! As a main course I had a braises lamb shank that was fall of the bone great, paired with risotto. The risotto was a tad undercooked, but the lamb made up for it ! In addition, the chocolate cake was similar to a brownie and I wouldn’t recommend it if you’re craving cake, but was velvety and sweet. We also ordered from the regular menu a prosciutto and mozzarella appetizer that was delicious and rack of lamb that was perfectly seasoned and delicious. The service left something to be desired and the place had a strange smell of urine at the front door. I would return but for the food but it’s not my first choice.

Many restaurants have graced (and disgraced) this venue. But not since the heyday of La Bussola has any brought us great food and a light, pleasant atmosphere until Willy Hernandez and this delightful restaurant. Zielo’s atmosphere is a pleasant, upscale change from heavy faux-​Mediterranean stone. White walled and lined with books or art, the 3 rooms are cheerful and pleasant.
The extensive menu features classics as well as some new inventiveness. There were two special fishes of the day and the Corvina with seafood and rissoto was excellent. Fetticuni with oxtail was al dente and rich with the beefiness of the shredded meat. The beef carpaccio and the tuna tartare were dellicious and nicely presented with greens for the carpaccio and plantain cups for the tartare. And the osso buco got raves. The service was attentive and respectful. We’ll be back.

Overall, it was a below average experience. We had 8:30 reservations on a Saturday night and we were surprised to find only 3 tables occupied. Two hours later the restaurant had 6 tables occupied and still slow.
Great décor. Very elegant and the ambience was great, especially for a romantic night. The service was slow and we waited a while for the check. We were thinking they wanted us to stay to make the place look busy. The dinner took a while to arrive and the rest of the evening took just as long.
We had the Cowboy Rib Eye, which I ordered medium and it arrived well done.
The Yellow Tail was very good, bones and all, but not exceptional.
Better places in the Gables to dine in, so skip it.

Willy is back in town! After a hiatus from Miami, Willy is serving wonderful and creative dishes. For appetizer we had the lobster crêpe. Presentation was beautiful. I did not know if the shaved apple would work with the lobster, but I was surprised at the unusual combination of flavors.
For dinner I had the stuffed ravioli with short ribs. Delicious, definitely will order again. My boyfriend had the Corvina with shrimp and a bed of asparagus risotto.
Not only was the food and service great, but the ambiance is beautiful. They spared no expense in creating an elegant and romantic atmosphere. Down to the beautiful plates and cutlery used.
I am looking forward to my next fabulous visit to Zielo.