The Best Barbecue in Miami

The neon-lit entrance hallway hits you with subwoofer bass before you've seen a single menu, which tells you exactly where the priorities lie. COTE is a Korean steakhouse in Miami's Design District, holding a Michelin star, where whole cuts of dry-aged beef are displayed like sculpture before they hit your tabletop grill. The servers know the room cold, the banchan is thoughtful, and the kimchi Wagyu paella has apparently earned its own fan club.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. Eater 38 Essential Restaurants in Miami
3. Miami New Times Top 100 Restaurants

Beets buried under coals for eight hours is either an act of patience or a personality disorder, and at Francis Mallmann's open-fire Argentine steakhouse inside the Faena Hotel, it reads as both. The room commits fully: leopard-print booths, red cushions, gold on everything. The asado is serious, the proteins are large, and the bar at the far end fills with people dressed for exactly this kind of place.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Caribbean spices do the work that Texas smoke usually handles at this Coconut Grove barbecue spot, where the brisket runs 14 to 16 hours and the spare ribs come jerk-seasoned. The team also runs the fine-dining restaurants Kyu and Shiso, and the patience shows in the supporting cast too: collards, baked beans, cornbread made from fresh-shucked corn. The open courtyard under the hammocks makes a strong argument for ordering an old-fashioned alongside.

1. Miami New Times Best New Restaurants
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Miami Right Now
3. Miami New Times 2024 · Best Barbecue · Best of Miami New Times

A hulking beef rib crusted with salt and pepper, served in a warehouse the size of a small airport, is your first clue that this isn't Miami's usual scene. Pitmaster Bill Durney's Brooklyn original comes to the Miami Produce Center, where forklifts idle outside and the smell of smoke drifts past a long bar and open kitchen. The Michelin Bib Gourmand BBQ shop does brisket that would hold its own in Texas, with yucca bowls on the side for local color.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Tucked into a South Miami-Dade golf course in a way that makes zero sense until you smell the smoke, Apocalypse BBQ is a bare-bones barbecue shop with a no-phone, no-takeout policy and a cult following to match. The menu leans Miami: cafecito ribs, brisket bacon, wild boar burgers. The wait is long, the free beer while you stand in line is a nice consolation, and the skull-shaped cornbread drizzled with hot honey is not subtle about what kind of place this is.

1. Eater 38 Essential Restaurants in Miami
2. Miami New Times Top 100 Restaurants

The flan is smoked, which tells you everything about what kind of barbecue shop this is. Growing out of a Latin bakery next door, this is a counter-service spot making the case for what Miami barbecue actually looks like: ribs glazed with guava-ancho sauce, brisket rubbed with Cuban coffee, black beans baked with pineapple. The New York Times put it on their Restaurant List. The savory-sweet logic of the Latin American diaspora runs through every bite.

1. The New York Times The Restaurant List
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Miami Right Now

1. James Beard Awards 2023 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: South · Rick Mace