Miami restaurateurs find fertile ground in Atlanta

In the past year or so, I’ve noticed a lot of Miami in my Atlanta.

I reviewed three notable restaurants with Miami origins between October and April: Necessary Purveyor, Ghee Indian Kitchen and Füm. Another Miami-based hospitality group, the Restaurant People, opened a glitzy rooftop bar called the Jagger Suite at the Moxy Atlanta Downtown hotel in March. Rosetta, an Italian bakery chain from Miami, opened in Buckhead last year.

Even local chefs have found inspiration in Miami, seen in the Grant Park restaurant Birdcage and the chicken dinner pop-up Wyld Bird, which takes over some evenings at Home Grown in Reynoldstown.

So why have we seen such a large influx of South Florida flavor? And is this influence good for the local restaurant scene?

I had the Miami invasion of Atlanta on my mind when I went to South Florida for vacation in March. The similarities between the two cities immediately became obvious as I stared at taillights on I-95 after leaving the Fort Lauderdale airport and heading south to Miami.

The Atlanta and Miami metro areas are almost identical in terms of population — about 6.4 million people, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Both are driving cities with a serious car culture, where intense traffic is a fact of life. And both are vibrant, diverse, multicultural hubs that have been steadily growing for years.

From a business perspective, it’s not a stretch to see Atlanta as Miami without the beach. Alan Roth, operating partner of the Restaurant People, said his team decided to invest in Atlanta without knowing that other South Florida groups had made the same move.

But the Atlanta dining scene has traditionally been hostile toward celebrity chefs and external restaurateurs. Natives view Atlanta as a cultural capital in its own right; we’re sensitive to any out-of-towners with an attitude that says, “Let me show you how it’s done.”

Among this new crop of Miami-based chefs and restaurateurs, I’m happy to say that I haven’t caught a whiff of that pretentious outlook. At all three places I recently reviewed, the restaurant leadership had boots on the ground in Atlanta. They source local ingredients and have built relationships with Georgia farmers. They’re excited about Georgia’s diverse local agriculture and more varied seasonal produce.

The group of recently opened, Miami-bred restaurants hardly overlap in terms of cuisine, but they all share a certain vibe. Each has a highly designed, intentionally curated atmosphere that fits their dining style. Their interiors imply that these restaurants are places to see and be seen.

“There’s probably nowhere else in the world that has a 12-foot disco unicorn,” Roth said with a laugh, referring to the centerpiece sculpture at the Jagger Suite.

But the designs of Ghee, Füm and Necessary Purveyor are more than skin deep; they’re as thoughtful as they are beautiful. Each establishment moved into new buildings as the first occupant of their space. Necessary Purveyor is set up to function as a market, sandwich counter and sit-down restaurant. Ghee’s open kitchen allows the scent of the kitchen’s custom spice blends to waft into the dining room. Füm gives diners a full view of their dry-aging chamber, pasta-making chefs and live-fire grill, all amid a stunning dining room.