August Birthday Month Celebration, Part 2: Miami, Family & More Florida Adventures

Florida Living LIfe

Julie and Jamie continue their August birthday celebration with a trip to Miami, exploring South Beach, visiting Aventura Mall, dining at Fo

Key takeaways

• The couple had mixed feelings about staying in South Beach due to the hotel experience and missing iconic attractions like Ocean Avenue and Versace's mansion.
• Fogo de Chão stood out as a top dining highlight, despite causing dehydration from salty meats and rich sides.

Main topics

• Miami travel experience
• Restaurant reviews (Fogo de Chão, Red Pine, Cheesecake Factory)

Notable quotes

"We stayed in South Beach for the night. And South Beach is not what it used to be when I was 27 years old."

"Fogo de Chão was really good. Let's talk about that."

Conclusion

Julie and Jamie reflect on their memorable, albeit imperfect, Miami adv

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:00) Welcome to Florida Living Life, where nothing is off the table. Not the food, not our stories, not our marriage moments we probably should not say out loud. We are Julie and Jamie, living the second slice of life under the Florida sun. Eating everything, laughing Speaker 1 (0:17) too loud. And Speaker 2 (0:18) telling the truth, even when we probably should just smile and nod. We start at our own kitchen table. Then we hit the restaurants across the Sunshine State. meeting people, tasting Florida, and stirring up just enough trouble to keep it interesting. Speaker 1 (0:34) If it's real, we share it. If it's delicious, we dive in. If it's awkward, well, that's the best part. Speaker 2 (0:42) So pull up a chair because this is Florida Living Life and Speaker 1 (0:45) truly, nothing is off the table. Welcome everyone to the next edition Speaker 2 (0:48) of the Florida Living Life podcast. My name's Julie. Speaker 1 (0:51) My name's Jamie. Speaker 2 (0:52) And here we are once again, living the second slice of life under the Florida sun. Tell us about the trip that you planned to Miami. Let's talk about that. Well, Speaker 1 (1:03) that trip for Miami was supposed to be a good trip. It turned into about a five and a half out of 10. I did not like the hotel. We stayed in the Hotel Balfour. Speaker 1 (1:19) The staff was amazing. They were nice. They did everything right as they could have, which was fine by me. It's just I felt like I was staying in a motel. But hey, guys, we stayed in South Beach for the night. And South Beach is not what it used to be when I was 27 years old. Speaker 1 (1:42) almost double that i Speaker 2 (1:44) think the main problem was is that we didn't go down to south beach we just stayed on the outskirts you know you missed out on like walking down i Speaker 1 (1:52) guess ocean avenue Speaker 2 (1:53) you missed the whole thing about you know walking past versace's mansion and news's cafe like all those iconic places okay Speaker 1 (2:03) well then you know we have to do that we missed that we should we should walk down do it But that was the first time we've been to Miami in several years. And... It wasn't what I expected, but Fogo de Chão was really good. Let's talk about that. Speaker 2 (2:20) Let's talk about Fogo de Chão. Fan favorite. One of my favorite restaurants right now. I mean, I know the next morning I woke up and I was so dehydrated because it's very salty, some of those meats. But I loved the buffet. Loved that buffet. And I love the meats. What about you? Did you like it? Speaker 1 (2:40) It's a great place. It's the only place I'm probably going to eat a buffet in. And in one of the buffets in like Las Vegas in one of those high-end luxury hotels like the Bellagio or Mandalay Bay or something like that. But it was really good. Speaker 2 (2:54) It was really good. Really Speaker 1 (2:55) good pork over there. Just to let you guys know, really good pork. Speaker 2 (3:00) Well, a lot of things were really good here, wasn't this? The polenta was good. The bananas were good. They make these fried bananas that are really delicious. We had, oh, I love the popovers. They make these gluten-free popovers that are delicious. They Speaker 1 (3:16) were really good also, yes. I forgot about those. Speaker 2 (3:19) Yeah, and they made this mushroom soup with, oh, my God, it was so good. The soup was so delicious. Speaker 1 (3:26) Oh, I didn't have that. Speaker 2 (3:27) It was so good. And then they had these, like, the. I think that's why I was so dehydrated. I ate all these olives and cheese and just the most delicious things. And then what about this cheesecake that you got? Speaker 1 (3:40) Cheesecake was good. I think it was a caramelized cheesecake, I think. I don't know really what it's called. It was really good. Yeah. You know Speaker 2 (3:49) what? As we're talking about this, I had to go back into the pictures because every time we go out to eat, I take a picture. And so I'm going back to my pictures and I'm looking at the food and and like what we did. OK, so after that, when we left in the morning, we had like didn't we have like multiple arguments about where we were going to go? Speaker 1 (4:11) Yeah. You know, Julie wanted to go to Brickell. I didn't want to go to Brickell. The traffic in Brickell is like horrible. That's what I heard. My friend lives in Brickell down the street from Saks, Fifth Avenue. And so we decided not to go there. And we decided to go head towards home. And then for whatever reason, I still don't know why I did this. We got a hotel. Boca Raton. Well, Speaker 2 (4:39) let's talk about the Aventura Mall first. Oh, I'm sorry.