Following the success of our Starchefs NYC episode, Flavors Unknown and Symrise joined forces again to bring you another Starchefs panel discussion. This time around, we sat down with four rising stars of Miami's food scene for a wide-ranging conversation about the hospitality industry, culinary creativity, and the impact of social media on the bar and restaurant business.
Our Starchefs Miami guests for this Flavors Unknown podcast were:
Ivan Barros, CEO of snacks and co-owner at Magie Wine Bar
Karla Hoyos, executive chef and owner at Tacotomia
Carmen Ibarra, chef and co-owner at Atomica
Valentino Longo, mixologist and owner of the Vice Versa cocktail bar
One Word To Describe the Miami Culinary Scene
We kicked off the discussion with a simple question: What's one word that summarizes the Miami food scene for you?
Chef Carmen Ibarra serves up modern Peruvian food at Atomica in MIA Market. For her, Miami's restaurants and bars are "on fire, in a great way." The Miami native said, "Right now, there's so much movement happening. I've lived here my entire life. Definitely seeing the growth in this industry and the people that are making it happen."
For Ivan Barros, the self-described CEO of snacks at Magie Wine Bar, the word is sazón: "I think it just embodies the energy, the excitement—obviously, the seasonings—but I think the cultural diversity of Miami." Barros grew up in the 305, but his career took him away from the city for about a decade. When he returned, "I was blown away...Everybody's really pushing each other forward, pushing the scene forward, and really putting Miami on their back. I really love it."
Tacotomia's executive chef and owner, Karla Hoyos, picked "blooming" to describe the growth of both "the super million-dollar investments" and "these amazing local small business owners that are bringing to the city great food, great flavors, great hospitality."
Valentino Longo, the creative mixologist behind the Vice Versa aperitivo bar, said Miami's drinks and bar scene is "united...there are so many new cocktail bars, so many restaurants up-and-coming, and I feel like we're really close to each other."
One Word To Describe Your Restaurant
The panel had a slightly tougher time when asked to come up with a single word or flavor to summarize their restaurants. For Carmen, "That kick in your face when you have a bite of ceviche...I don't know how to describe that into one word as a flavor, but that sensation of that power of a bite and making sure that that's in all of the dishes, but in its own unique way."
Karla had a similar feeling: "For me, it's bold, because the food I make at Tacotomia is mostly about my heritage, about where I come from, about what I feel."
Ivan, however, pivoted away from the single-word summary to describe the overall concept at Magie: "We wanted to bring something that we felt like Miami didn't have, which was a big focus on a lot of tinned fish. Very low intervention service...The menu, you'll come back in two weeks, and everything will be very different. Very tapas style, very snacky."
Related: Starchefs NYC 2025 Panel Discussion: Authenticity and Inspiration
What About Creativity?
The conversation shifted to the topic of creativity and developing new menu items and cocktails. "For me, the most important thing is storytelling," said Valentino, describing how he starts the process of inventing new drinks. He went on to explain that Vice Versa is a bar inspired by Futurism: "An artistic movement from the 1930s...they really were the first graphic designers in Italy...They actually did a cocktail menu...they opened a restaurant and cocktail bar as well. One of those menus had very interesting cocktails, completely undrinkable, but very interesting."
Those undrinkable cocktails included a red wine and Campari concoction garnished with chocolate and parmesan, and a potent potable combining "milk, pepper, chili, liqueur, cherries, and vermouth." The quest to make something appealing, modern, and drinkable inspired by that collision of ingredients led Valentino to "a barrel of red wine reduction with coconut sugar and cherries. Then, instead of pepper and honey, we use a spicy guava and a tiny bit of mezcal and a tiny bit of pineapple, which is the local touch. At the end of the day, it's a red wine, spicy margarita, but you're starting from a concept."
Karla described how the creative process typically starts outside the kitchen: "It's not that I'm like, 'Okay, I need to create a new dish. Let me think of this.' No, it's that I taste a flavor somewhere, or I see something, [and] I'm like, 'Boom, I can mix this and put my salsa here, and that's my new dish.' That can happen at 10:00 AM in the morning, and I want to run it at 5:00 PM at night because that's how all chefs are."
Ivan agreed, "Usually it just comes like Chef Karla said, you could be out somewhere. You go to a friend's restaurant, you have something you've never had before, and you're really excited about it, and you're like, 'How can I incorporate this into my restaurant, or my concept, or my cuisine,' but not lose yourself in the process? It's very difficult."
Carmen spoke to the importance of memories in driving new dishes, using one of Atomica's signature desserts as an example: "Our dessert in Peru, a dessert that's meringue is meringue with manjar blanco, which is Peruvian dulce de leche...We wanted to do our own twist...Trying to utilize meringue and manjar blanco, but we decided to do a dehydrated meringue, and have the elements there, but in a unique and different way. Then, adding the cherimoya ice cream, which of course is Peruvian fruit. Having all the flavors there that would make anyone happy or a Peruvian be like, 'Okay, actually, yes, I know what this is,' but when you look at it, they're like, 'What am I eating? You can't call this meringue.' "
Social Media, Mocktails, and More...
In the audience Q&A session, the Starchefs were asked how they engaged with social media. Karla mentioned an influencer post about her tacodillas that inspired a massive 150% sales bump: "It was amazing...It also exposed all of our flaws, because nobody is ready to go from that to 150% up in a day or triple in a weekend...It's good, but it can also be negative."
The cautionary tale resonated with the rest of the group, though Ivan also noted that social media can allow chefs to engage with ideas and concepts they otherwise would never see: "There [are] restaurants that I follow in Australia...I admire what they're doing, and I've never had the chance to actually try it, but at least I can see it through social media and get an idea."
Catch the entire 80-minute Starchefs panel discussion, covering a wide variety of topics including the rise of mocktails and the overall state of the Miami food scene (overhyped or best-in-the-US?) at Flavors Unknown & Conversations Behind the Kitchen Door. There, you'll also find many other podcasts featuring Emmanuel Laroche, Marketing VP at Symrise, and a man with a tireless passion for the latest trends and innovations in the American culinary scene.
Listen to Emmanuel's conversations with chefs, pastry chefs, bakers, and mixologists all over the US, including more group conversations like the Starchefs NY panel discussion.
For more insights about Miami's 2025 food scene and food innovations, contact the Symrise team.
