With buttery empanadas (try the steak chimichurri and the shrimp scampi) and salads full of good things, I can see why they know Dianna’s name here (I think they will soon learn mine).

Here, she gestures how she cannot be contained by a small salad bowl (Whitmanian multitudinous wisdom):

I ordered the superfood bowl as well, with quinoa, edamame, raisins, and broccoli to propel me through the rest of the day, inspired by conversation about Dianna’s cultural interventions and plans for picnics.

After work, I stopped by the Casablanca Fish Market to find sashimi to place atop mandolined Daikon radish from my farm box this weekend,

and Jess helped me eat the soft tuna and the crunchy, translucent radish,

while Pilar declared her allegiance to my favorite appetizer: crostini with fresh goat cheese, overripe tomato slices, and good salt (my friend Laura brought me this black salt that tastes mysterious and important).

Fresh goat cheese tastes of Spring (this is from Thomasville, Georgia’s Sweet Grass dairy), and we welcomed the season into the Magic Cottage kitchen.

Two wise women in the chairs across, another I’d met for lunch, and my day was full of questions and catching up, planning and preparing, pesto and pasta, cauliflower, chocolate, and choices…

Related posts:

1. spinning in the sun
2. while my butter gently weeps
3. slow food miami dinner at creek 28

The food is as satisfying as the great typefaces in the logo, and Pilar tells me everything is made in the restaurant:

My favorite is the “americana” empanada—smoked panceta, mozzarella, and plum—and Pilar and Juan’s mother both approve of my choice, as it is a traditional Argentinian combination.

The empanadas can be ordered baked or souffléd; cleverly, each is stamped to distinguish the type.

I think my regular order will be two empanadas (an americana and an onion) and a dulce de leche pastelito. As I’ve discovered, the only way to improve the caramel-like goodness of dulce de leche is to warm it inside a crispy pastry shell.

Many congratulations to Pilar and Juan on their new restaurant and being small business owners.

I now plan to bring all my Miami visitors to Half Moon so I can order dulce de leche pasteles—er, so they too can experience this heavenly empanada shop.

Half Moon Empanadas, 1616 Washington Avenue, Miami Beach, FL 33139, 305.532.5277 (delivery in South Beach)

What’s your favorite empanada? Any you’d suggest as new flavors for Half Moon?

Related posts:

1. with the greatest of ease
2. they put a woman on the moon
3. the sun shone brighter than doris day