Venue Review: Mez

EpiCentre, 210 E. Trade Street

More info about the restaurant

Mez works hard to be cosmopolitan. Really hard. Maybe too hard.

The food at this eclectic place is often excellent, but focusing on it can be challenging. Don't take my word for it. Listen to a server: “It's like a Super Target in here, a little bit of everything. I'm sure we've got a tire section somewhere.”

It's a little tough to find, for one thing. The uptown EpiCentre is massive and you need to get upstairs to get to Mez. It's not always clear, depending on your approach, exactly how to do that. Once in, you face quite an array: lounge, bar, five-screen movie theater, main-level dining room, upstairs loft/dining area/nightclub and assorted hallways.

Of course, that's also part of the place's urban charm: One Saturday, with an hour's wait for a table for two at 9:40 p.m., a thumping dance beat perforated the dining room from the upstairs lounge, girls in sequins sailed into the movie theaters (just a few steps from the restaurant) and a tableful of what seemed to be professional cheerleader-dancers howled at each other's jokes and nibbled from each other's plates.

So if it's the cuisine you're wanting to concentrate on, consider going early in the evening for dinner, or early in the week, or maybe for lunch. Then you can better appreciate silky miso-marinated black cod, or grilled hanger steak with truffle fries, or grilled ahi tuna with roasted cauliflower.

Chef Klime Kovaceski (klee-may koh-vah-chess-key), who polished his reputation at Miami Beach's Crystal Café for a decade before becoming a restaurant consultant, is at the helm here. His lineup boasts international influences, and his plates lean to the overflowing. (Seriously, when's the last time I couldn't finish a plate of pork? Never, that's when.)

A starter of hummus, roasted-pepper salsa and bright tzatziki, with warm wedges of pita, is a great first plate, though the abundant salads are a fine choice, too. Skip heavy gnocchi but try the Illegal Bread at least once, a Croatian concoction of phyllo encasing a mix of cheeses.

There are skewers (not bad) and pizzas (not good), new school (sliders) and old school (escargot) – and that's just in the small-plates category.

Entrees run the gamut from lasagna to broiled prawns stuffed with goat cheese and wrapped in banana leaves. The prawns were wonderful; the gnocchi beneath them paled in comparison.

Steaks and chops include venison with blueberry glaze (Kovaceski's sweet tooth shows often), and 10 side dishes are offered, a nice changeup from the usual four or five. Still, I'd prefer the other categories were winnowed a bit and execution perfected.

To get up to the restaurant from the box office area inside the entrance, you take an escalator flanked by what I'm told are horsehair walls. Once inside the dining area, black walls and tables, tweedy-padded chairs and crystal-dripping light fixtures give Mez a nighttime feel.

The dining room offers views to the kitchen and bar area, where you can order food to eat at your movie, if you desire (and get a beeper to let you know when it's ready). You'll also see an intriguing chandelier of bottles of liquid; I want to make this chandelier at home, and yet I can guarantee this would not be a good idea. In fact, trying any of Mez at home isn't be a good idea: It's designed, top-to-toe, for a meal “out” – and it's best you take it that way.