La Pecora Bianca Picks Coral Gables for Its First Restaurant Outside New York
La Pecora Bianca, the Italian restaurant group with nine New York locations, has opened its first restaurant outside the city at The Shops at Merrick Park in Coral Gables, with 300 seats and dishes cr
CORAL GABLES — The steady flow of New York restaurants into South Florida continues. La Pecora Bianca, the Italian restaurant group that opened its first location in Manhattan’s NoMad neighborhood in 2015, has opened at The Shops at Merrick Park in Coral Gables. It’s the brand’s first restaurant outside New York, the Miami Herald reported on Nov. 2.
The group runs nine locations in New York City, including Midtown, SoHo, Bryant Park, the Upper East Side, the Upper West Side, the theater district and Lincoln Square. Founder and owner Mark Barak told the Herald that he chose the Gables deliberately.
“We’ve been very deliberate about where La Pecora Bianca goes next, and Coral Gables felt right,” he said. “There’s a real appreciation here for restaurants that are beautiful and energetic but also become part of people’s everyday lives.”
A Big Room for a Mall Restaurant
The Coral Gables restaurant is large. According to the Herald, it seats 300 diners indoors and outdoors, with a wraparound bar seating 20 and a separate dining room for private events.
That size says something about the strategy. Brands that expand to Miami often start in Miami Beach or Brickell. Barak is betting instead on a Coral Gables shopping destination with a steady stream of shoppers, office workers and nearby residents, which fits his goal of being part of “people’s everyday lives.”
“We wanted this restaurant to feel unmistakably like La Pecora Bianca while creating something that really belongs in South Florida,” Barak told the Herald.
New York Favorites and a Few Miami Originals
Culinary director Ed Scarpone leads the kitchen and built a menu that mixes the brand’s best-known dishes with new ones for Miami. Regulars from New York will recognize the vodka rigatoni, whipped ricotta, chicken vodka parmesan, tiramisu for two and a dish called Too Much Fried Mozzarella, the Herald reported.
Other dishes include cacio e pepe arancini, linguine vongole, campanelle al limone and fusilli giganti, along with seasonal salads and Neapolitan-style pizzas such as a black truffle and ricotta pie and a Diavola with vodka sauce and hot honey.
The Miami-only dishes include a giant carbonara raviolo, lobster spaghetti fra diavolo and a tomato and melon carpaccio.
The bar program leans Italian and aperitivo-style. A Spritz Bar serves drinks like the Portofino Spritz, with cucumber, gin, St-Germain and prosecco, and there’s a rotating cocktail menu that includes an affogato espresso martini.
Hours and Details
For now, La Pecora Bianca is serving dinner only, from 4 to 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and 4 to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday. Lunch and brunch will be added later, according to the Herald. The restaurant is at 360 San Lorenzo Ave., and reservations are available through La Pecora Bianca’s website.
Part of a Busy Season for Miami Dining
The Coral Gables opening is one of several notable restaurant arrivals this fall. Gordon Ramsay’s Lucky Cat Steak, an Asian-inspired steakhouse in the former Lucky Cat space at 119 Washington Ave. in South of Fifth, is set to open Nov. 25, Time Out Miami reported. Ramsay told the outlet that Miami “deserves a restaurant created specifically for Miami.”
In Brickell, Hai Hospitality is previewing Uchibā, chef Tyson Cole’s izakaya concept, with happy hour pop-ups at Uchi Miami and Uchiko Miami Beach through Nov. 15 ahead of a winter opening at Mary Brickell Village, according to Premier Guide Miami.
Why It Matters
For Miami’s food and hospitality entrepreneurs, La Pecora Bianca’s arrival shows how competition is changing. Well-funded out-of-town brands are no longer clustering only in tourist areas. They’re also moving into the neighborhood shopping centers where local operators have long served regular customers.
That puts more pressure on independent restaurants to stand out. It also suggests the Gables has become a proven market for full-service dining, which matters to landlords, suppliers and hospitality workers. A 300-seat restaurant means a large staff and a big ongoing supply order.
For diners, the math is simpler: there’s one more place to get vodka rigatoni, and it’s a short drive from Ponce de Leon Boulevard.