Mark Militello
James Beard Award-Winning Chef Mark Militello
James Beard Award-winning chef Mark Militello is often credited with putting South Florida on America’s culinary map. Militello is recognized for creating contemporary cuisine that has Italian, Asian and Caribbean influences.
Militello opened his first restaurant, Mark’s Place, in North Miami Beach, Florida in 1988 and Mark’s in the Grove. It earned rave reviews and just two years later, Food & Wine named him one of the “10 Best Chefs in America.” In ensuing years, he operated four other namesake restaurants in South Florida: Mark’s Las Olas in Fort Lauderdale, Mark’s Mizner Park in Boca Raton, Mark’s South Beach on Miami Beach and Mark’s City Place in West Palm Beach.
Locally, Militello is revered as one of the “Mango Gang” – a group of Miami area chefs who revolutionized the South Florida dining landscape in the late 1980s. They featured flavor-forward food sensibility that married modern and classic cooking with chef-driven menus that changed daily and showcased tropical fruit, regional vegetables and fresh local seafood.
Militello was the opening chef for Prezzo. He served as Chief Consultant and Executive Chef for Zach Erdem’s 75 Main restaurants in Delray Beach, Florida.
Currently, Militello is a restaurant consultant and is providing his expertise to Josie’s Ristorante in Boynton Beach, ZErdem in Greenport, NY and Blu Mar in Southhampton, NY. Militello is credited with positioning the Eastern Long Island restaurant brand as one of the hottest destinations in the Hamptons, featured on Serving the Hamptons on HBO.
A Texan by birth, Militello studied pre-med at Marquette University in Milwaukee and earned culinary degrees from Florida International University, as well as New York State University. In addition to the James Beard Award for “Best Regional Chef” in the Southeast, he received two “Golden Dish” awards from GQ magazine and a “Distinguished Restaurant Award” from Conde Nast Traveler, among other prestigious accolades. Militello resides in Boca Raton with a beloved dog. He has two talented daughters, Margo and Molly.
