Mirra

Mirra's premise is a specific collision: Mexican and Indian flavors run through the same dish until you can't cleanly separate them, and the kitchen trusts you to keep up. The crispy scallop taco with green curry is gone in two bites and stays in your head for days — that's the whole strategy working as intended. The barbacoa biryani takes it further, juicy lamb sealed inside a roti like the dish forgot which cuisine it belongs to. Charred cauliflower salad holds its own against both.

The room doesn't try to compete with the food, and it shouldn't have to. It's small, plain, a little under-decorated for what's coming out of the kitchen — but nobody's staring at the walls once the plates land. Bring people who want to argue over what's in the salsa, not people who want ambiance.

Multiple national recognition lists have caught on, and the city's Michelin guide backed it with a Bib Gourmand. The kitchen's cooking picked up a James Beard semifinalist nod for Best Chef in the Great Lakes region too. None of that is the reason to go. The reason is a menu that keeps making two cuisines argue with each other and keeps winning the argument.