Bowled Over by Miami’s Cuban Restaurants

It was bound to happen.

The “yupscaling” of ethnic food that took place in Louisiana and the American Southwest was sure to hit Miami. Foodies and chefs are finally discovering the homey pleasures of Cuban cooking.

But celebrity has its price. After decades of enjoying mountains of Cuban food at embarrassingly modest prices, Miamians have begun to pay as much for a bowl of black bean soup or a plate of maduros (fried sweet plantains) at a trendy boutique restaurant as they would for an entire meal at a neighborhood haunt.

Perhaps it should come as no surprise that one of the hottest new restaurants in town is Yuca, which stands for Young Urban Cuban Americans or, depending on who you ask, the edible yucca. But Yuca’s not just a place for affluent Latins. Affluent Anglos drop by, too.

Smoky, noisy, chic and populated with the Rolex, diamonds and leather miniskirt crowd, the restaurant serves up eclectic Cuban in a storefront setting. Where Miami’s mom-and-pop Cuban food restaurants are strictly butcher block and linoleum, Yuca is white tableclothes, contemporary art and monumental flower displays. The cost of such high-falutin’ fare doesn’t come cheap: Dinner for two with wine will easily run $100.

Yuca is in a swank Coral Gables storefront and, though expensive, it is worth the dollar to those who can afford it.

Like a sort of culinary Columbus, Yuca chef Douglas Rodriguez charts a course between traditional Cuban cooking and nouvelle eclectic. What results are fabulous, as well as eye-popping, presentations such as conch tamales, malanga gnocchi and dolphin in a crisp plantain crust. The restaurant’s namesake appears in a dozen different incarnations: yucca croquettes, yucca blinis with caviar, even a chilled soup called yuccassoise. But when it comes to black bean soup and arroz con leche (rice pudding), Rodriguez does the right thing: He still follows his mother’s recipes.

Given Miami’s ethnic nature, it’s not surprising that Cuban food should figure so prominently in its culinary landscape. According to the Miami Herald, more than half of Dade County’s 1.8 million residents are Hispanic, and the lion’s share are Cuban Americans.

Miamians gobble up masitas de puerco (fried spiced pork) and tostones (mashed fried plantains) the way Texans devour burritos and Los Angelenos down decaf cappuccino.

Cuban food is Miami soul food: uncomplicated, down-home, sturdy and filling. And like most of the cuisines of the Caribbean, it reflects the tastes of the island’s diverse settlers.

Cuba’s first inhabitants, the Taino Indians, laid the foundations of the cuisine, growing starchy root vegetables such as yucca (manioc root), malanga (an acrid flavored root) and boniato (Cuban sweet potato). The preferred seasoning was achiote (annatto seed), the rust-colored spice responsible for the hue and flavor of modern arroz con pollo (chicken and yellow rice). Taino cookery survives to this day in ajiaco, a rib-sticking stew made with yucca, malanga and boniato, meats and annatto.

The Spanish introduced sugar cane, pork, chorizo (spicy sausage), olive oil, the banana and its harder, starchier cousin, the plantain. African slaves brought okra and yams and a fondness for chili peppers and starchy pastes, such as funchi (Cuban polenta) and fufu (mashed boiled green plantains).

Most Cuban dishes start with sofrito, a fragrant mixture of fried onion, garlic and peppers. Meats are usually marinated in mojo (lime or sour orange juice, garlic and oil). Cuban food is not for the diet-conscious. The preferred cooking method is deep-frying.

Another of the new, price-plumped Cuban restaurants is Victor’s Cafe, opened by the owners of the famous New York restaurant by the same name. The fare isn’t all that different from the food at a mom-and-pop eatery. It just seems that way, served by tuxedoed waiters in uptown surroundings of a soaring atrium, barrel-vaulted skylight, rushing fountains, candlelit tables and enough potted palms to fill a Babylonian garden.

Strolling guitarists, live mambo music and a piano bar conspire to make this one of the noisiest restaurants in Miami. Carnivores have a field day feasting on palomilla (smokily grilled shell steak), lechon assado (marinated roast suckling pig) and ropa vieja (skirt steak braised to fork-tender shreds with tomatoes, bell peppers and garlic). You know you’re dining uptown when a commonplace flan sports a flower painted in chocolate sauce. French creme brulee has nothing on Victor’s exquisitely creamy crema catalana. Here, too, dinner for two with wine will run $80 to 100.

While tourists are often more than willing to foot the bill for trendy, most Miamians would argue that Cuban food was never meant to be expensive.

They favor homey neighborhood restaurants such as Ayestaran. Three bucks will fetch you a Cuban sandwich, a sort of cold-cut submarine pressed and cooked in a device that looks like a giant waffle iron. Big spenders can drop $14 on the langosta Ayestaran (spiny lobster with onions, peppers and tomatoes), but most of the daily specials are priced at less than $5.

Monday brings ajiaco criolla (meat and root vegetable stew), Tuesday picadillo (ground beef stewed with olives and pimientos), while higados de pollo (chicken livers with sherry) is served on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. But whatever you order, save room for a dessert of torrejas (fried bread in star anise syrup) or bunuelos (figure-eight-shaped doughnuts made of yucca dough). Aware of the reputation of many Cuban restaurants on this count, Ayestaran’s management makes cleanliness a point of pride. The butcher block tables are immaculate; the silverware arrives in a sealed plastic pouch.

Most people drive right by Las Islas Canarias the first time they come to dine. Located in a nondescript storefront, in an equally nondescript strip mall, “Canary Islands” (as it translates) is easy to miss. It’s not until you taste the papas espagnolas (freshly fried potato chips), sopa de platanos (meaty plantain soup), the crisp chicarones de pollo (chicken cracklings) and soothing natilla (egg pudding) that you understand why the waiting line for a table here forms early and lasts for most of the night.

Islas Canarias serves what is arguably the best home-style Cuban food in Miami: tender boiled yucca with garlicky mojo , and Camarones enchilados (shrimp in a sonorous Creole sauce).

Daily specials range from harina con cangrejo (a rich crab-and-cornmeal casserole) to chilandron de chivo (goat stewed to fall-off-the-bone tenderness in tangy red wine sauce). The pudin de pan (a custardy bread pudding) and tocinillo (yolk-rich flan) demonstrate the supremacy of Cuban desserts. The best news of all is the price: Two can eat themselves silly for $15.

You never know who you’re going to meet in La Esquina de Tejas. Former President Ronald Reagan lunched here in 1983. The boisterous “Texas Corner” may be the only Cuban restaurant in the country where you can order a bottle of Chateau Lafite to accompany your arroz con pollo.

The voluminous menu has something for everyone: el especial del presidente (a full-course dinner of roast chicken, fried plantains, black beans and rice, flan and espresso), tasajo (shredded dried beef in an oniony tomato sauce) and even fufu (a starchy paste of boiled plantains, garlic and pork cracklings--a dish you may have to be Cuban to enjoy).

Desserts range from dolce de leche (a curdled milk caramel--yes, it’s supposed to be curdled) to the ubiquitous flan. La Esquina is a homey restaurant, with tables draped in red oil cloth and counters lined with stools. And almost everyone speaks English.

No survey of Cuban food in Miami would be complete without one establishment on Calle Ocho (S.W. 8th St.--Miami’s “Little Havana”). Most of the restaurants are tourist traps serving blah steamed table food in theme park surroundings.

Versailles isn’t my favorite Cuban restaurant in Miami, but the menu does offer two special dinners designed to acquaint neophytes with Cuban cooking. “The Classic” features picadillo --roast pork, sweet plantains, white rice with black beans, boiled yucca, ham croquettes and a tamale. “The Criollo” includes ropas viejas, fried spiced pork, tamale, croquette, plantains, black beans and yellow rice. In keeping with the name, this sprawling luncheonette boasts a baroque decor of mirrors, sconces and chandeliers.

About 15 minutes west of Versailles, on the west end of Little Havana, El Palacio de los Jugos (“The Juice Palace”) isn’t, properly speaking, a restaurant. It’s a produce market with a couple of picnic tables out back. There are no tablecloths, no waiters, no wine list and only three items on the menu. But to come to Miami and miss the arepas (grilled cheese on cornbread--a Colombian dish), sopa de mariscos (soulful shellfish soup) and pan con lechon (audibly crisp roast pork sandwiches) would be a little like visiting Agra and overlooking the Taj Majal.

This colorful market also offers a crash course in Cuban ingredients: The shelves are piled high with guavas, atemoyas (sugar apples), sapotes (a round brown fruit that tastes like a date) and dozens of other tropical fruits and vegetables. Try them in juice form for $1 a glass, or order a green coconut, which a vendor will open with a machete.

Homemade Cuban desserts are displayed in a revolving refrigerated carousel. For the ultimate sugar rush, wash them down with a glass of guarapo (freshly squeezed sugar cane juice).

Where else can you eat your way around Cuba without ever leaving the United States?

GUIDEBOOK Finding Miami’s Best Cuban Food

Ayestaran Restaurant, 706 S.W. 27th Ave., phone (305) 649-4982.

El Palacio de los Jogos, 5721 W. Flagler St., (305) 264-1503.

La Esquina de Tejas, 101 S.W. 12th Ave., (305) 545-5341.

Las Islas Canarias, 285 N.W. 27th Ave., (305) 649-0440.

Versailles, 3555 S.W. 8th St., (305) 444-0240.

Victor’s Cafe, 2340 S.W. 32nd Ave., Coral Gables, (305) 445-1313.

Yuca, 148 Giralda, Coral Gables, (305) 444-4448.