CUBAN STREET FOOD | What locals eat in Cuba | Havana Travel Vlog

When are we going to get a Cuban sandwich?

Oh my God. No.

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It's our second day in Havana and today we're doing one of my favorite things to do in a new place, which is learn more about the country through their food. We're going on a food tour.

I'm super interested to see how today goes because we've heard very mixed things about the food here in Cuba. When we told people that we were going, some people said all the food's super bland, it's not any good. And other people sent us tons of restaurant recommendations and told us they had some of the best foods of their lives. So also today we are back with our favorite guide, Caesar.

Today we're going to be focusing a lot on the local Cuban street food which is all priced in the local Cuban peso. And apparently we were pretty lucky because I was just able to exchange our tourist money for 400 local Cuban pesos. But that's not always the case. It depends on where you go, who you talk to, whether or not you're actually able to do the exchange. Because technically the Cuban pesos are only for the Cuban people. So.

Caesar knows how to start a tour off right. We just got some coffee from this lady's house. She Literally just opens her window in the mornings and sells coffee and snacks to people on their way to work. How cute is this little clay mug? And this coffee is only four sips.

Ooh, I'm very sweet. The coffee in Cuba is very strong, and this one has a lot of sugar in it. It is delicious. I don't typically put sugar in my coffee because we drink so much of it, but whenever I do get it, I'm very happy. Is this the guava?

Guava plus bread.

Okay.

It's named pankon timba.

Pankon Timb. Okay. So in addition to the coffee, we also picked up a couple local snacks. It's bread with guava, which is a fruit.

It tastes just like bread and jelly, but this is super normal for me. I thought it was gonna be really weird having a piece of fruit on a piece of bread, but it's delicious. I love that we are starting with such a local experience. All of these local people on their way to work are just standing outside of this lady's house sipping coffee together. Saw one person brought their own mug to get filled up. It's so fun. So Cesar also ordered us pan con pasta, which is bread with pasta. So I definitely thought we were going to get a piece of bread with noodles on top. But turns out pasta kind of translates to, like, a spread. So it's a sauce that's made with hamonada, which is like a ham mixed with garlic, onions, peppers.

Oil.

Probably wouldn't be my first choice of breakfast food. However, it tastes like a really good pasta sauce. Like a meat sauce on a.

Good morning.

So we just came inside of a bodega, which, from what we understand, is a place where the locals can come to get basically subsidized food. Everybody gets a notebook, and you can.

Buy from here with. With using the not. You get some pros per person.

And for fun.

Gracias.

Corn, cinnamon. Okay. Salt and fried.

Okay. So it's just a big sugar, of course. Just a big sweet chip.

Yes.

There's a little bit of a negotiation that took place, I think. We didn't pay the local price. We didn't have any change.

But it looks delicious.

The lady that we bought it from, she said she had a master's degree in economics, what's it called?

And she also have a master at Chirico making chibircos.

Everyone in Cuba has a side.

Completely thrown the conventional order of eating out the window. We're starting with dessert first. This is actually a stop that we brought to the tour because someone recommended that we Stop at the chocolate museum.

And we're like, okay, so this place only sells chocolate milkshakes.

Oh, wow.

It is rich.

Also, before we stopped in here, we were recommended to stop at the churro stand that's just right down the street. And I think this is a very Spanish thing. Cuba has a lot of Spanish influence. And pick up some churros to dip in the chocolate milkshake.

I don't eat churros.

Wow, that's so rich.

I know.

Hello.

And these use for their pizza. Street pizzas.

Salt.

Salt.

Salt.

If it's traditional, yes.

I hope you like it.

Next stop is this pizzeria. We've seen several of these throughout the city. But the story of why street pizza in Cuba is so popular isn't the most beautiful story. It's basically because it's cheap. All you need is flour, water, tomato sauce, which there are a ton of tomatoes here and some cheap cheese, but that doesn't mean it's not good. Apparently you fold it and eat it like a taco.

It's delicious. Which is probably why we waited in line for about 10 minutes to get this. It's super popular, and now I see why I love it.

Wi fi, anyone?

The trick with this is you have to eat it fast because we are in Cuba, in the Caribbean, and it melts.

It's melting, and it's melting right now.

They call these frozen.

But there's more ice than cream to make it cheaper.

I'm a mess.

You paid for these? How much did you pay?

2 supi tusi.

If I was a tourist and I walked in, how much would I pay?

I think you will be paying two, Susie.

So since he paid, we paid 25 times less.

You're welcome.

I'm a mess.

There's a fine art to this because you want to eat it fast enough before it melts, but at the same time, you don't want to give yourself a brain freeze. Sorry.

All right. It's not even 12 yet, but when in Havana. Oh, that's so good.

Popsicle.

We passed the kid carrying a popsicle down the street. So we asked him where he got it, and he just pointed to this house, like, no sign or anything. So he just walks up to the door, asks for a popsicle, and can you guess what they used to make it with? It's the bottom of a can. He said it was pina. That's a nice popsicle.

So we are back at the same restaurant that we ate at yesterday, where we ordered rova, but today we ordered lobster and it's covered in Cuban sauce, which is tomato puree, bell peppers, and lobster herbs. This is actually a really interesting dish. It's completely opposite with a lot of the other dishes that we've had today. This is an old traditional food that's not really eaten as often anymore. And a lot of the other things we've eaten are not really traditional originally in Cuba, but they're really popular in this time. Here we go.

I think this is the best thing I've had since we've been in Cuba. This is so tasty. The sauce is so savory. I love all the herbs. It's not tough at all. It's really tender lobster meat. I think whoever told us that the food here wasn't good decided to be at the right places.

When are we gonna get a Cuban sandwich?

Oh, my God. You had to take a plane. You have to get to the airport. First of all, in order to get a Cuban sandwich, you have to go to the national airport, and then you go to Miami. And then in Miami is where you get the orino Cuban sandwich.

Apparently, Cuban Americans are the one that came up with the Cuban sandwich. It's not a Cuban thing at all.

Well, Cuban, but Cuban doesn't live in Cuba.

Right. It's not something that you'll find here in Cuba, except for maybe a couple of the touristy places, because so many tourists have come asking for it that they've actually started making it now. Don't ask for a Cuban sandwich. If you come here, they'll know you're a tourist, or they'll just always know you're a tourist anyway.

They smell it.

So we're currently witnessing something that's very unique here to Cuba. We're in a park, but a lot of the parks here are also known as WI fi parks, because if you want Internet while you're in Cuba, you have to buy these cards and then bring it to a part that has, like, you can actually see the routers on the building. And so you walk into some of the parks, and, like, everybody's just on their cell phone, and you'll know that you happened up on a WI Fi park, because this is one of the few places in the city where you're able to get WI Fi. And to get one of the WI fi cards, you have one legal option, which is to wait in one of the long lines and buy a car from one of the official shops. Or if you're walking around the park, you know how, like, people in other countries sometimes sell drugs and they're like, hey, you want some drugs here? It's like, hey, you want to watch our card so you can. You can buy them for a marked up price if you don't want to stand in the long line. But it's like kind of like a drug deal transaction here.

For our last stop, we are taking the local bus, which is really nice.

Apparently we jumped on one of the new ones, so it's costing us a grand total of $0.25 to get all the way across the city. Had we jumped on one of the older ones that are standing room only, it would have been like 2 or 3 cents.

New reapertus reopening. A new reopening in January 7th.

I'm so sad. What's today? Third?

Yeah, four days.

Oh, this is such a bummer. This is one of the places that I was looking most forward to coming. It's actually one of the places we requested to go because somebody sent us an email and said we have to come here. The man who started this restaurant was a Cuban. He moved to Italy, earned a Michelin star, and then gave it all up to come back here to Cuba and start cooking delicious bread for his people. And I was really looking forward to eating there.

One of the coolest parts of the it to me is like, when we showed the location to Caesar, he was like, are you sure that's where it is? And apparently he wanted it like in this area and not in, like, the nicer areas just so it could be part of, like, the local community. And I really wanted to meet him and get some good bread next time.

Okay, whoever comes here next, we're going to leave a link down below for where this restaurant is and come here and tell us how it is.

You have to come here for us.

Okay.

So there's a local and a tourist way to come to the most famous ice cream shop in all of Havana. There is a line that is like a mile long out on the street in the sunshine where you can pay to go into the local area. And in the local area you pay one Cuban peso. Like one local Cuban peso, just like you say, 5, 5, 4 or 5 cents. Or you can come to this little, like, tourist section that they have. And as you can see, there are very few people here and you can pay a grand total of 50 cents for the same ice cream. So 10 times the price. But still, by our standards, yeah, it's cheap and worth paying a little bit more not to have to wait in the sun. It's time to say goodbye.

And I feel like I've eaten enough sweets today to last me the rest of my life.

We said at the beginning of this video that we had heard a lot of mixed reviews about Cuban food. But I can definitely say everything we had today, maybe with the exception of the pan con pasta, was absolutely delicious.

We hope you enjoyed this video. Don't forget, if you want to get a delicious coffee from trade, use our link down below. Take the quiz, get matched up with the perfect bag, and if you're fast enough, you can get 50% off by using the code Karen, day two.

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This is awesome.

So messy.

I know. I don't know how you're supposed to eat this and look not like a heathen.

He's going to eat. It's hungry.

Ah, something full of my eyeball.

It's not very tough at all. It's super. It's not tough. It's super. I think it's off the tender.