Havana Good Time

Cohibas, mojitos and a whole lotta communism. That would sum up our trip to Cuba in a nutshell. And the food? Mojitos, duh. Kidding. Kind of.

Cuban food is delicious - lots of meat, seafood, platanos and that beans and rice dish you guys probably all have seen. And a lot of the food is fried. So really, you can't go wrong.

But of course, what would a "Food While Traveling" blog post be without a detailed description of airplane food?

I love Delta. I'm always upgraded on its flights. Even though Delta's points redemption is awful (seriously? 90,000 miles to Caracas? Really? I might as well go to Africa on Star Alliance), I love the upgrades.

{Oatmeal & Coffee in the Lounge in ATL}

Ugh. No mimosas. So I had 3 screwdrivers. What am I? A 19 year old college student? Well, I was flying to Cancun...so why not. I guess I can forgive them because they gave me a Twix bar too. 

Cancun's airport has a Bubba Gumps, Johnny Rockets, and CALIFORNIA PIZZA KITCHEN. You can see the pizza below looks NOTHING like what you would get at one of the restaurants, but we also know how much I love pepperoni pizza while in transit.

I really thought Cubana would have served us medianoches, coffee and mojitos, and maybe cigars (even though you can't smoke on flights), but all we got for our hour long flight was a lame bag of salty snacks. As Becca would say, "this is the WORST part of communism". 

One mojito, two mojito, three mojito, four. And repeat for a week. Below is a tribute to every mojito we had during our trip. 

Breakfast depended on where we were staying. One morning, we swapped some CUCs for Moneda Nacional (at a rate of 1 to 25), and got some coffee and a Cuban version of an egg mcmuffin for breakfast. All for less than a dollar. 

{Beats my usual oatmeal for breakfast!}

Sometimes we had freshly squeezed juice. But we always had fresh fruit! 

After watching Anthony Bourdain in Cuba and reading our Lonely Planets (yet another instance of where we should get royalties from LP), we all knew about the paladar "scene". Paladars are privately run restaurants, usually in people's homes. This was actually illegal for a long time, since privatized businesses were not allowed. I don't think they are illegal anymore though. Paladars serve all kind of authentic dishes. We made a pact to never order the same thing on the menu. 

{Infamous Rice & Beans}

{Roasted Chicken}

{Pork}

{Ajiaco - similar to the soup we had in Bogota!}

{Fried Pork}

{Fresh shrimp and...not beans and rice but plain rice}

{Platanos}

{Lobster. For $10.}

What about snacks? Oh, I thought you'd never ask! We like traveling because it gives us an excuse to eat snacks at any time of day. 

{A lot of cafe con leche} 

{Coppelia's Ice Cream}

{Iced Chocolate at Museo del Chocolate}

{Batido del Helado}

{Senorita del Chocolate}

{Sandwich con Queso y Jamon}

{Sandwich con Queso y Jamon, una mas}

{Sandwich con Queso y Jamon, again}

{Guava Ice Cream Topped with Bananas}

{Bocadillas!}

{Tandem Ice Cream Sandwich}

{Strawberry Ice Cream with Chocolate Pieces}

On our last night, we had dinner at one of the nicest restaurants in Havana (according to LP). 

{Is That Hummus? Yam Fritters & Hummus}

{We Love White Asparagus}

We ended our night with a daiquiri at La Floridita - the bar that INVENTED the daiquiri. Our waiter had the foresight to give me the one with the pink straw.

Out of all of these things, I'd say my favorite things were the iced chocolate drink, all the fresh juice, and that humongous lobster tail. I can honestly say I did not have a single bad meal in Cuba. Or maybe all the mojitos numbed my taste buds brain cells and I just couldn't tell.