Cooking in Cuba
One of our most favorite experiences in Cuba was cooking for our new friends in their home. Maria Rosa and Lerdo were the amazing duo couple (guide and driver) and became our good friends as they literally spent ten hours a day with us for a week! They are an adventurous pair and fellow foodies š (well, Zayan and Kapil are the fellows there).
One day, as Kapil was voicing his desire for spicy food, Maria Rosa mentioned that she had all kinds of Indian spices that had been gifted to her, but that she didnāt know how to use them. We all made a plan that Kapil and I would cook Maria Rosa and Lerdo an Indian meal (Moms please donāt laugh at us) at their home and the kids would get to meet their three dogs! We didnāt commit to a specific day, but knew it would be one of the last one or two days in Havana.
Well, as luck would have it, I was sick and our second to last day was spent as a rest dayāwhich meant that our final day was busy. We spent all day learning about the Mafia, rum, and Fusterlandiaās art. As we finished the dayās activities around 5:45pm, we discussed the menu for the dinner.
Our plan was to make homemade dal (lentils), rice, some veggies (we were craving them), and some sort of protein (Maria Rosa had some frozen fish at home). We went through the list of ingredients we would need, and Maria Rosa indicated whether she had them or not:
- LentilsāāYes. I have two kinds.ā
- RiceāāYes. Cuban rice.ā
- ButterāāI have some.ā
- GingerāāYes we can dig up the one that Mai gave us yesterday, when we visited her garden the other day.ā
- TomatoesāāNo.ā
- OnionsāāNo.ā
- GarlicāāNo.ā
- PotatoesāāNo.ā
- Other veggiesāāNot really.ā
- LemonāāI have a lime.ā
Ok great. We had a list. I knew it wouldnāt be as easy as it is in California to pick up these items at the local grocery store, but I was sure that we could get them in a matter of two or three stops. I told Maria Rosa the same and she looked at me and replied, āAila, this is Cuba.ā
We went to our first produce market (think of a farmerās market stall) and they had a few items but were closing up at a few minutes to 6:00pm. When we picked them up, and went to pay, they said that they were closed. I was pretty interested by their response, given that we had cash, there was no āregisterā that needed closing, and there were still a few more minutes to go!
Maria Rosa, Kapil, and I, then tried another market next door and bought a few items from our list, but they didnāt have much. However, at this second market, Maria Rosa did learn about someone selling potatoes, so we thought we would at least go and pick up some of those.
We drove for another few minutes and then Lerdo rolled down the window to ask someone on the street about āsomeone selling potatoes.ā The man replied that there was a person who was selling potatoes on the street corner here, but he ran away from the police a few minutes ago. What? If I didnāt know better, I would think that āpotatoesā was a code word for ādrugsā and that would all make more sense to me!
We turned the corner towards another market and parked by the side of the road and a man walked up to us very discreetly. I gathered that he was the potato man, but I didnāt see anything on him! He looked side to side and quietly asked what we needed. We shared the list with him. He acknowledged that he had some of these but not all of them. He disappeared for a few minutes and then came back. When I asked about the potatoes, Maria Rosa, Lerdo, and the man just told me that he will take care of it.
Potato man asked us if we wanted to come into the back of what seemed like a closed market. We agreed and walked over (the kids stayed with Lerdo in the car). We picked up the items that they had and bought at least $50 USD worth of groceries (we did buy a lot of vegetables, but the prices are very steep (i.e. 1 tomato is $1CUC/$1USD). Basically, the price of good produce is equivalent to the US farmerās market prices, except that American salaries (even minimum wage) are far greater than those in Cuba.
We got back in the van feeling pretty accomplished after three stores and an underground transaction. Feeling concerned that I would use all of their butter, I casually asked, āok so what about the butter?ā Maria Rosa and Lerdo looked at me and laughed saying that butter was in a completely different market on the other side of town and it would be closed. I decided we would work with what we have and cook in oil instead.
Before I move on, here were our Cuban learnings from the shopping experience:
- Cubans are not incentivized to sell āmoreā because the markets are not private. This means that they wonāt make that additional transaction even if it is a few minutes to closing hours. They also wonāt discount any produce if you are the last customer of the day or if the produce might go bad. There is no need to because there is not really any additional money to be had.
- Shopping for produce āundergroundā in Cuba is a serious business š
- Following recipes in Cuba means improvising with at least a few ingredients.
- You must plan ahead to cook specific foods in Cuba.
- Because you never know what each store/market will carry, most Cubans will need to go to 10+ places to get specific ingredients for recipes AND most Cubans donāt have carsā¦so that is a lot of walking.
At around 7:30pm we arrived at Maria Rosa and Lerdoās place. It was a clean, bright two-bedroom unit a t the end of a row of homes. You could tell that Maria Rosa took pride in their home and had redone their bathroom and were in the process of finishing the upgrade of their kitchen in the Cuban way (i.e. patiently waiting to see what tiles get imported, watching the cost of cement and buying as much as she can when the prices are low, coming back with overseas construction tools when they travel, etc.). The kids immediately started playing with the dogs while Maria Rosa showed us her spices and oriented us to her kitchen.
It was on! While Maria Rosa, Lerdo, kids, and dogs watched Despicable Me and Trolls (Maria Rosa knows every line), Kapil and I shared a cutting board and a small stove and made the following:
- Dal (with onions, garlic, ginger, and spices)
- Rice
- Salad (cucumber, onion, bell peppers with lemon, salt, and pepper)
- Garam Masala Potatoes
- Green Beans (lighter spices and onions)
- Fish and Garlic Shrimp (caught by Lerdo and frozen)
There was so much food (and sorry, but we didn't take any pics)! We fed a total of 9 people (seven of us and then Maria Rosaās mom and neighbor came too) and we still had some leftovers! Maria Rosa topped it off with amazing chocolate milkshakes for dessert and we got back to our Casa Particular (i.e. hostel) just before midnight!
This experience so perfectly summarized Cuba for me. It illustrated the Cuban way of patience, difficulty, flexibility, irritation, coupled with warmth, generosity, and family. This swirl of Cuban flavor is easily lost on tours, restaurants, and tourist cooking classes, but it was among the most precious experiences for me. Donāt get me wrongā¦there is enough to āexperienceā in Cuba with normal travel (i.e. in that most restaurants are in peopleās homes, and that there is so much to learn), but it is special to get an insight into local living. All to say, that memorable and enjoyable night was the perfect way to end an amazing trip.
The kids talk about Maria Rosa and Lerdo all the time and two weeks later, we still miss them! We look forward to hosting them one day in California. #global_family
Follow us on Instagram (@franklin_street_globetrotters) to see more of our highlights and posts from Cuba!
Cooking dal and green beans.
20 Likes, 5 Comments - Franklin Street Globetrotters (@franklin_street_globetrotters) on Instagram: "Every Cuban gets a ration card for a monthly allotment of food at their assigned Bodega (see next..."
40 Likes, 1 Comments - Franklin Street Globetrotters (@franklin_street_globetrotters) on Instagram: "The hardest part about leaving Havana is leaving our new friends, Maria Rosa and Lerdo! They are..."
