Cafe Cienfuegos, Cuba; 14 Nov 09

Nobody goes to Cuba for the food. In restaurants the choice is generally chicken, fish or meat and the meat is usually pork. You get some salad (good) and some vegetables cooked English ie over-cooked (bad). And for dessert it always seems to be flan. But the Cafe Cienfuegos is different.

The wife and I went to Cuba courtesy of Travel Editions. We’ve used them several times for tours in Italy and they’ve been good. We thought we’d try them for Cuba since we wanted to go before it changes. Because with Fidel gone and the rest of the revolutionary leaders old and a new man in the White House change there must surely be.

We were in a group of 11 plus a local guide and an excellent driver. And it was tremendous fun although perhaps 10 days was enough. It was a bit like an Agatha Christie crime story only it wasn’t about murders but who would get the next bad stomach. We numbered a doctor and a dentist, 3 ‘consultants’ and a couple of IT geeks. Photos available on request.

Cuba was exactly as expected but more so. The old cars are still there, everywhere, and it has many of the trappings of a communist country. But it’s also Spanish and Caribbean which means that it’s neither quite like the old Eastern Europe nor China before it started to change.

Cuba has colour and music and on the streets, although it’s not exactly like your average European country, there’s enough fashion to tell you that the average urban Cuba knows what’s current elsewhere in the world despite the state domination of the media. However there’s no free press, the TV is ostblok standard and the internet where it’s available is dial-up slow.

The clue to the food is in the country-side: limited mechanisation and continued state domination of the sector so that despite apparently fertile land it imports food and doesn’t do variety. And why it does not offer the bounty of the Caribbean Sea beyond just ‘fish’ and lobster I do not know.

But the Cafe Cienfuegos is something else. It’s in the Club Cienfuegos which is a yacht club and would fit  anywhere in the Caribbean or the Mediterranean. It’s classy, elegant and has a great position. My guess is that many of its patrons come by sea rather than walking from the Hotel Jagua which we did.

The food, service and ambience were simply first class. The waiters spoke fine English and interacted with humour and dignity. The food was excellent. Most of us had steaks (after 5 days away we needed red meat) and although not exactly Aberdeen Angus it was very tasty and had ‘good bite’. And to wash it down, wonderfully, there was a selection of wines at European restaurant prices. The Casillero del Diablo (one of my regular tipples in the UK) went down a treat.

And whilst we’re at it. As long as you look there are good eateries elsewhere in Cuba. We also enjoyed Don Tomas (a Welsh restaurant?), an excellent top-end cafe in Vinales, and the Cafe del Oriente, seriously fine dining, in Havana.